Talk Elections

England ties Isreal today


How long until McClaren is booted?

I haven't seen the press reaction today, but I'd suggest (despite the very poor results to date) that he will hold on until the end of this qualification run (or as long as England have a reasonable chance of qualification).

In Dublin, also under pressure Steve Staunton has managed to hold onto his job for another 4 days at least with a lacklustre 1-0 win over a really poor Welsh side, in the first ever soccer international at Croke Park. Going into this weekend, the general media consensus was that Staunton would need to beat both Wales and Slovakia (on Wednesday) to hold on.

Is this a discussion of NFL Europe? Go Rhine Fire! ;)

Scotland got the 2-1 victory over Georgia they needed. We still sit atop the group but have to face Italy next :(

Lol.

They look good though, they're taking thier wins when they can, they look good for the long run.

Scotland will qualify... so might Northern Ireland (if Spain continue to fluff it in their group)... but i dont see England pipping either Russia or Croatia, not under MaClaren, he was noone's pick to replace Sven, just a compromise and to be honest thats only part of the problem, the entire FA is in need of an overhaul... on the plus side failure to qualify will open the door for Wenger. 

a little off topic..


U.S.A. 3
Ecuador 1

not like it matters, but still

England is going to fail to qualify. Sweden on the other hand is looking very good. I'm rooting for Northern Ireland to come with us! Or maybe Denmark. Just as long as Spain gets knocked out, I'll be happy. Too bad they won their last game against Denmark.

About three more games, then? :)
I saw the last sixty minutes of that game, then I saw all of Lithuania vs France afterwards. Ireland vs Wales was several times more entertaining than that really lacklustre game.

McClaren is going to be around until its confirmed that England CANNOT qualify for Euro 2008.

The English FA don't like to look bad. In their delusional minds it would seem like keeping McClaren around until he runs the team into the ground would be a better course of action than admitting that they made the wrong choice and to replace him.

I'd agree Sweden are flying at the moment, well clear at the top of their group... I'd like to see N.Ireland qualify though, and Spain's form is simply bizzare when you consider the players they have avalible, more so than England IMHO.

Well let's takes a look.

Next up, away to Andorra on Wednesday. Well, anything less than 3 points would almost certainly see McClaren resign - but I'll be generous and presume an away win.

Then away to Estonia on 6 June. Estonia are 0 for 4 at the minute so again 3 points to be expected. Again must win game, anything less may lead to a forced resignation.

Their third game isn't until 8 September, at home against Israel in Wembley. On paper should be a comfortable win. In practice, may be anything but. Anything less than a win, would make topping the group exceedingly difficult and coming second a real struggle.

So, McClaren will need at least win, win, draw to survive in the next three. Though if he makes if until the Israel game, I'd imagine he'll still be in charge for the Russia game on 12 September in Wembley. By which point, win, win, win may be enough to let him away with a draw against the Russians, but win, win, draw, would probably require a win against the Russians to hold on.

Glad I missed it then.

I´m really looking forward to tomorrow's game:

France vs. Austria in Paris

And I have to say that Austria is very, veeerrry baaad when it comes to soccer. The last time we beat France was in 1970, home, in Vienna.

The game Austria vs. Ghana last Saturday was quite OK I think with a 1:1 draw.

But I don´t expect a draw or a win in Paris tomorrow :P

Well, tonight is the night. Tough away game against Northern Ireland, BUT with Zlatan Ibrahimovic back on the team again after his conflict with the coach. If we win this it would take a lot to prevent us from qualifying. So I really hope we do.

France vs. Austria starts in 10 minutes.

I predict a 3:1 win for France. See you later ! ;)

1:0 for France. I´ve seen worse games by Austria though. We just lost because of a bad mistake in the defense :P

The surprise was Denmark beating Germany 1:0, even if it was their B-Team :)

Ireland 1-0 Slovakia
:)
Much better performance than the last few games. Keeps a tiny little bit of hope alive for qualification.

N Ireland 2-1 Sweden
:o
Amazing first goal by Healy.
Amazing result.
NI top of the group with some serious teams in it.
Lawrie Sanchez is a miracle worker.

