The Official Football/Soccer Thread: 2017-2018 Season
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unclesox:
Spain/Portugal believes they have 8 votes to host 2018 (12 votes are needed). But apparently Russia is the favorite to win the rights to host. Replays showed there was no offside on any of the goals. And I haven't heard any complaints of the C.Ronaldo 'penalty'. Poor Casillas was constantly looking at his defenders after each goal. Not just Marcelo, but Pepe... all of them. He was very frustrated, again. As for Mourinho, I think he stayed on the bench because he felt embarrassed the way his players were allowing their frustration show. Everytime the ball rolled out of play into Real's bench Mourinho never came out, something you never seen from him before. I'll give him credit for after the match when he shook the hands of Guardiola and all of the officials and then patted each of his players on the back trying to offer encouragement. Mourinho has always loved his players no matter how good or bad they play. I just don't like the way he talks to the media trying to play mind games with other teams, like when he was asked about Benzema and he said "Benzema isn't the most expensive player who hasn't scored goals. He was refferring to David Villa, but since then Villa has been scoring regularly including two on Monday. Sporting Gijon coach Manolo Preciado spoke for a lot of people a few weeks ago when he shared his disgust at the way Mourinho treats other teams. So now, after they get slaughtered 5-0, you don't like Real again.. lol :
it's not the result, it's the ways... Real was slaughtered at home too 2-6, that was worse but different. I'm not with this Real Madrid, the agressions and all that. There are no complaint about the offside and penalty for several reasons. There were lots of red cards not shown to Real Madrid players and the offside and penalty didn't matter much as Barça was way better, it was going to win one way or another. There are many things done wrong in Real Madrid these last years. Florentino's way and all that. But there are things that just... how do you say it English? The last straw?. One is the treatment to Raul, the 2nd most important player of Real Madrid history with a kind of hidden, silent farewell. With Raul on the team it would have never happened what happened yesterday. I don't mean the result, I mean the ways. He would have keep on fighting no matter what, you know, and get to steal some ball to Messi instead of trying to injure him. And the other is that. I don't know how many agressions there were yesterday coming from Real players, quite a lot. "If you're talking about destruction, don't you know that you can count me out"
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La Gazzetta dello Sport says Iniesta is gonna be the Golden Ball winner, 2nd will be Xavi and 3rd will be Messi. A radio station in Spain created a 12 years aged players tournament where we saw for the first time many of the ones that today are on the national team (Iniesta, Pique, Torres, Fabregas) And Iniesta was the most shocking one:
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Congratulations to Lionel Messi, Ballon d'Or winner for the second consecutive year. Lots of debate, however, on whether Xavi should have won it. The Spanish media seems very bitter that a Spaniard didn't win it since they won the World Cup. In fairness, Messi probably had the best individual performance of the three throughout the whole of 2010 even though his performance during the World Cup was not what many had expected. Maradona played Messi more in the attacking midfielder role which Leo does not play at Barcelona. Perhaps surprisingly, Iniesta finished second in the voting just ahead of Xavi.
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This is why i love football http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/9352496.stm
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nowords:
This is why i love football http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/9352496.stm
fantastic goal
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unclesox:
Congratulations to Lionel Messi, Ballon d'Or winner for the second consecutive year. Lots of debate, however, on whether Xavi should have won it. The Spanish media seems very bitter that a Spaniard didn't win it since they won the World Cup. In fairness, Messi probably had the best individual performance of the three throughout the whole of 2010 even though his performance during the World Cup was not what many had expected. Maradona played Messi more in the attacking midfielder role which Leo does not play at Barcelona. Perhaps surprisingly, Iniesta finished second in the voting just ahead of Xavi.
