Champions League 2011/12

Maybe Valdes missed the international part of his career that people underrate him? Not by much though. A lot of people, including me, rate him very highly. Valdes is a great keeper but I still get a feeling he is prone to amateur mistakes. Like wasn't he a while a go caught sleeping outside the area with a shot from half of the field that he barely saved at the last second?

Also, he still comes out with childish acts at times you wouldn't see from Buffon and Casillas. Like the way he always rushes to get involved in the brawls instead of pushing it away.
 
gerd said:
Kanouté, i think it is rather easy to "let images speak for themselves".
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Well it should've been clearer. I said I didn't have much time because not that I didn't have the desire to write my thoughts down or I'm not able to do it myself. It was just that it was about the course time then for me so I had to leave home. Moving on.

The first compilation comes from Arsenal fans...enough said i think...
These carefully compiled videos are the opposite of objective reasoning. If i would only care the least bit i could easily make a compilation that suggests that Barcelona is disadvantaged, but to be honest i can't be bothered (since i'm not even a Barcelona fan).
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So, don't keep going by the misunderstanding. I didn't choose them (Arsenal fan-made or a Madridista-made, whatever) on purpose. I actually was searching for the famous RM and Chelsea matches of Barcelona in CL where some very controversial decisions happened. Quickly found and posted the first vid and then the second one in the related vids list. Cuz I did not have time.

Secondly, who would you expect to upload these kind of videos? A New York Cosmos fan? An objective one? C'mon, you said it yourself you wouldn't bother to do it since you're not a fan of either Barça or lets say Real. Of course they are gonna be mostly the ones that have suffered from bad refereeing and especially big team-favouring ones. I see no weirdness in this situation and the uploaders being fans of certain teams doesn't justify anything to me either, unless they manipulate things in videos. And what about if I said "The second video's uploader is an objective one from what's written on the descriptions part. Enough said I think."? Would it make sense to you? No, neither to me. I don't care who the uploader of a video is.

These images are what football is all about...discussions. Take for instance the foul on Malouda in the first clip...30 years ago there would not have been any discussion: penalty. If you give this now there are 8 penalties in every match...this has nothing to do with Barcelona being advantaged.
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The thing is not that, it is how the ref didn't give damn none of them. It is ridiculous. If none of those tackles made on Drogba or the handball of Pique (ffs his arm was wide open) aren't penalty, what's the point of the rule then? I think it would rather make sense to think of Barcelona being advantaged there. To say the ref is retarded or he innocently made mistakes is just timidly and simply easy.

Regarding the diving issue, of course I'm honest and I just can't stand to when players dive and cry for foul from refs no matter what their sides are. It just ruins the real competitive spirit of the game, you know. The thing about Barcelona players is that they are very good at acting, the best ones. So this combining with being favoured as a big team that attracts new generation growing is leading to disastrous match-deciders. Those non-given penalties in the Chelsea game, Van Persie's red card, Pepe's red card are very well match-deciders to me. It does bother me when a side gets favoured regularly and obviously more times than other teams and the other one's efforts get stolen like that. Also, a bit off-topic but I don't get how some people could complain about what Mourinho did (instead of praising such a great defensive display) in the match that saw Motta was sent off unfairly and his team played as 10-men for more than sixty minutes. Of course, he wasn't supposed to play an open game in such an important match like that against the world's best attacking team by a mile.

Anyway, I'm in full support for use of technology in football. No matter what it takes, the f*ckin justice has to be provided everyday for every side. Discussions may be a joy sometimes but seeing stolen efforts makes me lose my enthusiasm for football or any other sports. Justice always comes first imho.

The_Special_One said:
People found weird when I said Falcao was the best poacher in Europe while ago.
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I never ever did so. :BLEH:

Btw, the underrated Francesco Toldo FTW! :WORSHIP:

Francesco Toldo
 
Toldo was indeed a great GK, i forgot him. I'm not sure Buffon was better than him, but to be fair i haven't seen enough Serie A football to judge both of them.

I agree with you (Kanouté) on the diving and on fair competition, but i think that is an utopic view. Van Persie's red card is debatable, but i personally agreed with it (and i was a neutral who supported more the underdog...and that was Arsenal).
 
gerd said:
Toldo was indeed a great GK, i forgot him. I'm not sure Buffon was better than him, but to be fair i haven't seen enough Serie A football to judge both of them.

