Todays Games

[L/H White]

1 hour ago, bolty58 said:

The Special One does it again. Please for the lad. Made history once more.

can we count  a 3rd tier poverty european competition?

stretching it abit for me

not his fault like

[gonzo]

54 minutes ago, Sweep said:

It's amazing to think that an Italian team hadn't won a European trophy in over a decade, but I think it just shows how utterly shit the Italian league is these days

 

Nah its miles above our league 🙄🤣

[Mantra]

Italian league seems to get a bit of a free pass from what I read.

Everyone always calls the German, Spanish and French Leagues 'farmers leagues'.

Never see Italy mentioned in that, but maybe they're just so irrelevant now since they haven't done anything in Europe for a while.

Juventus' era of domination seems to be ending so maybe it will become much more competitive now with Roma, AC, Inter, Juve, Lazio, Napoli 

[Mantra]

City might go invincible next season with this lad and Haaland up top 

[Tonge moor green jacket]

Some wonderful movement and timing there. Dodgy goalkeeping too, was crellin or Dixon in goal?

[bolty58]

3 hours ago, L/H White said:

can we count  a 3rd tier poverty european competition?

 

I would give my left arm to see BWFC win it. Third tier poverty league my arse. Leicester couldn't win it and they came 5th and 8th respectively in the last two PL seasons.

Hang on, I'd forgotten that you no longer identify yourself as a Bolton fan. As a glory hunting failed quadruple bandwagon jumper, maybe I do see your point.

[L/H White]

2 minutes ago, bolty58 said:

I would give my left arm to see BWFC win it. Third tier poverty league my arse. Leicester couldn't win it and they came 5th and 8th respectively in the last two PL seasons.

Hang on, I'd forgotten that you no longer identify yourself as a Bolton fan. As a glory hunting failed quadruple bandwagon jumper, maybe I do see your point.

i mean, its just a load of teams who pretty much have finished mid table

its worth as much as winning the charity shield imo

[bolty58]

3 hours ago, gonzo said:

Nah its miles above our league 🙄🤣

Has anyone on here actually said that? If so, they should lay off the hallucinogens. There isn't a league anywhere in the world at the moment which is even a millimetre above the Premier League by whatever yardstick you care to measure it with. They are all a way behind from what I can see.

Doesn't mean to say that watching a different style of football to the pace and power of PL football can't be enjoyable. The cat and mouse game of Southern Europe can be fascinating in its own way.

[bolty58]

1 minute ago, L/H White said:

i mean, its just a load of teams who pretty much have finished mid table

its worth as much as winning the charity shield imo

...and we are all entitled to one. Mine is that I saw history being made last night - in more ways than one.

[L/H White]

Just now, bolty58 said:

...and we are all entitled to one. Mine is that I saw history being made last night - in more ways than one.

I like Jose btw, love him probably

i just think this competition is worthless

it wont be long before teams in the bottom half have their own form of losers compeition to

[MickyD]

8 minutes ago, L/H White said:

i mean, its just a load of teams who pretty much have finished mid table

its worth as much as winning the charity shield imo

I just looked up past winners. It seems your beloved Liverpool haven’t won it since 2006. Is that why it’s worthless or would it have been a massive part of your attempts to win as many trophies in a single season if you’d won it at the start of this season?

[Pablo]

13 minutes ago, bolty58 said:

Has anyone on here actually said that? If so, they should lay off the hallucinogens. There isn't a league anywhere in the world at the moment which is even a millimetre above the Premier League by whatever yardstick you care to measure it with. They are all a way behind from what I can see.

Doesn't mean to say that watching a different style of football to the pace and power of PL football can't be enjoyable. The cat and mouse game of Southern Europe can be fascinating in its own way.

 

The Prem is far from the BEST.

We have the best 2 teams but that’s it…..the drop off after those 2 is massive....hence the huge number of points they are both getting.