I don't have very much to say, I've never understood this prize, and I think I never will. I'm gonna do a XI with players that have never won the Golden Ball or the Silver or Bronze! Casillas Maldini, Baresi, Puyol, Roberto Carlos Koeman, Guardiola, Hierro Laudrup, Raul, Gento this makes more sense http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Soccer_(magazine)#The_100_Greatest_Players_of_the_20th_Century
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Remember "Where's Waldo"? Well, "Where's Cristiano Ronaldo"? Typical CR7. :
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well... Ujfalusi injury to Messi on Saturday was just the same he did to him not so long ago. this is the old video
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well, don't forget to prepare your fantasy football teams for next week, when the Champions League gets back. Spain played again a friendly in a not-interested way. The extraordinary moment, to go down in history is Bernabeu stadium, the Real Madrid one, ovationing Iniesta repeating his name again and again, like if he was Casillas or Raul. We've seen applauses to some Barça players in the Real Madrid but never something like this... maybe the older people... but I guess this never happened before. it was longer than this video shows...
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Some player gets back to his homeland tonight. Not the faster player ever, neither the stronger or the most skilled with the ball. But the sharpest and most combative one, the most spirited. Some fans have even traveled from Madrid to Valencia to see him play again. "The boy who does nothing"
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Valencia 1 - Schalke 1 Quite defensive match. Valencia created some attack only through his left wing and scored a goal like that at the first half. 2nd half, Good pass to Raul, into the penalty area, so you know, goal. Classic Raul goal, it was gonna be goal the moment when he received the ball... Lots of people from all parts of Spain when to Valencia's stadium to see Raul's comeback. Raul was wooed and whistled for the stadium, it seems some Valencia fans don't like him so much. They stopped wooing and whistling after he scored, yet another classical Raul scene. Raul becomes now the top scorer ever of the Champions League and of all the UEFA competitions. Milan 0-Tottenham 1 I don't know what happened but I think it has been a very violent match.
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21st Century Paul:
Milan 0-Tottenham 1 I don't know what happened but I think it has been a very violent match.
First half was all Tottenham but they couldn't score. Second half was all Milan but Tottenham scored on a quick counter attack late in the game. Gattuso shoved Spurs assistant coach Joe Jordan in the face in the second half when Jordan was on the touchline protesting a call, and when they resumed their yelling affair after the final whistle Gattuso gave Jordan a slight head butt. And yes the Valencia fans continued to whistle and jeer Raul after he scored due to his excited celebration. Typical Real Madrid player, always looking to incite the opposing fans. :
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unclesox:
And yes the Valencia fans continued to whistle and jeer Raul after he scored due to his excited celebration. Typical Real Madrid player, always looking to incite the opposing fans. :
That's just his typical celebration, same old. now this is Raul "inciting" the opposing fans... Raul tells the Barça's stadium to shut up. I think it happened just the same, lots of wooing until he scored.
Barça vs Schalke in quarterfinals? -
Arsenal 2 - Barça 1 For 60 minutes it seemed like another match of Barça of this season. Then Guardiola substituted Villa for Keita, quite defensive. And Arsenal did the oppossite and started to play with 4 creative midfielders and no defensive one. Fabregas, Nasri, Wilshere, Arshavin. Barça went a bit out of his style and Arsenal more into their own style, and being true to your style is what works in football 9 times out 10 no matter what. Probably Arsenal is the only team in many time that has passed-around the ball against Barça, forcing them to do what they're not used to or made to, run and defend. Sometimes Villareal, but with so many great passing players.
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On an absolutely gossip way... (music and football) Pique and Shakira confirmed their relationship, Pique posted this pic at his Twitter and Shakira has moved to Barcelona. both Puyol and Pique will miss the other match against Arsenal
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the Valencia-Schalke match has had twice the audience in Spain that a similar Valencia match in the Champions League. Kind of like a match played for Barça or Real Madrid... and only for the Raul comeback. The Raulmania is still alive. Actually, even after winning the World and Euro Cup, Del Bosque is wooed in many places for not calling Raul to the national team. Well, Raulmania is something beyond football, but one of these days we'll know what happened with Raul and the national team. Some say he didn't accept to be a substitute,
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21st Century Paul:
the Valencia-Schalke match has had twice the audience in Spain that a similar Valencia match in the Champions League. Kind of like a match played for Barça or Real Madrid... and only for the Raul comeback. The Raulmania is still alive.
