The 2010/11 UCL UEFA Champions League & Europa League Thread

That's what make Mourinho a genius IMO. He makes headlines when his teams play poorly to deflect criticism off his team. It takes a lot of pressure off them.

One would imagine he should focus that energy on improving his and the players' performances. He seems to think there's never anything wrong with the way he plays, but referees and whatnot. He'll probably tell his players to play rough next week, get sent off so he can make up excuses for the result. He often seems to be asking for punishments and when he gets one he makes a huge deal out of it. "Me, again?"


On another note, did Real Madrid leave out a frame in their video "by accident"? Saw this pic on another site and it's pretty interesting if Real Madrid published an edited video on their official site like some accused earlier:
ZfVsU.jpg


Jimi Hendrix said:
Of course, having Messi allows them to spend 70 minutes doing absolutely nothing with the ball, knowing that the Argentinian can decide a match in a few seconds.

But I find the way they play extremely, extremely boring...maybe a passive play rule similar to the one which exists in handball should be introduced in football.

I agree it often gets pretty boring but I don't see there's anything Barcelona can do about it when every team they go up against plays a 10-man defense. The way practically every team plays against Barcelona is to play very defensively to keep them from scoring and try to score from the few counterattacks they get. And if you watch closely, Messi is often very active in the games. There's just not much highlight-video type stuff to do when he usually plays middle-ish and is surrounded closely by three or four players.
 
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On another note, did Real Madrid leave out a frame in their video "by accident"? Saw this pic on another site and it's pretty interesting if Real Madrid published an edited video on their official site like some accused earlier:
ZfVsU.jpg

And of course you are 100% sure that image hasn't been manipulated, jeeezzz...

wgxhmt.jpg


I agree it often gets pretty boring but I don't see there's anything Barcelona can do about it when every team they go up against plays a 10-man defense. The way practically every team plays against Barcelona is to play very defensively to keep them from scoring and try to score from the few counterattacks they get. And if you watch closely, Messi is often very active in the games. There's just not much highlight-video type stuff to do when he usually plays middle-ish and is surrounded closely by three or four players.

It would be enough if in their immenese arrogance they didn't try to sell what they do as the only proper way of playing football.
 
And of course you are 100% sure that image hasn't been manipulated, jeeezzz...

Hence why I said I didn't know the source and said IF the the video is edited. I figured it's most likely manipulated since it wasn't anywhere in the news, didn't bother to take a closer look.

Jimi Hendrix said:
It would be enough if in their immenese arrogance they didn't try to sell what they do as the only proper way of playing football.

Please show where the club is trying to do this. This is an image created by the media about the "joga bonito" and goes way back.
 
Bar?a's style of playing reminds me of this. The audio is in Spanish but if you watch from 1:10 to 1:30 you'll get what I'm trying to say:

Of course, having Messi allows them to spend 70 minutes doing absolutely nothing with the ball, knowing that the Argentinian can decide a match in a few seconds.

But I find the way they play extremely, extremely boring...maybe a passive play rule similar to the one which exists in handball should be introduced in football. :)

You're talking like holding the ball like that is easy to do. What about when Bar?a loses the ball and they all turn into pressure and get it right back, forcing excellent players such as those in Real to make stupid rookie mistakes?
The reason Bar?a circulates the ball so much is because they are looking for holes in the defense, which rarely appear because teams go out and play all defense against Bar?a cos they know they're most likely to lose. If the holes don't show up, what is the team supposed to do, throw the ball forwards in hopes it'll find the net by itself?
 
You're talking like holding the ball like that is easy to do. What about when Bar?a loses the ball and they all turn into pressure and get it right back, forcing excellent players such as those in Real to make stupid rookie mistakes?
The reason Bar?a circulates the ball so much is because they are looking for holes in the defense, which rarely appear because teams go out and play all defense against Bar?a cos they know they're most likely to lose. If the holes don't show up, what is the team supposed to do, throw the ball forwards in hopes it'll find the net by itself?

Nobody said it was easy, I just said I find it extremely boring, in fact if Bar?a have declared themselves some kind of football saviors and have criticised other teams for playing a solid defense against them it must because what they do it's really difficult to achieve and they consider themselves above anyone else.
 
Nobody said it was easy, I just said I find it extremely boring, in fact if Bar?a have declared themselves some kind of football saviors and have criticised other teams for playing a solid defense against them it must because what they do it's really difficult to achieve and they consider themselves above anyone else.

What's boring is not what Bar?a does but what other teams attempt to do against them, which is defend with 5 people and hope for a quick counter situation, instead of pressuring up the pitch and connecting passes.
Go ask Real Sociedad how they did it, Bar?a is not unbeatable. But if you go out letting them hold all the ball, and letting them play the way they like it... it's gonna be a bad evening for ya
 
What's boring is not what Bar?a does but what other teams attempt to do against them, which is defend with 5 people and hope for a quick counter situation, instead of pressuring up the pitch and connecting passes.
Go ask Real Sociedad how they did it, Bar?a is not unbeatable. But if you go out letting them hold all the ball, and letting them play the way they like it... it's gonna be a bad evening for ya
Don't think you can't take Real Sociedad's game as a reference, it's not like if they were giving it all.