Andorra 0-3 England
As a result, in and of itself, no surprise. But the first half efforts of England were awful. Really awful. Luckily for them Mr. Gerrard played very well int he second half.

Terrible, terrible. Still, we have one game less played than Northern Ireland, so there is still hope. But the group is becoming a real rat hole now with Spain and Denmark creeping closer and closer. If we can tie Denmark in the away game and beat Iceland in the home game in June I think we still have a very good chance though.

Amazing second goal by Healy. You forgot to mention that.
I sort of went through all the groups and predicted who'd come through, based on standings so far, and then noticed with a shock that I had just predicted a Euro without British Isles participation... after two very close calls against British teams (plus two more who still have a decent chance) ... but the really shocking part is, the second most likely scenario is that the British Isles will be represented by Northern Ireland only. :o

Absolutely brilliant play by Liverpool and especially Crouch, he hasn't looked that good in a very long time, perhaps he should break his nose more often.

I agree 100%. I right now think it is more likely for Northern Ireland than for England to reach the EC.

Today 2 Champions League Quarter Finals:

AC Milan (ITA) vs. Bayern Munich (GER)

PSV Eindhoven (NLD) vs. Liverpool (ENG)

Any predicitions ?

My predicition: Milan wins 2:1 and Liverpool wins 2:0

Looks pretty good.

Today:

AS Roma (ITA) vs. Manchester United (SCO)

Chelsea (NIR) vs. Valencia (ESP)

My Prediction:

1st game = draw (1:1)

2nd game = Valencia wins 2:1

???
Have there been major border redrawings that I missed?

With Scotland having Manchester and Northern Ireland taking London, does England still exist? :P

A late April joke, just wanted to see if anybody is noticing it ... :P

Gee, you should follow the news more closely. Chelsea have relocated to Belfast.
The Scottish-English border was moved to the Trent in exchange for the release of 15 English soldiers by Scottish authorities.

Utd. goes down hard to Portsmouth, great result.

Why can't Chelsea and Man United both lose the premiership?

Anyway Come on Roma and Valencia!

When does NFL Europe start? :P

For once, you and I are in total agreement.

Its actually NFL Germany + Amsterdam ... ;)

PS: It starts next Saturday, April 14.

Seriously though, how popular is it over there?

American football? Let me put it like this. I've never met, seen nor even heard of anyone who plays it anywhere in Europe. :P

Have you ever watched it yourself? The main problem that most Americans seem to have with soccer is that it doesn't have enough offense. Americans love high scoring games...maybe soccer should play with no goalie or one of the players drops back to goalie. :P

I've seen it on American movies...and I've played a little rugby. The problem is that it seems to one-dimensional. It's just people running into each other trying to get a ball a certain distance. Now, soccer is much more tactical and refined. ;)

Not very popular. Just professionally played in bigger cities (above 100.000 inhabitants - at least in Austria) But I like to watch the SuperBowl each year with a friend of mine. Last time we had some girls with us who watched the game with us, but they fell asleep after half an hour. Remember, the Superbowl starts at midnight here, local time.

Austria has some good teams in the EFL (European Football League). The Vienna Vikings got the dynasty last year, by winning the Eurobowl 3 times (2004, 2005, 2006).

Actually the playbooks of both the defense and offense are very complicated with quite often hundreds of unique plays per side per team.

I've seen a few American football games (and made a few half hearted attempts to play). It's certainly one of the more enjoyable American sports to watch, but my biggest problem with it is the interminable number of pauses and breaks in play, which results in endless commercial breaks (ARGH!).

On the last part you are most definately correct! I know in highschool ball they have a rule that if the game goes over 21 points on one side the clock continues running unless a timeout is called. But American football does have way way to many commercial breaks.

I know you're being tongue in cheek here, but to a lot of people that actually is the "beauty" of football/soccer. The emotional investment that goes into scoring a goal, and when your team does score it's just f***ing beautiful. Seriously, nothing can compare to the feeling of being in a stadium and going wild with thousands of other fans when your team scores. It wouldn't be the same if there was a goal every other minute.