With the Valencia match there was only one other match being played, and I doubt many Spaniards had an interest in Milan-Tottenham. Raul may have been part of the reason, but the options of what to watch was very limited.
21st Century Paul:
Well, Raulmania is something beyond football, but one of these days we'll know what happened with Raul and the national team. Some say he didn't accept to be a substitute,
He didn't want to be a substitute because he felt he was bigger than the team. Raul never performed well for Spain when the team needed him most. He played 18 matches in EURO and World Cup finals and only scored six times, none of those goals came during the knockout rounds (all in group phase). In EURO 2000 in the quarterfinal against France he had a chance to level the score in the final minute and shot the penalty over the bar. Without Raul Spain have won both the EURO and the World Cup. I know you're a big Raul fan and have a tough time accepting all of this, but the results speak for themselves. It's time to turn the page, yesterday.
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unclesox:
21st Century Paul:
the Valencia-Schalke match has had twice the audience in Spain that a similar Valencia match in the Champions League. Kind of like a match played for Barça or Real Madrid... and only for the Raul comeback. The Raulmania is still alive.
With the Valencia match there was only one other match being played, and I doubt many Spaniards had an interest in Milan-Tottenham. Raul may have been part of the reason, but the options of what to watch was very limited.
Valencia never had an audience like that in Spain (unless playing against Real Madrid or Barça), it was because of Raul, I guess some were not Raul fans but Raul anti-fans or so too, you know...
21st Century Paul:
Well, Raulmania is something beyond football, but one of these days we'll know what happened with Raul and the national team. Some say he didn't accept to be a substitute,
He didn't want to be a substitute because he felt he was bigger than the team. Raul never performed well for Spain when the team needed him most. He played 18 matches in EURO and World Cup finals and only scored six times, none of those goals came during the knockout rounds (all in group phase). In EURO 2000 in the quarterfinal against France he had a chance to level the score in the final minute and shot the penalty over the bar. Without Raul Spain have won both the EURO and the World Cup. I know you're a big Raul fan and have a tough time accepting all of this, but the results speak for themselves. It's time to turn the page, yesterday. Well, SPAIN never performed well when Spain needed the most (now it's the other way round). It's all a history of bad performances and missed chances. What is supposed is there is some reasons that are not related really with Raul's level as a player. The "bigger than the team" the "I don't want to be a substitute". But no player or coach has said something like that. And Raul has history of "perfect" behaviour in Real Madrid. Results have showed over the years that you can stop using your best player and win anyway. Probably the most shocking example is Denmark winning the Euro Cup and winning the EuroCup with Michael Laudrup (probably the best Danish player ever... ) at home because of coach's decision.
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21st Century Paul:
Well, SPAIN never performed well when Spain needed the most (now it's the other way round). It's all a history of bad performances and missed chances.
They performed well in the mid-80s but were quite unlucky. Lost the EURO 84 final to host country France, which was arguably France's best ever side with Platini, Giresse and Tigana. And they only went out of the 86 World Cup to Belgium on penalties.
21st Century Paul:
Results have showed over the years that you can stop using your best player and win anyway. Probably the most shocking example is Denmark winning the Euro Cup and winning the EuroCup with Michael Laudrup (probably the best Danish player ever... ) at home because of coach's decision.
It wasn't the coach's decision not to call Laudrup into the team. Laudrup had disagreements with coach Richard Møller Nielsen and voluntarily quit the team in late 1990. He made himself available for selection again in 1993 even though Nielsen was still the coach. The Denmark win at EURO 92 was a fluke in many ways, the biggest being that they didn't even qualify for the finals and only re-entered when Yugoslavia were forced to withdraw due to their civil wars.
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AS, the sports daily that is very much pro-Real Madrid, were forced to issue an apology after they had posted a photoshopped image that apparently showed Dani Alves being offside on Barcelona's first goal against Athletic Bilbao. Later the paper printed the correct image and cited a "computer glitch" as the reason for the mistake. How the heck does a computer eliminate a player from a photo without being programmed to do so? :