Football spam

[Nico]

Against who? I am completely out of the loop now.

[shred]

You mean the CL finals? It's ManU vs Barcelona.

[James]

May 10, 2011 11:58:47 GMT 10 shred said:

I don't fancy us winning either. Barca are just too good in my opinion.

Oh sure. Arsenal lost the title waaaay back in December.

I think Arsenal lost the title way later than December. They came to Newcastle and blew a 4-0 goal half time lead. They lost a 3-1 lead to Spurs about a month ago. They lost to Stoke recently and Bolton a couple weeks back too. They just have no fight in them at all. When the going gets tough they really crumble and never do they look like a team that's gonna be as brilliant as they can be for 90 minutes.

[shred]

Mathematically, yes, they lost it a couple of months ago.

But to me, I never saw them as a title challenger. Chelsea was always our closest rivals. I don't think the current Arsenal team has the mental strength to win the title in my opinion. Plus, they'll never do well if Wenger doesn't get off his high horse and start buying big name players - especially a goalkeeper!

[shred]

Congratulations to Ranger, Nico! ;D

[James]

I know it's nothing too major but Newcastle played valiantly against Chelsea yesterday and it was nice to have a good performance and get a result we deserved. =D

"There's only two Ameobis... TWO AMEOBIS" <3

[shred]

I'm very pleased with the Newcastle result, James!

[Nico]

May 16, 2011 18:40:09 GMT 10 shred said:

Congratulations to Ranger, Nico! ;D

Thanks Irene! I managed to watch the game online but it cut out right before they got the cup. I am hoping my parents remembered to pick me up the Monday morning paper with all the details & pics!!

[James]

May 17, 2011 11:51:42 GMT 10 Nico said:

May 16, 2011 18:40:09 GMT 10 shred said:

Congratulations to Ranger, Nico! ;D

Thanks Irene! I managed to watch the game online but it cut out right before they got the cup. I am hoping my parents remembered to pick me up the Monday morning paper with all the details & pics!!

Must be nice to win something...

I'm looking foward to next season already. Pardew (as much as I hate the man) isn't doing a terrible job and we have some pretty bad injury troubles. If we can work like we did on Sunday we could be promsiing next season especially if Mike "Who ate all the pies" Ashley injects some of the £35 million we got for Carroll into some good players.

[shred]

I'm still scratching my head as to why they hired Pardew. I thought the previous manager was doing well enough. :-\

[James]

We love Chris Houghton. Generally fantastic bloke and I hope he gets a new job soon, he deserves it.

[Deleted]

Speaking of managers, I'm not sure if I should be blaming Mourinho or the team in general (or someone else behind the scenes) for RM's lackluster season. They won the Copa del Rey, but lost the league title and, after playing Barcelona a total of 5 times this year (one with a very shameful scoreline), was knocked out of the Champions League. It is not my beloved Casillas' fault (of course ) and I can't even blame Benzema like I usually do because he actually started acting like a soccer player during the last part of the season. I wasn't thrilled with borrowing a player during Higuain's surgery, but I came around to that in the end, although I don't want him sticking around. I wasn't really thrilled with Mourinho's signings for the most part. They were all decent enough players (and Ozil seems to have been worth the money), but most of them haven't really been showing what they're supposedly capable of, at least not in the games I've been able to see. But, we actually won hardware this year, which is an improvement, so you can see the dilemma I have. Either way, I will be wholeheartedly rooting for Manchester United during the CL final.

I'm rather pleased with my Tottenham boys. My dear VDV is doing quite well there, so I'm no longer upset that Mourinho sold him, as he's really getting a good chance in England. I don't think he's ever had this much playing time while with RM. I believe I've seen more Tottenham games than Madrid matches (stupid American sports televising), which is disappointing, but my English boys have done well. They were fifth the last time I checked the standings, and top five is always respectable.

