The Ultimate Football Thread 2013-2014 Vol. 4 EPL, La Liga, Bundesliga, Serie A etc

Grant Wahl reporting that England will play Ecuador and Honduras in Miami in pre-WC friendlies. Plans for a game with the US have fallen off.

I'm already looking forward to the London papers whining about Honduras' play. The internet griping when Honduras played Brazil a couple months ago was almost too much to take... :lol:
Crowd should be hot for that one.
 
I saw on another site that Smalling was wearing Red Bull cans and Jagermeister to be a Jagerbomb :lol:
 
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cs02132 said:
I saw on another site that Smalling was wearing Red Bull cans and Jagermeister to be a Jagerbomb :lol:
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That's what we were discussing a page ago or so....


You're a footballer for f sake! A public figure, representing a club...what a stupid and reckless move...smh
 
A youtuber put together a compilation of the top 50 goals in Barca history. A good watch for footy fans even if you're not a Cule or Socio... This list of the goals in spoiler mode below the vid.






The top 50 goals are:

50 — Hans Krankl Goal vs Anderlecht
49 — Lionel Messi Goal vs Atletico Madrid
48 — Ronaldinho Goal vs Werder Bremen
47 — Guillermo Amor Goal vs Malaga
46 — Txiki Begiristain Goal vs Valladolid
45 — Michael Laudrup Goal vs Real Madrid
44 — Ronaldinho Goal vs Zaragoza
43 — Xavi Hernandes Goal vs Real Madrid
42 — Lionel Messi Goal vs Manchester United
41 — Lionel Messi Goal vs Stuttgart
40 — Txiki Begiristain Goal vs Logrones
39 — Pep Guardiola Goal vs Atletico Madrid
38 — Luis Enrique Goal vs Espanyol
37 — Patrick Kluivert Goal vs AIk Solna
36 — Samuel Eto’o Goal vs Panathinaikos
35 — Alexis Sanchez Goal vs Real Madrid
34 — Romario Goal vs Atletico Madrid
33 — Ronaldinho Goal vs Real Madrid
32 — Lionel Messi Goal vs Arsenal
31 — Amor Goal vs Sporting Gijon
30 — De la Pena Goal vs Zaragoza
29 — Ronaldinho Goal vs AC Milan
28 — Koeman Goal vs FC Porto
27 — Koeman Goal vs Trabzonspor
26 — David Villa Goal vs Manchester United
25 — Schuster Goal vs FC Porto
24 — Lionel Messi Goal vs Athletic Club Bilbao
23 — Maradona Goal vs Alves
22 — Ronaldinho Goal vs Chelsea
21 — Lionel Messi Goal vs Valencia
20 — Romario Goal vs Osasuna
19 — Rivaldo Goal vs Valladolid
18 — Pedro Goal vs Deportivo La Coruna
17 — Ronaldinho Goal vs Atletico Madrid
16 — Lionel MEssi Goal vs Zaragoza
15 — Ronaldo Goal vs Valencia
14 — Romario Goal vs Real Sociedad
13 — Rivaldo Goal vs Atletico Madrid
12 — Ronaldinho Goal vs Sevilla
11 — Bakero Goal vs Espanyol
10 — Lionel Messi Goal vs Real Madrid
9 — Iniesta Goal vs Chelsea
8 — Koeman Goal vs Sampdoria
7 — Romario Goal vs Atletico Madrid
6 — Maradona Goal vs Real Madrid
5 — Ronaldinho Goal vs Villareal
4 — Ronaldo Goal vs Celta Vigo
3 — Johan Cruyff Goal vs Atletico Madrid
2 — Rivaldo Goal vs Valencia
1 — Lionel Messi Goal vs Getafe
 
Was Bryan Ruiz having that bad of a season that Fulham let him go to Betis just like that? I know it's a short loan, but considering how much they paid for him...
 
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Nike can maneuver there way around not using the "ballon D'Or" name on their boots or CR7 line. They can get creative if he wins. Many possibilities.
 