Anyway, I actually enjoy watching American football, but like Jas said, I'd probably enjoy it a lot more if there weren't so many breaks. Out of all US sports I definitely like watching basketball the most. Go Sonics!

States my friend you know no one enjoys American football more than you Harry and I, but do not hijack my thread about soccer...

and NFL Europe is horrible

Exactly. The game is so retarded and untactical (compared to soccer) that it can actually be broken down into repeatable situations like that - although granted there's quite a lot of them.
Of course, the whole bit about the breaks ties in here as well. If you scratched the play on rule and bookings for "tactical fouls" in soccer, it'd probably degenerate AF-like (except with even fewer goals than now) pretty quickly.

NFL Europe is basically a farm league of the NFL's, so of course you'd expect lower quality playing, wouldn't you?

Yeah. A goal is better than sex.

Man United really took it to Roma today. Unfortunately Chelsea got another last minute goal to beat Valencia. Is it just me or do Chelsea always, always score when they absolutely have to? :(

I like Chelsea but I must say what a great result for M Utd and for England, UEFA needs to take a lesson and ban Italy from participation until they can clean up their act like England did.

Great job.

Best Man U performance I've seen in a long time. Destroyed Roma after a fairly tame performance over 48 hours before in losing to Portsmouth.

By far the best Michael Carrick has ever played for them, very good effort by Alan Smith too. Wayne Rooney, though, still not playing at the level he can.

That was a thrashing. Hopefully this will carry on into the FA Cup Semi-Final.

(I don't actually care who wins that match, provided it doesn't go into extra time. If it does, we'll have to wait an extra week for the third episode of Doctor Who)

Oh God was that a great game. I love the English Stadium Atmosphere. Unique.

Have a watch:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eu8ckDxgUK4

Simply great ! :)

YES! Bayern are out.

Chelsea edges out another win today, I thought for a moment Terry was going to start throwing fists again.

German cup semifinals coming up.
Tuesday Nuremberg vs us (I'm going!)
Wednesday Wolfsburg vs Stuttgart.

If we win and Stuttgart wins, we're back in Europe. Well not technically yet, but Stuttgart would have to take a maximum of 2 points from the remaining five games to drop to sixth place - and even that only if Leverkusen wins everything and Nuremberg wins everything except their upcoming away game to Leverkusen. So we'd probably be officially back in Europe by next weekend.

Today it was announced that Poland/Ukraine are hosting the 2012 European Football Championships.

It´s the 3rd time 2 states combined are hosts after Belgium/Netherlands in 2000, Austria/Switzerland in 2008 and now Poland/Ukraine in 2012.

That didn't go too well...

Horrible, Horrible, Horrible, HORRIBLE events are occuring at this moment in time, Unspeakable really.

Though the plus side is now Chelsea won't do the three in a row.

Yes, Liverpool qualifing for another Champions League Final is indeed horrible.

Surely not, United winning the title instead of Chelsea - good :)
Sunderland promoted under the guidance of the legend that is Roy Keane (who did turn around the awful work of the evil McCarthy) - excellent! ;D

Charlton were relegated today, they fought very very hard, and I feel bad for Alan Pardew, who hit a bad patch at West Ham and was fired, only to very nearly pull a poor Charlton out of the pits, I like him, I think their chances in the Championship next year are good, I hope they're back up soon.

Today Champions League Final:

AC Milan vs. Liverpool

In their rematch of the legendary 2005 Final in Istanbul, when Liverpool kicked their @ss. One of the best games I´ve ever seen.

I hope Liverpool wins again today :)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=1oIPrGbsfvw

And I hope that Milan have their revenge today :).

Well... the game has just finished, Milan played better, but what in the hell is the deal with the referee ending the game before MINIMUM stoppage had passed? Benitez has good reason to ask for an explanation.

Congrats to Milan, I still hate Italian football, they're horrible examples, and AC Milan doesn't deserve to be in competition this year.

