Football Season 2012/2013

[Valeron]

With how United are playing and how it seems Real Madrid are playing, I actually have some hope United might win their CL clash.

I'd say you have a very good chance. Although Madrid do play their best against the big teams this season so maybe. It'll be a great tie to watch though.

[Larath]

I'd say you have a very good chance. Although Madrid do play their best against the big teams this season so maybe. It'll be a great tie to watch though.

I think madrid have given up the league since its the spanish one and will trash united (one can hope right) :P

[Xanjori]

I have never seen that before, a player sent off for spitting. Spurs maybe even needed that, once again dominating possession but failing to score >.< We really miss Adebayor, just a big strong striker in the box makes so much difference.

---------- Post added 2013-02-03 at 03:56 PM ----------

God dammit fucking Bale is our only player capable of scoring goals atm. Gotta love him.

---------- Post added 2013-02-03 at 04:09 PM ----------

And David Pleat is being mocked by his own commentary partner now.

Pleat > "He has played for 3 London clubs now. Football clubs that is."

"As opposed to what other kind of clubs?"

---------- Post added 2013-02-03 at 04:25 PM ----------

Claiming this page for my own at this point.

I like Lloris a lot as a goalie, he may not be the biggest but he is very quick at dealing with situations, he can catch and seems very consistent.

Holtby looks to be similar, really solid player, has good technique and very industrial.

We just need a big player to be in the box sometimes, so we can cross the ball. Reminds me of the Arsenal play style, just trying to walk the ball in at times.

[Northern Goblin]

Spurs seem to lack a physical presence in the box, there's too much push on continental playstyle against a solid more physical English/German defence. It might have worked 15 years ago when a typical England defence was a rigid flatback four, but they've adapted without losing their physical nature.

I don't really see that physical threat in Tottenham these days.

[mirodin]

Damn Gerrard has a mean right foot.

[Northern Goblin]

10 years ago if you told me I'd be hoping for Liverpool to beat City, I'd laugh at you and say you're mad because that City weren't a team worth bothering about.

Today, I'm sat here cheering Liverpool on, I feel filthy.

---------- Post added 2013-02-03 at 05:48 PM ----------

Also I'll admit, I've mocked a lot of Liverpool signings in the last few years, but Sturridge has been a brilliant purchase so far.

[Xanjori]

Sturridge should be good for them. He may have a decent price tag attached but I think overall he may live up to it. Also yeah, strange times when Liverpool are taking points off Man City to keep City from chasing down Utd. Reina gonna be real disappointed, Liverpool coulda won that. Bit of a scrappy game though, not really a great showcase for either side.

[Valeron]

I wonder if Reina goes for that ball if Jose Enrique is still in the game

[Deleted]

Interesting story released today that it's believe that a European Champion's League match played in England over the last 3 or 4 years was rigged and players / staff / managers / officials could be banned. There's been no comment on which match it was, however.

[koodledrum]

Well to be honest it is a limited number of clubs which can be involved (Man Utd, Chelski, Arsenal, Spurs, Man City, Liverpool), IF these allegations are true then the club involved should be banned for minimum of 5 years from European competition, but in reality there is a better chance of me winning Miss World. It would not surprise me to hear that said match involved an Italian team, this shit is rife over there and ultimately the Italian FA might have tried to get it under control but it's now time to get serious on it. Any team caught involved in match fixing an IMMEDIATE no nonsense ban, that includes if it's discovered domestically, there needs to be a deterrent against this.

[Trixie]

Anyone else think Nacho Monreal could be a distant cousin to peter crouch? o.O

[Larath]

pretty hefty speculations that its liverpool and fiorentina that played in rigged games against hungarian side Debrecen, not really sure why you'd need to rig those matches though.

its the goalkeeper in debrecen who apparently is the guilty one here, fiorentina and liverpool were merely in the matches.

[Nerph-]

My phone Eurosport app notified me of the news... I then proceeded to read the comments and half of them were 'I wonder how many Manchester United titles are going to get stripped now!'.

Haters gonna hate -_-

[Larath]

My phone Eurosport app notified me of the news... I then proceeded to read the comments and half of them were 'I wonder how many Manchester United titles are going to get stripped now!'.

Haters gonna hate -_-

hey, we can only hope right :P but nah, its gonna take some serious amount of investigation to get to the bottom of this, it could be a huge deal, how would you deal with it though, cause I highly doubt that the clubs are in on it themselves, would you still punish say Debrecen or simply go after the player who made it (the keeper) and try to get whatever you can out of him.

[Northern Goblin]

From everything I've read, it seems the keeper was involved in a betting scandal. I don't think the club needs to be drawn into it, they're victims of it as much as anyone else, being backstabbed by one of your own players is a pretty low point for any club.

[Nerph-]

Couldn't agree more, if it's only the keeper the club should be left out of it...

[Northern Goblin]

55 years ago today, we still keep the red flag flying high.

[Larath]

we are playing Argentina today, gonna be fun I guess :P

just for reference, during the 2002 world cup, we played arguebly our best game of the 2000-2009 era against argentina and knocked them out in the group stages, fairly sure you were in that group aswell weren't you :P

[koodledrum]

Much as this is going to be unpopular, I will disagree with you on the fact the keeper needs to be punished but not the club, the player has a duty to inform the club of any approaches made to him, now that's where he's failed BUT I'll play devils advocate. The club have to be punished otherwise the players will perform similar "acts of forgetfulness" - this I don't buy for a second anyway, he knew he should have informed someone but clearly this was a lucrative venture for the guy and he was doing wrong, he didn't neglect to tell the club accidentally, he figured he was getting away with it. Now if you punish the club you essentially render it virtually impossible for clubs to tolerate any wrongdoing by saying "oh well, we didn't know", like it or not that club were involved, albeit involuntarily but they're involved in this and are claiming they weren't told - they're hardly going to say "we knew it all along" are they.

This is big money we're talking about, millions of pounds, with potential for billions, that's not something you can just punish the player & you NEED to crucify their club for this, ignorance is no defense they have to be punished as they provided an opportunity for the offense.

[Larath]

Much as this is going to be unpopular, I will disagree with you on the fact the keeper needs to be punished but not the club, the player has a duty to inform the club of any approaches made to him, now that's where he's failed BUT I'll play devils advocate. The club have to be punished otherwise the players will perform similar "acts of forgetfulness" - this I don't buy for a second anyway, he knew he should have informed someone but clearly this was a lucrative venture for the guy and he was doing wrong, he didn't neglect to tell the club accidentally, he figured he was getting away with it. Now if you punish the club you essentially render it virtually impossible for clubs to tolerate any wrongdoing by saying "oh well, we didn't know", like it or not that club were involved, albeit involuntarily but they're involved in this and are claiming they weren't told - they're hardly going to say "we knew it all along" are they.

This is big money we're talking about, millions of pounds, with potential for billions, that's not something you can just punish the player & you NEED to crucify their club for this, ignorance is no defense they have to be punished as they provided an opportunity for the offense.

the thing is though, how do you prevent anything like this as a club happening? thats right, you can't. only way to stop this would be if they locked the players up inside a cage between matches.