The lack of competition at the top of the prem is embarrassing, from 3rd to 20th, its bang average.

The choreographed title race and VAR stuff every week is what makes the league “exciting”.

The money spent gives the illusion of the best, but its just not.

 

 

Edited May 26, 2022 by Pablo

[bolty58]

1 minute ago, L/H White said:

I like Jose btw, love him probably

i just think this competition is worthless

it wont be long before teams in the bottom half have their own form of losers compeition to

We shall see. Some of us lived through a long period of 3 European competitions and no one looks back at winning the Cup Winners Cup (Chelsea twice, Arsenal, Spurs, Man City, West Ham, DMB's, Everton, Rangers Aberdeen) or even the Inter Cities Fairs Cup (Leeds, Newcastle, Arsenal) as worthless.

You are displaying European Super League tendencies.

[L/H White]

1 minute ago, bolty58 said:

We shall see. Some of us lived through a long period of 3 European competitions and no one looks back at winning the Cup Winners Cup (Chelsea twice, Arsenal, Spurs, Man City, West Ham, DMB's, Everton, Rangers Aberdeen) or even the Inter Cities Fairs Cup (Leeds, Newcastle, Arsenal) as worthless.

You are displaying European Super League tendencies.

We all know who the real kings of europe are pal

The real european giants meet on saturday

[bolty58]

1 minute ago, Pablo said:

 

The Prem is far from the BEST.

 

We have the best 2 teams but that’s it…..the drop off after those 2 is massive....hence the huge number of points they are both getting.

 

The lack of competition at the top of the pre is embarrassing, from 3rd to 20th, its bang average.

 

The choreographed title race and VAR stuff every week is what makes the league “exciting”.

 

The money spent gives the illusion of the best, but its just not.

 

 

 

I'd be interested to know which you see as stronger overall at the moment? Not Spain or Italy. Bundesliga? Don't think so.

All of these top line managers in the PL at the moment (Conte, Klopp, Pep etc.) say the PL is the toughest and that there are no easy games. There seem to be a lot of easybeats in Spain, Italy, Germany and France these days.

[bolty58]

1 minute ago, L/H White said:

We all know who the real kings of europe are pal  Of course. I have supported them all of my life - COYFWM.

The real european giants meet on saturday I thought Real Madrid were playing your current adopted second team. I must have missed something - are Madrid playing Bayern, Juventus or Barcelona?

 

[Pablo]

Just now, bolty58 said:

I'd be interested to know which you see as stronger overall at the moment? Not Spain or Italy. Bundesliga? Don't think so.

All of these top line managers in the PL at the moment (Conte, Klopp, Pep etc.) say the PL is the toughest and that there are no easy games. There seem to be a lot of easybeats in Spain, Italy, Germany and France these days.

All of them, I recon you match up teams in similar positions, and the prem lose most of them.

What do you expect them managers to say, while employed in the prem, taking the prem money!?!

How on earth can it be that competative when the top 2 are getting 90+ points ?? That says NO competition at all.

Most teams dont even bother when they play Liv/City....teams even rest players against them as its already a loss.

[Tonge moor green jacket]

9 minutes ago, bolty58 said:

We shall see. Some of us lived through a long period of 3 European competitions and no one looks back at winning the Cup Winners Cup (Chelsea twice, Arsenal, Spurs, Man City, West Ham, DMB's, Everton, Rangers Aberdeen) or even the Inter Cities Fairs Cup (Leeds, Newcastle, Arsenal) as worthless.

You are displaying European Super League tendencies.

Back when there were those competitions, the European Cup was for league winners.

Nowadays other for also rans too.

Which devalues the next one and so on.

Chuck in leagues within those competitions and it's all a bit cack.

Whilst our European adventures were good and novel, the mini leagues made the games that bit less attractive, for most clubs it's become a bit devalued which can be seen in some of the team selections.