This year, despite all the star power, has been a poor year for English clubs (even if you're a Man Utd. fan) I think next year will be a million times better.

No such thing as "minimum stoppage". Nor anything unusual, at least in the Bundesliga, about the game ending up to 30 seconds before the referee's earlier estimate of how much he'll grant. (Which is all that figure on the sign is.)

Strongly agree.

Strongly disagree.
Liverpool, Chelsea and Man United made the Semi Finals of the Champion's League. This can't be brushed off as poor.

I agree that we did well in the Champions league, but we lost, and the Prem was boring this year, only two teams ever has a shot, Arsenal wasn't competitive, Liverpool stopped caring many weeks before the end (try Christmas) and West Ham cheated and no justice was done.

Grrr, Lucky Lombardian Pizza Bakers !

The Premier League (the championship that is, not relegation etc) has not been entertaining since... well ... since it has been the Premier League.
Not that Bundesliga, Serie A, Ligue 1, Primera División etc are any better.

Performance of teams in the Champion's League is a reasonably objective (or at least about as objective as is possible) measure of how strong the top teams in any particular league are.

Yes, Milan won, but by brushing off the fact that 3 Premiership teams made the semis - in describing it as a poor year for English clubs - this implicitly means that every other league (bar Serie A) had a 'poor year'. What exactly would make it a 'good year'?

As to the internal Premiership competitive balance, it's probably not fair to say that only two teams ever have a chance, things change from year to year. This year, Arsenal suffered because of Henry's injury trouble - had that not been the case, they could have been  serious challengers.

As for Liverpool, they stopped playing in the Premiership only when they got to the Champion's League semi - due to the importance of the semi (and later the final); and because it was only around that stage that they were solid for a top 4 finish and so qualification again next season (To say they stopped at Christmas is hardly fair, considering they were four for four in January).

Finally, as to West Ham, sure there was some sort of malarchy over the transfers, but I'm actually glad that it was the results on the pitch that decided matters, not some technical flaw in the transfers.

I supported Milan, but even I can't claim that they played better. Especially in the first half, their attack was feeble, and their defense not much better. Liverpool could easily be two up by the break and the goal was totally against the run of the play.
In the second half Milan did play better, but it's usually easier to play better if you're in the lead.
I agree that Milan didn't deserve to be in the Champions League: what use was their punshment if it didn't deprive them of their main source of income?

Beckham back in the England squad :o

Really? :o

That's fun, it isn't the same without him.

Less than a week till the next round of qualification games now! I sure hope we can beat Denmark...a tie would be ok, but a loss could be it.

I guess we can use this thread for the Euro Cup discussions...

Good news.

England 1-1 Brazil


Not the win that would have saved McClaren, but a good sign nonetheless.... you would think they could have held Brazil off for few more seconds though....


Beckham was in fine form, I hope he can continue producing like that.


In very sad news, Giggs has quit the Wales national team, he was one of a few bright spots for the team, I can hope sometime soon we can build a good young team, but for now, Wales stays at the bottom.

Representation of European Nations in first full round of European Cups (CL+UEFA), assuming Sevilla doesn't slip up against AEK (game was postponed for a week. In case of a sensation, Spain is 3+5 and Greece is 2+4):

Scotland 2 + 1
England 4 + 4
Netherlands 1 + 5
Belgium 0 + 3
France 2 + 5
Spain 4 + 4
Portugal 3 + 4
Norway 1 + 2
Sweden 0 + 5
Finland 0 + 1
Denmark 0 + 4
Germany 3 + 4
Switzerland 0 + 3
Austria 0 + 3
Italy 4 + 4
Poland 0 + 1
Czech Republic 1 + 2
Slovakia 0 + 1
Croatia 0 + 1
Bosnia 0 + 1
Serbia 0 + 1
Macedonia 0 + 1
Greece 1 + 4
Turkey 2 + 2
Cyprus 0 + 1
Israel 0 + 1
Bulgaria 0 + 3
Romania 1 + 2
Ukraine 2 + 2
Belarus 0 + 1
Russia 1 + 3

Basically confirming what we already know.. the leagues outside the big five or so in Western Europe continue to get shafted.