Come next week Messi will win that Ballon D'or again. If he could only win that damn world cup. The debates would be over.
 
Messi winning in Brazil at his peak would be legendary.

I hope this doesn't cause a thread derailing argument, but do you guys have Maradona in your top 3 all time?

I never caught Maradona play besides highlights and a preseason match against the Cosmos :lol: but from the research I've done there's no way he's better than Pele, Messi, or CR7. Don't know why Maradona/Pele was ever even a debate. He had that monster run in '86 but never sustained a level of play and winning like that over his career.
 
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I didn't have Argentina winning the World Cup but after their draw and the opponents they can potentially play in the knockout round it's very possible. They can breeze thru to the semi's.

Still don't think it happens, it's Brazil or Germany for me. Don't think Argentina are defensively capable. Who knows tho.
 
Rumors are getting stronger that Arsene might sign Jackson Martinez, but Porto wants 40m pounds :x :x :x :x man *****WTB!!!!!







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Flyeed said:
Messi winning in Brazil at his peak would be legendary.

I hope this doesn't cause a thread derailing argument, but do you guys have Maradona in your top 3 all time?

I never caught Maradona play besides highlights and a preseason match against the Cosmos :lol: but from the research I've done there's no way he's better than Pele, Messi, or CR7. Don't know why Maradona/Pele was ever even a debate. He had that monster run in '86 but never sustained a level of play and winning like that over his career.
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Maradona literally carried Argentina and Napoli in the 80s. Never sustained a level of play? Argentina made the finals again in Italia '90, and only lost due to a terrible call from that piece of trash Codesal. With Napoli, he wins 2 Serie A's, UEFA, and Copa Italia.
 
Think Porto want 40 million euros, not pounds. Regardless, they want too much for Jackson, I'll admit it, but this is what we do. Lol
 
Lamela, what a joke. I blame it on his old man but damn what a joke.


Well it's good he did it this way (assuming the rumors are true and he wants out) because Roma would have never sold him to Juve. Yet both players involved in that possible deal are ex Roma players :smh:
 
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CoupeIt88 said:
Think Porto want 40 million euros, not pounds. Regardless, they want too much for Jackson, I'll admit it, but this is what we do. Lol
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Interesting, the Arsenal bloggers/writers I follow are leaning towards the Morata loan or another player on loan. They think that we will make a move for a big player over the summer being that it's easier. Which is understandable and makes sense. It is a bit much for him, I read that even Jackson said 34mil for him was a bit much.
 
I hate FOX man :smh: :smh:

NBC No Longer In The Running For MLS TV Rights, Says Report
Posted on January 9, 2014 by Christopher Harris
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nbc mls NBC No Longer In The Running For MLS TV Rights, Says Report
NBC Sports Group is no longer in the running to acquire the next round of MLS TV rights, which will begin with next season. According to a report tonight in Goal.com, sources are saying that the finishing touches are being made to the MLS rights deal, but NBC Sports is out.
The winning bidder of the MLS TV deal is expected to be announced next week at the MLS Draft. FOX is the favorite to acquire the rights in a deal that could include ESPN. Sources to World Soccer Talk revealed that FOX and ESPN were in discussions about sharing the rights in some capacity, which could include FOX sub-licensing some UEFA Champions League games to ESPN in return for FOX getting more MLS or USMNT games. However, nothing had been finalized as of press time.
Since 2012, NBC Sports has televised MLS games on NBC Sports Network (now NBCSN) as well as a small number of games on NBC. After acquiring the rights to the American top flight league, NBC significantly improved the production value and presentation of the league, including having talent do studio shows and commentate games on-site, in addition to producing additional programming.
Despite all of NBC’s efforts to elevate the presentation of MLS to US audiences, the TV ratings were dismal due to little interest in the league due to a combination of factors — poor quality of play, lack of authenticity and little relevance to soccer fans.
For the 2013 MLS regular season, MLS TV ratings on NBC were down 8% compared to the previous year, while they were down 29% for ESPN.
The 2014 MLS season will be the final year of NBC’s relationship with MLS.
Meanwhile, FOX is focused on acquiring more soccer TV programming with World Cup 2018 in mind. FOX already has UEFA Champions League and FA Cup rights as well as World Cup 2018 and 2022, and has acquired Bundesliga rights (beginning 2015) and European Championship 2016 qualifiers.

