UEFA Champions League '06 - '07 Final: Liverpool - AC Milan

Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

Liverpool are at the bridge first, Anfield second.

The mancs are at Old Toilet first then San Siro second.
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

El Diego said:
Three finals running with an English club featuring - how can anyone argue about the quality of the Premiership now?

I constantly hear "but the Spanish/Italian leagues are more technical." Bollocks. Most of the top Serie A/La Liga players wouldn't be able to hack it in the Prem - it's too fast, too physical and the mindset is to attack.

The England team are SHIT but we finally have the best league in the world. Finally! :)
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Arguably you could be right.
BUT...

It's only logical that those English teams are among the best in the world, they should be there each and every year (which they don't) because they are among the richeest clubs in the world...Man Utd is even the richest sports club in the world...more wealthy than any American sports club...if you know the importance of money in football...what has happened now is only logical. No surprise there, they have merits to get there, but relatively less than meets the eye...

Take Liverpool - PSV for example...(the two teams i liked most).

On the one hand you got a team with plenty of money and a fantastic coaching staff...a team with only one real star player (Gerrard) but lots of very, very good players...just beneath star quality (virtually the rest of the team and the bench and the players who weren't even on the bench like Fowler in Holland).
On the other hand you got one of the most clever teams with perhpas the best scouting in the world (Romario, Ronaldo, Park, Alex....). PSV misses a couple of players due to injury (Kone and Alex) and suddenly they are no match at all for Liverpool...Liverpool has money enough to buy 25 players who are as good or even better than PSV's first team....this.may sound naïve but that is not fair and in the long term a bad thing for football...the way the CL is organized now makes the clubs from the rich leagues richer...in USA sports like NBA people have understood things like that...that's why there is a salary cap and a draft system which has the potential to make bad teams better and good teams worse...a very good thing.
To me the most attractive aspect of football is that it is the only sport (to me it's more a game than a sport) where there is a big chance that the underdog can win...in more athletic sports like athletics or cycling...the best always winns...in football underdogs can win.
What UEFA and the big clubs are doing now (with the television money) is a thread to the most attractive aspect of football...i'm sure the fans of the big (advantaged) clubs will disagree with me, but in the long term they will agree...imagine the semi-finals of all CL's in the future with 3 English clubs (and those three would be Arsenal, and/or the three who reached the semi's this years, there's a huge gap between those four and the rest) : this would become very boring.
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

@ stan, unless youre a supporter of one of the big 4 im sure it already is boring. Totally correct with regard to money, but it works at the same scales in each country (psv being one of the richest clubs in holland and continually in the CL). Its just the way its gone and tbh i dont think it will change when it comes to competitions/tv/moneydistrabution. The only way i think other teams could get in is doing an ambramovich with a potential big club.

As for being the best league in the world, already talked about this with lo zio, they have the "best" top 4 atm, but the rest are pretty average (look at the football getting into the top 6, bolton and everton).
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

I dont think the prem is the best in the world, i just think this years CL has been poor quality.

If you look at each team, you can see how weak they are in compariosn to past years. Real Madrid are full of old Galacticos and cant defend, Barca cant defend, Roma are mid table at best, MIlan are ageing, Inter are full of journeyman mercenaries, United depend on Ronaldo, Arsenal have no backbone, Chelsea are 1 dimensional, Liverpool cant score goals, Juventus are corrupt and the less said about the dutch and french sides the better.

Either we are moving out of a golden generation of top, top players and the transition as begun or football is worse off than ten years ago. Ten years ago you would have shat yourself to draw any of the big boys in europe. Can you say the same now?
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

antred said:
I dont think the prem is the best in the world, i just think this years CL has been poor quality.

If you look at each team, you can see how weak they are in compariosn to past years. Real Madrid are full of old Galacticos and cant defend, Barca cant defend, Roma are mid table at best, MIlan are ageing, Inter are full of journeyman mercenaries, United depend on Ronaldo, Arsenal have no backbone, Chelsea are 1 dimensional, Liverpool cant beat United, Juventus are corrupt and the less said about the dutch and french sides the better.