I agree with you (Kanouté) on the diving and on fair competition, but i think that is an utopic view. Van Persie's red card is debatable, but i personally agreed with it (and i was a neutral who supported more the underdog...and that was Arsenal).
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Buffon was better, besides that we all remember Buffon at World Cup 2006 :WORSHIP::WORSHIP:
 
I'm a bit amazed that nobody posted about Napoli-Man City. That was the best CL match i've seen so far. Lavezzi was fantastic. Man City are in trouble unless Villareal does them a favour...or unless Bayern comes with a B-team...but that seems nothing for German teams.
 
IMO Napoli will not get far if they reach the knock-out stage...their defense is quite weak and away goals are very important in the knock-out stage...they will win home matches, but they will get results like 2-1 or 3-2...never a goalless win...

I hope i'm wrong, because i love watching that team: Lavezzi, Hamsik, Cavani, Inler, Cannavaro, Maggio, Zuniga or Dossena...all great players and then there is the unsung hero of this team: Gargano...
 
Me, i'm very happy for Lille, so unlucky in the two first games with two draw, finally win in Moscow.
About Lyon, go to Europa League, play only the 15 last minutes versus Ajax with a great goalkeeper, Lisandro not yet really ready.
 
I`m loving the Napoli vs City game too! Napoli could of really embarrass City . Mancini looked in disarray in his post match interview were words of a man that experience something unexplainable .To think Spurs will have gone further w/o the richness maybe?
 
I didn't watch the game but was it better than Shakhtar vs. Zenit!? Because that one was the best CL game I've seen in a long time!! Anyway I'm sure it was good and will try to watch it.

Lyon and Man City both F***Cked up big last night! Now there's a good chance both will be in Europea League. In fact in Lyon's case, it's almost certain now isn't it?! :LOL: What an embarrassment!

I'm also happy for LOSC because they were very unlucky in some of the previous matches where they definitely deserved something but ended up with 0 points. Now they have hope...

@Gerd, Toldo was a great and often under-rated goalkeeper. I did have the pleasure of watching him at Fiorentina, etc. just like Gianluigi since his Parma debut however and I can also definitely say Buffon was better. Toldo was great but Buffon was one of those that will go down in history.... that little bit of difference which puts you in the 'God-like' category as opposed to just a very good player.
 
-Panos- said:
...and somehow, we won. Didn't expect Marseille to be THAT bad today. Hopefully, we grabbed a fully unexpected 3-point victory and now hope for the best to come.
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What a poor OM gain, what a shame and Deschamps is too defensif coach, i don't like that, versus Arsenal maybe, not versus Olympiakos, when Cheyrou out for M'Bia, i know what happens...
Now OM go to Dortmund with 0-3 versus a furia yellow and black who want take a revenge.
 
Gerets was a much better coach than Deschamps Thomas...

Genk?
Unai Emery (Valencia's coach) said that he had much respect for Genk. He is a nice and gracious man...
After six goals, i couldn't stant it anymore and i played Valencia-Genk in PES, i got a thrashing, stopped playing when it was already 4-0...(this is a joke, in reality i listened some music).

Are there any excuses? When you loose 7-0 there are no excuses, but Genk should have had a penalty when it was still 0-0...could this have changed to match? I don't think so...the home match ended 0-0 but then it was already clear that Valencia, was much, much stronger than Genk...Last time they played in the CL Genk lost 6-0 against Real Madrid...Spanish football clearly don't suit them...
Poor Kevin De Bruyne. He should not have played, last week he was supposed to make his debut for the national team against France, but he got sick and lost 7 kilo's of weight in less than a week. Under those circumstances it was useless playing him, but he is by far Genk's best player...let's not forget they won the title because they had a miraculous good GK who performed super save after super save...he's gone now.

Well, it's only football...only one match to and the suffering is over (and once again i have tickets...).
 
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It was a great bit of control by Boateng leading up to the shot, but Victor Valdez was, once again in the Champions League, beaten at his near post. The shot had a lot of pace on it, but if his positioning had been adequate he would have at least got a hand on it. It's a basic rule of goalkeeping that you cover your near post and dive to your far post, but he dived far too early and he hadnt covered his near post properly. Boateng was able to see the gap and slice it there with the outside of his foot.

I still think he is a weak link in that team (also Malafeev is a weak link in Zenit's team) and it could cost them in the latter stages of the cup.
 