Read more at http://worldsoccertalk.com/2014/01/...ls-tv-rights-says-report/#wXwLRav6r1aR5XPV.99
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also, is Nani injured? I only watch United games if theyre on, but the last time i saw him play was the red card against Real Madrid
 
trunks206 said:
Mastamind89 said:
Leandro Damiao transfered to Santos
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At a food bank somewhere in Portugal, AVB weeps.
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:lol: First thought in my mind, damn AVB must be tight.

cs02132 said:
also, is Nani injured? I only watch United games if theyre on, but the last time i saw him play was the red card against Real Madrid
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Yea, he's injured but I don't know the extent of it


Walcott injury reinforces need for fixture reform
Posted by Michael Cox
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It is impossible to determine whether fatigue was a contributing factor in the serious knee injury suffered by Arsenal forward Theo Walcott, which will keep him out for the remainder of the Premier League season, as well as the World Cup.
However, the statistics are clear -- Walcott was playing his fifth game in the space of 13 days. It is a startlingly strenuous schedule, probably unmatched anywhere in top-flight European football at any point this season. Even at the upcoming World Cup, a tournament that notoriously features matches in quick succession and tests a player's fitness levels, there's only an outside chance that a player will compete in four matches in the space of 13 days -- let alone five.

Walcott's knee injury -- which didn’t initially appear to be serious, considering the smile on his face as he departed on a stretcher -- was the third separate injury he suffered in the Tottenham game. His manager, Arsene Wenger, is one of the most intelligent managers around, hailed upon his arrival in English football as a revolutionary physiologist. Perhaps he would have liked to rest Walcott, but this was an important north London derby and he had a striker shortage because both Olivier Giroud and Nicklas Bendtner had also collected injuries over the Christmas period, while Lukas Podolski was only just recovering.

Again, it's difficult for someone with no medical background to reasonably blame fatigue with any level of certainty. Nevertheless, it's worth recalling the opening chapter to the autobiography of Robert Pires, one of Walcott's predecessors as an Arsenal wide man and a player who suffered a similar knee injury back in 2001-02, his best campaign for the Gunners.

"There's always some physical or psychological explanation as to why [injuries] happen," Pires wrote. "This one came about because I had been careless. Maybe I was mentally fatigued ... I just wasn't concentrating. I must have been worn out by the endless run of games, the constant competition ... for injury, read tiredness." He goes onto complain, in some detail, about the physical strain upon players in English football.

Theo Walcott
Allsport
Could Theo Walcott's serious knee injury have been avoided if he wasn't playing so many competitive games over the holidays?

This is the worst time of year for the Premier League.

Statistics from the excellent analytics website StatsBomb prove that injuries have increased rapidly in recent weeks. Meanwhile, using data from the reliable injury source PhysioRoom, it appears around 25 percent of Premier League players are currently injured. Spurs, for example, have 11 players unavailable.

Ahead of a World Cup year, there are frequently calls for a winter break considering that England's chances are seemingly regularly harmed by fatigue. Successive England managers have complained about this issue, but isn't really the Premier League's problem; England are controlled by the Football Association, but the Premier League is an independent body.

It would indirectly help the Premier League as an organisation if England were world champions, but it’s not their responsibility. Their concern, instead, should be that the absurd run of matches over Christmas is harming the footballers and the spectacle of the Premier League. Or, to use an expression they might sympathise with more, it’s harming their "product."