Either we are moving out of a golden generation of top, top players and the transition as begun or football is worse off than ten years ago. Ten years ago you would have shat yourself to draw any of the big boys in europe. Can you say the same now?
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One day mate, one day! :lol:
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

antred said:
FA cup last year? ;)
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;)

Lets stop bickering mate, we are both obviously passionate about our teams so lets leave it like that. I actually told my Scouse mate at the weekend that I think you lot will win it this year (that was before we hammered Roma mind!) :)
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

El Diego said:
;)

Lets stop bickering mate, we are both obviously passionate about our teams so lets leave it like that. I actually told my Scouse mate at the weekend that I think you lot will win it this year (that was before we hammered Roma mind!) :)
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Fair enough it is getting tiresome now. We will soon know who will scoop up the trophies this year in a few short weeks. :)
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

antred said:
Fair enough it is getting tiresome now. We will soon know who will scoop up the trophies this year in a few short weeks. :)
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:applause: :)
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

Stan said:
Vann, what i meant by "Latin" is that they are playing a football which is very technical and based and individual actions and talent...i'm very impressed with this Man Utd team...shame that Vander Sar is struggling a bit lately, otherwise i consider him one of the best GK's in the world.
What happened with Man Utd GK's after Schmeichel???? I thought that with Vander Sar they finally had an excellent one (i'm a fan). I something wrong with the GK coach Vann????
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lol we have a decent enough coach, keepers will make mistakes regardless, I always thought we should have signed VDS instead of Barthez when Schmeichel left...

our three young keepers are looking pretty decent but its difficult to GK at the big clubs IMO cos its about concenration more than anything..

I agree on the teams technical abilty , thats all down to Carlos really, you dont get that from an english/british coach...
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

I dont think we should make too big a deal out of having three semi finalists, its not the first time one country dominated Europe, its just The Prems turn...

As gerd said the money side of things is relative, no suprise that when Italy and Spains teams had huge budgets they dominated...

And as Antred posted, its down to our "golden generation" as I posted earlier all three teams each have a few of the best English players...

I've no doubt that next year will probley be another countries turn...
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

Completely agree with you Vann, but what is worrying is the fact that the clubs who are rich now want to organize things this way that their wealth and other clubs being relative poor is permanent...and that is not good for football..there is a gap between England and the first group: Spain and Italy and maybe Russa, then there is a gap between those two or three countries and Germany and France. Then there is a huge gap with countries like Holland and Portugal...
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

Stan said:
Arguably you could be right.
BUT...

It's only logical that those English teams are among the best in the world, they should be there each and every year (which they don't) because they are among the richeest clubs in the world...Man Utd is even the richest sports club in the world...more wealthy than any American sports club...if you know the importance of money in football...what has happened now is only logical. No surprise there, they have merits to get there, but relatively less than meets the eye...

Take Liverpool - PSV for example...(the two teams i liked most).

On the one hand you got a team with plenty of money and a fantastic coaching staff...a team with only one real star player (Gerrard) but lots of very, very good players...just beneath star quality (virtually the rest of the team and the bench and the players who weren't even on the bench like Fowler in Holland).
On the other hand you got one of the most clever teams with perhpas the best scouting in the world (Romario, Ronaldo, Park, Alex....). PSV misses a couple of players due to injury (Kone and Alex) and suddenly they are no match at all for Liverpool...Liverpool has money enough to buy 25 players who are as good or even better than PSV's first team....this.may sound naïve but that is not fair and in the long term a bad thing for football...the way the CL is organized now makes the clubs from the rich leagues richer...in USA sports like NBA people have understood things like that...that's why there is a salary cap and a draft system which has the potential to make bad teams better and good teams worse...a very good thing.
To me the most attractive aspect of football is that it is the only sport (to me it's more a game than a sport) where there is a big chance that the underdog can win...in more athletic sports like athletics or cycling...the best always winns...in football underdogs can win.
What UEFA and the big clubs are doing now (with the television money) is a thread to the most attractive aspect of football...i'm sure the fans of the big (advantaged) clubs will disagree with me, but in the long term they will agree...imagine the semi-finals of all CL's in the future with 3 English clubs (and those three would be Arsenal, and/or the three who reached the semi's this years, there's a huge gap between those four and the rest) : this would become very boring.
Click to expand...
acually stan i think the washington redskins have surpassed manu in terms of wealth... and they suck! Havent wont anything in 16 years. Which goes back to your point, american sports have a good handle on making sure every team is competitive, rich or not, they can only spend so much, so even if the club is super duper wealthy, like the skins, they can only spend so much on players, the
same amount as every other team.
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