Big Six. Portugal counts.

The system for determining places can be unfair as it zooms in one one season and if you'r country performs poorly that season it relects that in the few seasons afterwards. It happened to Scotland last time round :) I'm pleased we secured two Champions League spots and on recent form, we should hold them.

Look forward to seeing this as a regular occurance in Rangers' and Celtic's Away Champions league Group Schedule

Scottish Away Matches
Played - 6 Won - 0 Drew - 0 Lost - 6 Points - 0

:P

But I wanted Red Star to win. And Lewis, Portugal is just living of FC Mourinho's former glory once that goes off the UEFA points (alright, co-efficients) then...

And on the fact that there's no difference between fourth and sixth place. Of course, look at Romania's recent jumps... this year's qualification stages show very well that the country doesn't have more than three clubs able of competing... however well those three have recently done.

True but it stagnates progress by all other clubs outside the elite... Before the Champions league was started nearly every second year (especially after the ban on the English clubs) would see a new champion who had never won it before - In that period clubs like Steaua Bucharest and Red Star Belgrade could win the trophy. Since 1997 there hasn't been a single new name on that big earred cup.. Real Madrid three times winners since, Milan twice and almost no winners outside Italy, Spain, England and Bayern Munich (Porto was a one-off..)

You and half of Glasgow ;)

And alot of Ireland too I imagine. ;)

And for the Record, I wanted Spartak Moscow to win too. I have no general fondness for the bigot brothers.

I don't think it sets a good example to want a Russian team involved with mafia elements and past threats to lives of players and their families to beat Celtic ;D Besides, Celtic have a clean bill of health on tackling sectarianism with the help of organisations like Nil By Mouth this past decade. Besdies, the agression between themselves and Rangers is no where near like the firewall of agression between Rangers and Aberdeen :P

NFL Europa was shutdown fellas...


oh, that's not what youre talking about.

I don't really think it's right to blame the big leagues for their success. It certainly isn't their fault that... for example, the Irish leagues...are hopeless.

Nyes. The exact rules on how many clubs can start depending on a country's coefficient were made up after the hierarchy of leagues developped after all.

I was really referring to Eastern Europe rather than Ireland.. Ireland's just too damn small to have anything other than a glorified version of twenty-two lads in the park for some Friday night kickabout.

Also what Lewis said was accurate. The Spanish League was awful in the 70s and 80s (Despite having more money than most other leagues.. but not THAT much more money, like now.)

Well, I don't really buy the argument that it's because we're too small. I actually think that it's due to the complete dominance of the GAA. Consider the number of guys playing week in, week out in Gaelic Football and Hurling.

So long as football is the 3rd (maybe even the 4th sport after rugby) here, then our clubs are likely to remain ultra-marginal in the European context, unless some form of major re-structuring took place...á la the Celtic League in Rugby.

We also lack (or rather, lacked) a rather big Industrial\Working class city where football could have taken off strongly. In most medium sized Decent-European leagues the big clubs tend to be just one or two big cities - Portugal, Holland, Russia, Romania... etc. (LOL@ At the first person who might suggest Dublin in this thread.) Of course the Gah is an influence, but look at the North where the Gah influence only grow began to grow in the 60s (it's now dominant in the more nationalist counties o\c) hardly a footballing superpower.. Though I guess George Best may beg to differ. The amateurism of the clubs until recently would be much bigger.

Of course now the best the Irish leagues can aim for is perhaps the middle tier of obscurities (or we get a Dublin based Franchise and put into the English league Championship somehow.. but I can't imagine going down very well across the channel...)

Any thoughts on the European qualifiers?

I'm pretty ok with Sweden's point against Denmark and very happy about Spain failing to get one.

I am, shall we say...less than pleased, with our draw with Slovakia. Shambolic.
And whose fault is it?

()
No need to check your watch Steve, it's time to go.

---

Elsewhere, the North were unfortunate against Latvia, they deserved better on the day. Hugely dents their changes at progressing, redeemed somewhat by the Spanish failure against Iceland.