The issue of a winter break won't go away, primarily because it won't happen any time soon, although Christmas football and a winter break aren't mutually exclusive. It seems logical, should England persist with Christmas football, to have a small break in early January. It would be a chance for players to rest, for managers to focus on the transfer window and for fans to take a breather at a time when money is tight.

If not, the Premier League needs to reduce the number of games over the Christmas period. Boxing Day matches are a great tradition, as are matches on New Year's Day. The matches in between, however, are superfluous. There is simply one too many matchday in this period -- games are extremely close together, and moving matches for television can mean one side having a crucial advantage in terms of preparation time. Injuries would surely be prevented if even one game was removed from this schedule.


Allsport
Alan Pardew has been vocal in his displeasure at the festive-fixture congestion given the physical toll it can take on players.

The packed fixture list is nothing new, but the increased pace of football means that such a succession of games has become increasingly dangerous. Watch a Premier League game from just 15 years ago and the contest is entirely different -- it feels like a walking pace compared to matches from the modern era. Today players are faster, passing moves are faster, transitions are faster and tackles are faster. Less contact is allowed, but players still dive in to challenges with incredible force.

English football's overall problem is the insistence on a 20-team league along with two cup competitions. Should England persist with both the League Cup and the FA Cup -- and despite their decline in importance, that format remains preferable -- a move to an 18-team league, replicating the Bundesliga, is preferable.

It's been over a decade since Sepp Blatter proposed that national leagues should be cut to 16 teams, in order to give players more rest. Those moves were fiercely rejected by the leagues and in fact, the opposite has happened. Since then, Italy has expanded from 18 teams to 20. Portugal grew from 16 to 18.

This is one of Blatter's rare good ideas. Cutting two teams from the Premier League wouldn't be a particular loss -- there seems to be a particularly high number of poor sides this season, for a start -- while a reduction of four games would allow more rest over Christmas and around the time of the European knockout stages. It also seems ridiculous that at the end of January and the start of February, there are two midweek rounds in the space of three weeks.

No wonder managers are treating the FA Cup with less regard -- it's the only chance for them to rest players.

"I am not convinced the timing of this historic weekend is conducive to Premier League teams being at their best, with the nature of the Christmas fixture schedule placing unrealistic demands on the players," wrote Alan Pardew in his weekend programme notes for Newcastle's FA Cup defeat to Cardiff.

“Injuries and fatigue are a natural by-product of a fixture list which does not consider the welfare and safety of the players," he continued. "I'm sure both sides in this game will be making changes, because it's unrealistic to expect top players to continue to perform every three days."

Ultimately, such a busy fixture list plays into the hands of the big clubs with the biggest wage bills, and increases the demands upon the smaller clubs -- therefore, the inequality in the division increases.

Some managers, like Jose Mourinho, relish the packed schedule. "It's a period I like," he said recently. "We go into the Christmas period and the accumulation of matches is so high ... I like that very, very much. I enjoyed it when I was in England and I missed it when I was in Spain and Italy." Not every coach, though, can rotate his starting XI and bring Juan Mata, Willian and Samuel Eto'o into the side.


Shaun Botterill/Getty Images
Sepp Blatter's ideas about reducing fixture overload have been surprisingly sensible: trim league sizes to gently ease bloated schedules.

There persists a frustrating faction of English football supporters that insist footballers have no right to complain about their workload -- they're paid well enough, the reasoning goes, they should do their job. But the players are not complaining because they don't want to be playing football. They're complaining because they're unhappy at the elevated risk of injury.

Football is a sport that naturally embraces patience, one that doesn't follow the "more is better" approach. It's probably the lowest-scoring sport in the world; the point-scoring isn't frequent, but when it comes along, it's more meaningful. The same should apply to the number of matches.

It's not unreasonable to expect a fixture schedule that helps, rather than hinders, the standard of play. We should want the most talented footballers to be playing at their peak for the remainder of the season.

One of them, alas, won't be playing at all.
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If Fox wins, hopefully it means more Gus Johnson 
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jk it'll just give yall more incentive not to watch MLS soccer 
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