Kanouté said:
Valbuena's goal, what a goal!! An absolutely stunning game-winnner.
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With Dortmund defenders just looking at him like they were set on the Amateur difficulty of PES..

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EXCEPT
When a French club plays....

For a team that won Bayern Munich 1-0 few days ago, the 2 goals they conceded at the end wouldn't be scored against a C' Division Greek team.
Also, just tell me, why while every other match finished, the "suspicious" match was still on for 5 more minutes?
 
Look, I feel for you, I exactly know how it feels and have no disrespect to you personally but seriously Ive no desire to join needless conversations like that. Just open up your mind and somehow try to see differently than you do now. Turks, Greeks, Slav people etc, unfortunately we all have this tradition that is blaming refs and making ridiculous conspiracy theories up when we lose. That's all total nonsense imo.
 
It is just very hard to get over the fact that up to the 85' minute we were through, and then suddenly two completely unexpected goals send you to the 3rd place.
conspiracy-keanu-290x160.png
(Conspiracy Keanu, for those who like memes)
 
We all knew that if Olympiakos would be eliminated the refs and Platini would be blamed. This is utter rubbish. Nobody talks about the fact that Arsenal played with a second team. Is that fair? No it isn't. I'm sick and tired of Greek teams and their fans with their silly conspiracy theories. The fact that they don't trust European refs and UEFA says more about Greek refs and the Greek FA and clubs IMO.


Oh and Genk? Another point, another cheap goal...they could have won this match, but that would have been exagerated...in the end a fair result. They redeemed themselves a litle bit for the 7-0 against Valencia...at home they were OK, but away they were too naïve and not good enough. I guess 3 points is good for a Belgian team in the CL. This also illustrates the huge gap between CL and Euro League where Belgian clubs are doing very well at the moment...
 
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gerd said:
We all knew that if Olympiakos would be eliminated the refs and Platini would be blamed. This is utter rubbish. Nobody talks about the fact that Arsenal played with a second team. Is that fair? No it isn't. I'm sick and tired of Greek teams and their fans with their silly conspiracy theories. The fact that they don't trust European refs and UEFA says more about Greek refs and the Greek FA and clubs IMO.


Oh and Genk? Another point, another cheap goal...they could have won this match, but that would have been exagerated...in the end a fair result. They redeemed themselves a litle bit for the 7-0 against Valencia...at home they were OK, but away they were too naïve and not good enough. I guess 3 points is good for a Belgian team in the CL. This also illustrates the huge gap between CL and Euro League where Belgian clubs are doing very well at the moment...
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Refs? Who spoke about them? 2nd team? Koscielny, Squillacy, Arshavin, Benayoun, Fabianski, Chamberlain, Andre Santos, Djourou are -if not in the first 11- always in the first team. Anyway, seeing things with a clearer mind, you are right, blaming UEFA is kind of silly. End of conversation, we are going to Europa, congrats to OM.
 
Can't really blame Dortmund for what happened last night. At half time Arsenal were down, a 5:1 victory out of reach, Kehl injured, Marseille in desperate need of a victory - all hope lost, if you will. Tough to motivate yourself knowing all that. And yet, they did well "almost" long enough.
See, every team has the chance to qualify all by itself, if you need the help of others, you're screwed already. Especially when the constellation is so utterly hopeless for the team you wish to be your "support".

Anyway, Dortmund played a horrible European season. Entirely their own fault they finished fourth of that rather mediocre group. No politics involved, just bad luck and a lot of newbie-mistakes.
 
Fabianski is clearly the second GK
Djourou, Chamberlain, Squilacci and Benayoun are clearly second choice (and i have the distinct feeling that Squilacci is living on borrowed time with Arsenal).
Even Arshavin is less and less a regular starter.

Of the players you mentioned only Andre Santos is a first team player...
So, yes Arsenal fielded their second team against Olympiakkos.

Glad you see that blaming UEFA is silly...my reaction was provoked by your posts; but you are not the only Olympiakos fan with conspiracy theories...
 
gerd said:
you are not the only Olympiakos fan with conspiracy theories...
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But we are not the only fans with conspiracy theories anyway. Remember all the fuss for UEFA favouring Barcelona all these years, from the games with Chelsea in 2009 to last years game with Arsenal (the red card to Van Persie) and Real Madrid. It's like, a physical reaction to everyone.
 
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