Saw a bit of the England and Scotland games, both did fine against relatively poor opposition. Not sure if anything much can be read into either game.

Real men like NFL. Soccer is for people who can't handle the NFL.

I fell asleep watching Germany-Wales.

I'm looking forward to the end of year when John Delany tells us once again he'll hire a world class manager.. which means this time it will be John Aldridge. I could have told you all that was going to happen after Kerr left unfortunetly. :(

I've been really rooting for NI, but sadly I doubt they will make it through. They will have to beat Iceland and then get at the very least one tie in the two away games against Spain and Sweden (as well as beating Denmark on their home ground) in order to have any sort of a chance. I still hope Spain will fail to qualify though.

:(

Not that it was unexpected but still...

:(

ONE- NIL!!!!!! :D

Yeah, just saw that. Knock those sore losers out, will ya.

England seem to have found their stride just in time as well.

Time for the FAI to evict Mr. Delaney and his "world class management team".

And replace them with Clueless Hack #1248 and John Aldridge.. as that is what would happen, sadly.

I still think we should never have sacked Kerr.. (or rather; we should have shot all the Keano-loving media which hounded Mick McCarthy out of the job in the first place.)

I can't believe it.. but it's six years since Jason McAteer scored against the Dutch. :(

You never know. The job isn't as unappealing as it was when Staunton took over. Reasonable group of young players coming through, and it looks fairly certain that we'll be 3rd seeds in the next World Cup qualification draw. Qualification and success should be easier.

But, if they're really stuck, I'd do it. :)


Kerr's sacking may have been premature. I thought at the time it was a bit of a 50-50 call, myself. That though was predicated on the belief that a reasonably good manager would be brought in...

And as to Irish Civil War II, from your comments, I suspect we would have been on different sides, so I'll leave that one alone. ;)

Id gladly hire you as Ireland manager.

I don't really see how it's more appealing now.. How many of our players by 2009 really have a good record in big pressure games - by then how many will be WC2002 leftovers? Not many - will Damien Duff ever play well for Ireland again? Unlikely. Will we have a new strategy then will somehow create a forcefield around our goal during the 90th minute - because I think that's our best chance for WC2010?

And who the bloody hell in the whole of Ireland is actually competent enough to run the FAI?

As I don't correspond much with traitors; I'll leave the rest of our commentary alone. ;)

So I can put you down as an undecided then to be my assistant when I submit my application then? ;D

Taking a look at the squad re:2009...
Given should still be there. At the back Finnan is now 31, so he'd be fit (and make the team) at least until 2010 - it's just a matter of making sure he doesn't retire from internationals. Kilbane at 30 is a similar concern but I suspect he'll keep playing as long as he can. Apart from that Dunne; McShane; O'Shea will be available for years. A back four of Finnan; Dunne; McShane and Kilbane should be competent.

In the middle the only realistic chance of a retirement is Carsley. The rest are all fairly young. In fact, their problem is largely lack of experience. Reid, Hunt and Duff are likely to be a part of things. Beyond that, we'll have to see how Ireland; McGeady; Douglas; Potter and Gibson develop. 4 good midfielders shouldn't be an unreasonable expectation.

Keane and Doyle will also be around for a while yet. I also have big hopes for Shane Long - i think he's potentially better than either of them.

This list contains some solid attacking players who can produce the necessary moments of flair to break a game open. I just don't think Steve Staunton is fit to lead them.


Good question. Unfortunately I've no answer to that one.


;D

Ack... I'm sorry but we're in trouble if one of our most experienced players is Kevin Kilbane. (No doubt whoever is Irish Manager come late 2008 will continue to play him; due to the 2nd Commandment of Irish Football: "Thou Shall always Play Kevin "Zinedine" Kilbane".) Duff and Keane.. well.. their Ireland form has been patchy at best since McCarthy left and IIRC since then the best team we have beaten in a competitive game are Slovakia; then Georgia.. hardly an impressive list.