Stan said:
Completely agree with you Vann, but what is worrying is the fact that the clubs who are rich now want to organize things this way that their wealth and other clubs being relative poor is permanent...and that is not good for football..there is a gap between England and the first group: Spain and Italy and maybe Russa, then there is a gap between those two or three countries and Germany and France. Then there is a huge gap with countries like Holland and Portugal...
Click to expand...

I agree with you that big clubs want to keep it this way, but the big clubs around now have always been The Big Clubs, okay chelsea are a "new" major club, but the rest have always been there, and the clubs that have fallen by the wayside have done so mostly due to poor management, not necessarily on the footballing side but defo on the money side of things...

There are many factors that determine a clubs/leagues wealth, I know for a fact that England is one of the best supported leagues in the world, its also very expensive to be a supporter in England, so a big chunk of money in each clubs comes from match going supporters (hence everyone wanting to move to new stadiums) these are the most important people in the world of football...

I cant say for 100% but I dont think the countries you mentioned have the same, especially Italy, I mean Juves crowds are terrible but they are still very wealthy, as I mentioned pre-sky this country was wayyy behind Italy and Spain because there was a lack of rich benefactors at each clubs, that was as equally unbalanced as it is today...

So although football originated as "working class sport", a socialist enviroment it isnt, as nice as it would be to have a level playing field its not the fault of clubs who are ran excellently and generate their own money...
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Quarter Finals : Second Leg

csaunders said:
acually stan i think the washington redskins have surpassed manu in terms of wealth... and they suck! Havent wont anything in 16 years. Which goes back to your point, american sports have a good handle on making sure every team is competitive, rich or not, they can only spend so much, so even if the club is super duper wealthy, like the skins, they can only spend so much on players, the
same amount as every other team.
Click to expand...


possibly, I think Forbes just rated us at the top of some list, it was probley just The Football not your football lol...
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Semi Finals : First Leg

Tonight we kick off with the Semi Finals!

What do u guys think?
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Semi Finals : First Leg

Tough tough game. I can see it going either way. If Pirlo and Kaka can get into rhythm, along with Seedorf, I feel we can win at OT. The last time we played, our midfield dominated the whole game, and the same players are going to be playing tonight.
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Semi Finals : First Leg

Milanista said:
Tough tough game. I can see it going either way. If Pirlo and Kaka can get into rhythm, along with Seedorf, I feel we can win at OT. The last time we played, our midfield dominated the whole game, and the same players are going to be playing tonight.
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Very true but a different Man U this time, that United couldn't create much where as this side can create and score from all over the pitch. They have a weaker side though which may be costly in the first leg.
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Semi Finals : First Leg

COME ON UNITED! LETS HAVE EM!
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Semi Finals : First Leg

With the form they have at the moment, you can only see United winning this. Comfortably too.
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Semi Finals : First Leg

foxtrot said:
With the form they have at the moment, you can only see United winning this. Comfortably too.
Click to expand...

I never underestimate Milan though - they are a class act.
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Semi Finals : First Leg

I expect Man U to win comfortable tonight myself but the same thoughts are in my head. Milan I expected to struggle after the group stage but seem to have grown, they had to produce a good performance to beat Bayern.
 
Re: UEFA Champions League 2006 - 2007 Semi Finals : First Leg

Wayne Rooney! Great finish and a good win for United. Not as comfortable as I predicted but they take a win to Italy at least. The tie is still wide open with those 2 away goals though. United should win overall.

Michael Carrick will be thanking Wayne Rooney after missing that sitter from the corner. Darren Fletcher should have buried his shot at goal too. Milan didn't seem to have many chances in the second half.
 
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