Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Mon Apr 28, 2014 4:43 pm  

Lord God Jose Mourinho wrote:

In terms of long term damage a Man City title win has the potential to be a lot more dangerous than a Liverpool one.

Don't know what you mean. Man city will always spend big money, now they've got over the hurdle of that first one in 2012, winning this year makes little difference to future prospects IMO. Of course it may give them greater confidence, knowing 2012 wasn't a one off, but they are a club that now will always challenge and win titles in the long term as long as they are signing world class players and appointing top managers.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Mon Apr 28, 2014 5:00 pm  

FlexWheeler wrote:

Don't know what you mean. Man city will always spend big money, now they've got over the hurdle of that first one in 2012, winning this year makes little difference to future prospects IMO. Of course it may give them greater confidence, knowing 2012 wasn't a one off, but they are a club that now will always challenge and win titles in the long term as long as they are signing world class players and appointing top managers.

Which top managers are they then?

I think that Manchester City have a magnificent squad. They should have the league wrapped up. But I think they are massive bottle jobs.

I think they have the squad right, but I don't think the manager is right and the mentality is pretty terrible. I think that Pellegrini ending this season with just the League Cup would be a terrible return considering the team they have.

I think that winning two titles in 3 years can potentially heal their bottling tendencies and allow them to grow. While winning both those titles on goal difference would be damning in analysis, I don't think it will be analised. I think it will be just as celebrated as any title is.

I think the fact that will have won 2 titles in 3 years it will give them a huge boost in confidence and Pellegrini could flourish after struggling this season. I just think a Man City title win would do them far more good than it could do the scousers.

I'd still take the risk of City winning the league though. I want the scousers to go 50 years without winning the league again.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Mon Apr 28, 2014 5:12 pm  

The main problem from Liverpool's POV is that they clearly allowed Chelsea's breaking down of play early on to get to them.

For me Liverpool really bought into the hype that they were going to give Chelsea a beating on their glorious way to a title. IMO Liverpool should have turned the tables and simply allowed Chelsea to sit back and kill the game. Chelsea NEEDED to win the game, Liverpool didn't.

From a CFC perspective it really peed me off that the ref was so blatantly clamping down on time wasting. Half the teams that come to Stamford Bridge pull that 5hit against us and referees couldn't care less. In fact Mourinho was sent to the stands early in the season against Cardiff partly because of this. For the whole game the ref ignored Cardiff taking the mickey. As soon as Chelsea went a goal up and we wanted to take our time the ref was straight into pointing at his watch. Mourinho was mad about that blatant double standard and was sent straight to the stand because of it.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Mon Apr 28, 2014 6:56 pm  

City's main problem this season has been that Pellegrini's system asks too much of our weakest players. The defenders have very little cover. Kompany and Zabaleta can usually cope with that but not the others. We've had this continual weakness on our left side of defense that he's not really addressed. Even the poorest opponents know that we've got a weakness for them to exploit.

He's very much a football philosopher rather than a tactician. He seems to think that if we play in a certain way the results will follow. That may be the case if we had 4 top class defenders but this season its meant that if we aren't at our best, scoring 4 or 5 goals a game we are vulnerable.

The club also needs to have a good look at the medical / physio side. Too many of our players are getting recurring muscle injuries. When players are injured the club's estimates of how long they'll be unavailable are usually way out. Jovetic and Nastasic have missed large chunks of the season without the club seeming to have diagnosed exactly what was wrong with them.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Tue Apr 29, 2014 8:46 pm  

Madrid have just polished off bayern in their own backyard. Devastating.

No doubt lord god hose mourinho will be typically bullish about chelsea's chances when they win tomorrow.

But chelsea will need to produce more than simply turn up and have it 'written in the stars' ala 2012. La decima on it's way to madrid IMO.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Tue Apr 29, 2014 9:03 pm  

FlexWheeler wrote:

No doubt lord god hose mourinho will be typically bullish about chelsea's chances when they win tomorrow.

I rarely make predictions about football matches.

I'm not bullish about tomorrow's game, and I'd be even less so about a final against a team that have just smacked Bayern Munich 5-0.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Wed Apr 30, 2014 8:46 am  

Lord God Jose Mourinho wrote:

The main problem from Liverpool's POV is that they clearly allowed Chelsea's breaking down of play early on to get to them.

For me Liverpool really bought into the hype that they were going to give Chelsea a beating on their glorious way to a title. IMO Liverpool should have turned the tables and simply allowed Chelsea to sit back and kill the game. Chelsea NEEDED to win the game, Liverpool didn't.

Agreed.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Wed Apr 30, 2014 2:48 pm  

So the rumours are surfacing that Real Madrid are going to be offering 70m for Suarez in the summer.

I don't think the scousers can sell him. I think he's too important to them so Rodgers would want to keep him no matter how stupid they bid. But I think the club might take the money of offer over the wishes of Rodgers. But I reckon Suarez could be the first >100m player in the world if LFC do let him go.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Wed Apr 30, 2014 6:56 pm  

Lord God Jose Mourinho wrote:

So the rumours are surfacing that Real Madrid are going to be offering 70m for Suarez in the summer.

I don't think the scousers can sell him. I think he's too important to them so Rodgers would want to keep him no matter how stupid they bid. But I think the club might take the money of offer over the wishes of Rodgers. But I reckon Suarez could be the first >100m player in the world if LFC do let him go.

I know LFC will deny it, but you can't help feeling that there will already be an agreement in place between player and club, similar to the ones that Fabregas had with Arsenal and Ronaldo with United, that once a suitable offer is received, then Suarez will be allowed to go.

Re: Football Chat Thread PART II : Wed Apr 30, 2014 8:46 pm  

Dita's Slot Meter wrote:

I know LFC will deny it, but you can't help feeling that there will already be an agreement in place between player and club, similar to the ones that Fabregas had with Arsenal and Ronaldo with United, that once a suitable offer is received, then Suarez will be allowed to go.

I think there might be an agreement like that. But just like the one last summer, Liverpool will say "screw that agreement" and insist he stays. Last summer the price was 40m, the next agreement might say 70m but I think that isn't enough to cover them for the loss to the team.

I think the difference between last season and this is that Suarez will fight to push through a move to Real Madrid, while he didn't even want to go to Arsenal.

The major question to ask is why didn't Real Madrid go and nick him for 40 last summer and get rid of Benzema as was as Ozil. I guess they didn't want to risk it in case Suarez kept on biting and pulling stupid poop, but 30m is a big price to pay for just that. I do actually think that's mainly why we weren't after him, but if he'd have pulled another stunt in England he'd have been getting a season long ban and we couldn't risk it. In Spain though he'd have started with a new slate anyway, after serving his ban out.