Take the King's Cup final for instance, during the first half Real Madrid was clearly superior applying a very strong pressure on Bar?a players and having clear goal opportunities, of course during the second half Bar?a imposed his physical superiority (it's like if the never get tired....), but Real Madrid played a very solid defense and decided the game in the extra time with a beautiful goal. Sadly, after losing the title, Xavi (Bar?a's captain and officious referee during most of their matches) dismissed that way of playing as easy or cheap and once again elevated their style as the only legitimate one.

Sadly, Real Madrid couldn't have done that during the CL match, first of all because they missed some key pieces like Khedira and Carvalho but also because of the utterly disgusting (or at least I thought it would be considered disgusting by any proper football fan, doesn't seem to be the case here) Bar?a players' attitude that the referee 'bought' time after time.

So for beating Bar?a you have to be at the top of you game but you also have to be allowed to do it. None of this could be seen during Wednesday's match.
 
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Claiming Barca to be the only ones exhibiting bad attitude in their latest ChL game is wrong. Both team showed stupid behaviour. Real Madrid only did it in a way that left them vulnerable to get some judgements made against them - when you decide to play hard against Barcelona, and you have players like Pepe who are notoriously ill tempered, then what do you expect?

I'm sorry, but have many El Classico's in a row is it now, that Real Madrid have ended up with 10 players? So what, all the refs are bought by Barcelona?

Barcelona have their concept, and they are, deservedly, proud of it. What do you really expect Xavi to say? Really?

Barcelona are the ones to beat, they've proven that. Mourinho has shown that he has a way of during it, it certainly isn't pretty, but it's effective - it is, however, riscy. Which too has been proven in the last matches.

And Jimi Hendrix, I had just proclaimed that I was happy that this was pretty much the only place I knew of on the internet where it didn't end up in insults, so please, why don't we keep it like that?
 
Don't think you can't take Real Sociedad's game as a reference, it's not like if they were giving it all.
So for beating Bar?a you have to be at the top of you game but you also have to be allowed to do it. None of this could be seen during Wednesday's match.

Okay then take H?rcules game as a reference.

Saying Bar?a buys the refs is like the stupidest excuse for losing I've ever seen, sorry.
Specially when RM played in such way they were lucky not to end the game with 9 (the first leg)
 
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And Jimi Hendrix, I had just proclaimed that I was happy that this was pretty much the only place I knew of on the internet where it didn't end up in insults, so please, why don't we keep it like that?

This. Most of these arguments end up the way most "iPhone vs others" arguments do, ie. completely pointless back-and-forth shitslinging.



Shame about all the media game etc turning these Clasicos to quite a farce. You could see the referee was a bit affected by all this, he clearly didn't want to hand any reds. Carvalho got away pretty soft and then he gave a pretty unusual card for Pedro, but when Pedro made a much clearer foul later blocking Casillas' kick he didn't want to give a second one. Game-wise not that excellent either, yesterday's game and the Copa del Rey final had great first halfs but other than that I was expecting more. Since Barca and RMA will face each other in the 2-leg Supercopa, it's only about three months and these teams will face each other again. Usually a title no one really cares about, but with the recent events I'm sure it'll be a slightly bigger deal this year.

Unfortunately I'll miss tonight's game since it collides with Finland's ice hockey game but it's not like there's much doubt which team will go into the final anyway. Braga - Benfica should be a good fight on thursday though. Not that the winner matters that much, pretty sure Porto will be the champions nevertheless.
 
I thought Real Madrid came out of it with the honor restored somewhat. They were definitely trying a lot harder to play attacking football, and to be fair they did manage to score one goal more than Barcelona, I don't think there's any doubt that Higuains goal was falsely annulled?

Anyway, happy that Barcelona advanced, and looking forward to a final against (probably) Manchester United :) Barcelona will be favourites, but you can't really dismiss United :)
 
Okay then take H?rcules game as a reference.

Saying Bar?a buys the refs is like the stupidest excuse for losing I've ever seen, sorry.
Specially when RM played in such way they were lucky not to end the game with 9 (the first leg)

Who says that Bar?a buys the refs? Only that most decisions go their way, as seen once again yesterday...

Anyway, good (not) to see that diving and playacting get so much love here, I'm my opinion are despicable pratices that go against the spirit of the game, what do I know...
 
Congrats ManU followers! :cheers:

See you the 28th.

Well done Man U, enjoy the Final at Wembley.
Good run in the UCL by Schalke, getting to the semis. :thumbup:

:cheers:

Man U 4 - 1 Schalke 04 (agg. 6 -1)
 
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