[Pablo]

1 minute ago, Tonge moor green jacket said:

Back when there were those competitions, the European Cup was for league winners.

Nowadays other for also rans too.

Which devalues the next one and so on.

Chuck in leagues within those competitions and it's all a bit cack.

Whilst our European adventures were good and novel, the mini leagues made the games that bit less attractive, for most ENGLISH clubs it's become a bit devalued which can be seen in some of the team selections.

 

Corrected it for you....

Pure English snobbery it is.

[gonzo]

Chelsea won champions league last season. Spurs were in final year before.

Theres not a chance in hell the Spanish league is better than the prem. Ive Watched la liga most Saturday tea times since I got my dodgy twig and some of the stuff on show sends you to sleep.

The only close call Id say is German. But still not for me. Bayern win the league by 12 points every season and dortmund limp to 2nd. The rest that follow arent a patch on our top 6/7.

The prem is miles more than just Liv and City. 

The bottom 3 this season mind is as bad as you'll ever see. All 3 made no attempt financially to stay up.

 

Edited May 26, 2022 by gonzo

[Sweep]

1 minute ago, gonzo said:

 

The prem is miles more than just Liv and City. 

The bottom 3 this season mind is as bad as you'll ever sea. All 3 made no attempt financially to stay up.

 

Norwich seem to have a business model of going up, coming down, going up, coming down and just pocketing the majority of the money. Over the last season, I'm sure I heard they had only spent about £25M, once you net the departures off against the arrivals. Still, I guess they're happy doing that, and not getting into shit loads of debt, when in reality they know they'll never really have a chance of winning the PL, or even qualifying for the CL

[Johnnyrotten]

1 hour ago, L/H White said:

I like Jose btw, love him probably

i just think this competition is worthless

it wont be long before teams in the bottom half have their own form of losers compeition to

I'm with you on that (the competition, not Mourinho).  They could have a competition for teams that finished 12th to 14th and it would be really difficult to win, you'd end up playing biggish teams like Villa, Espanyol, Eintracht Frankfurt, Torino.  If you won it, it could be your clubs greatest ever achievement.  I just don't get why anyone that doesn't support that club would care about it any differently to who wins the Papa Johns.

[Mantra]

It's an interesting debate but also a pointless one as the standard changes so often and depends on many factors. If we're matching up all the teams this season so 9th in the Prem plays 9th in La Liga, you could probably play that fixture 10 times and have a relatively even split of wins/draws/losses imo. You also get teams that underperform and overachieve every season. Wasn't long ago that Burnley were in Europe and then been flirting with relegation for last 3 years.

And if you want to talk about the competitiveness at the top, generally the Prem has been the most competitive in modern times. Yes, the top 2 have pulled away a bit recently but Bayern have just won their 10th in a row, France is a one horse race, La Liga has basically been the City/Liverpool thing but with Barca and Real for a lot longer.

Far more foreigners care about the Premier League than English fans care about their leagues. Call that snobbery if you want but you can't deny that it's also due to the competitiveness of the league. Right now it's a City/Liverpool era, but in 5 years it will probably not be that. Newcastle are going to chuck a ton of cash at it. Klopp and Pep might go elsewhere.

Even though the other 4 from the big 6 can't get close to them at the minute, you've still got them all fighting for two Champions League places and essentially a few points being the difference between disaster and success. 

[Mantra]

The conference league may hurt competition across all leagues as the whole Thursday/Sunday European matches are often described as being a negative for clubs trying to break into the CL spots. 

So now with another place in europe going to the best of the rest, it may cause them to underperform in the league as they try and balance their squad for the added fixture list

[Tonge moor green jacket]

2 hours ago, Pablo said:

 

Corrected it for you....

Pure English snobbery it is.

I was only talking about English clubs.

Don't really know enough about foreign ones.

Not sure about snobbery, it's a financial concern for a lot of clubs that the prem has to be the be all and end all. Which again points to too many average teams being in Europe.