Both teams have just one more match to go. I will be trying to catch both. I know I can catch RM's season closer on my computer. I think I'm, unfortunately, at the whimsy of the sports network PTB for the Tottenham match because I'll only be able to see if it they replay it on Monday or Tuesday. But then we'll move onto the CL final and, ultimately, the off-season and trade rumors.

Madrid's already signed Nuri Sahin from Dortmund. I don't know anything about him, and after some of Mourinho's signings from this past season I'm very doubtful of any new players.

[James]

You gotta give Jose at least another season. As much as I can understand that people may get annoyed and irritated by him I'm a huge fan. The fact Porto won the champions league under his management (I challenge you to name 5 players from the squad that won it) shows that he knows what he's doing. He also brought success to Chelsea which some managers recently have proven it certainly isn't easy despite the endless investment. I really don't think it's a case of it being Real Madrid's fault I just think, right now, Barcelona are so so good.

As for your Tottenham team, the main problem I've seen from it is that all your good players are attacking midfielders, the likes of Van Der Vaart and Modric especially and when your team are defending they offer you absolutely nothing. A new keeper is a must; no doubt Gomes has all the attributes to be a top class keeper but his mistakes are far too frequent and costly. A new striker is needed too, Crouch isn't too bad and usually I'd be happy with Defoe but he just hasn't been on the ball this year and I'm not a fan of Pavale... (sp )

[shred]

The thing about Mourhino is that he doesn't give you a team that plays pretty football, like Barcelona or even Arsenal do. But he gets you results. He is one of the greatest managers out there and I won't be surprise if Madrid hit their stride with him next season. I would love for him to come and take over SAF.

As for Spurs, I agree with James. Too many attacking players not enough good defenders. I wonder how Bale would have done if he stuck with being a left back.

[Deleted]

I'm all for giving Mourinho another chance. I guess I just like the pretty Spanish style of football, as it was, after all, my first foray into the football world, and this is a much more down-to-business style, as you guys have mentioned. That and, after five matches against Barcelona with the league, Copa del Rey, and CL, we weren't able to earn a better record against them than we did. But I must admit Barca seemed to be on fire this season and ultimately that's what really did us in. We'll see if the new signings and off-season training sessions help the team to adjust a bit more. Having won the Copa means this season has shown a lot of promise and potential, so hopefully everyone just needs a little more time to adjust to one another. The up-and-down results were what frustrated me the most, but maybe that was just because it was a transitional year for the team. Of course, overall I'm proud of how they did, it's just that losing 5-1 at the hand of such teams as Mallorca (as a not-quite-accurate example) can be frustrating when Madrid should have no trouble in at least evening the scoreline.

I do agree about Tottenham. Too many players in similar positions. We'll see what they choose to do regarding signings during the off-season. I'm disappointed they finished fifth instead of fourth, as it means Europa Cup instead of Champions League, but top five is still good.

Madrid's made a couple more signings, the most noticeable being letting go of Dudek as backup keeper, although I cannot for the life of me find the announcement about the new keeper we signed, although I'm sure I saw one on the official RM site--not finding it now, though. The way they do their news page is awful--although I guess I could sort through it in Spanish. It would possibly go faster that way.

[James]

I was going to write something with a little length about tonights champions league final but...

Barcelona. Stunning.

Is the only thing going through my mind right now.

[shred]

Same here.

I'm not surprise with the result. Knew as soon as Barca were through to the finals, we'll lose to them. No complaints here. They were just superb. This is how football should be played. They deserved it.

Overall, I'm happy with our season.

[Deleted]

I thought Manchester United stood a fair chance, but the game was just beautiful. Barcelona was in top form tonight. They were on a whole other level. It was fairly won and deserved, but I was just a bit disappointed with the result.

[shred]

I'm glad we managed to score about against unlike the last time.

I can't see anyone stopping Barcelona for the next few years.

[Deleted]

Yeah, it looks like they'll be ruling Europe for a while. We shall have to wait and see what happens next season, but any team that does manage a win against Barcelona will certainly have to fight for it.