IYRC when Mick McCarthy took over after Jack Charlton we were utterly gash for the entire of France 98' Qualfying... Playing that Man U traitor as sweeper, drawing with Iceland, losing in Macedonia.. and we only managed to make the play-offs because our major rival for them in our group was Lithuania, and then we got fairly owned by Belgium. But over time McCarthy managed to dramatically improve the Irish squad, admittely he did have some of the old 94' base and that Man U playing guy in the centre of Midfield (He was quite good... I think.) but the only way we can have any success as if we stop pretending we are a big football nation and just accept that we're not likely to qualify much and that we appoint managers to last at least four years so that they and only they can build the team - The nature of International football is such that team soliditary is a huge part of success; much more than at Club level and you can't have that if you sack your manager after every game. Though perhaps I would have thought differently I hadn't been in Sligo the day we lost 5-2 to Cyprus.

But hey Given the nature of the FAI and the desirability of the Ireland Job right now, I'd say you have a good shot. ;)

Well, goodness knows, it took a long time for me to forgive him after the '02 WC match v. Spain, but he's not that bad. Obviously, you can't expect miracles from him, and he's never going to be the star of the side, but he's a competent player and worthy of his place. Unless and until the next generation (mentioned above) come through, he's acceptable.


I'll grant you that for Duff (though I think he hasn't performed to potential for his club(s) either in the same timeframe). Keane blows hot and cold, again, much like for his club, but again the potential is most definitely there.


I agree that, in general, managers should be given time to develop their teams. However, Staunton should never have been appointed to begin with, by any football side, to manage things. He simply isn't up to it. Giving him time, IMO, only digs the hole deeper and drags out the mistake.

McCarthy, much as I blame him completely for Siapan, wasn't a brilliant manager, but he certainly had a level of competence, which I don't credit Staunton with. I don't accept that they are comparable.

I cringe every time I see/hear an interview with Staunton. It's reminiscent of George W, in his ability to convey a complete disengagment with the situation or pertinant issues. IMO he is clearly very far out of his depth and we can do better.

No I don't think Kilbane is that bad; I just find it amusing that's almost never, ever dropped for such an average player.

Generally I actually agree with what you say; but unless we have a replacement for Staunton what can we do? (And again who would want the Job?)

Things are heating up for the final rounds coming later on. I'm rooting for France+Scotland, Finland+Serbia, Sweden+Denmark, Norway+Greece and England+Croatia in the still contested groups (I'm counting Romania+Holland and Germany+Czech Rep. as safe). I think Italy, Portugal, Spain and Turkey are gonna make it though, probably knocking out Finland Denmark, Norway and France/Scotland (can't make up my mind there).

Bye, Bye Stan! (http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/breaking/2007/1024/breaking1.htm)

"I'm the boss. I'm the gaffer. At the end of the day what I say goes. The buck stops with me."
So said Stan at his first press conference when he was unveiled by the FAI as the new Irish manager after they promised to bring in 'world-class' management.

()

This morning he is no more - hurrah!! ;D

So, how long till we appoint John Aldridge?

We dare not even suggest such things!

Scotland have moved to within two places of England in the FIFA world rankings, to 13th place behind England at 11th. While the rankings themselves are questionable, they do count when it comes to 'seeding' teams for future competitions.

Which is why our game against Wales is still important. We're hanging onto a third seeding but if results go against us, then we'll face a heck of challenge qualifying for 2010.

Anybody else seen the Scotland vs Italy game?

Pre-game situation: It's Scotland's last game. If Italy wins, Italy and France qualify. To get to my personally preferred outcome of Italy and Scotland qualifying, Scotland would need at least a draw and France would have to lose their last game against Ukraine on wednesday. (And Italy need to win their last match against Andorra wednesday, but that's a formality.) Scotland winning today and France at least drawing their last game gives us Scotland and France. I forget what happens if this game draws and France doesn't lose. Not that it matters as things turned out.

Synopsis of important situations during the game:
2nd minute: Italy go up 1-0.
17th or so minute: Scots want a penalty for hand play, which isn't granted, probably correctly all things told.
30th or so minute: Italy go up 2-0. The linesman claims to have seen an offside position somewhere. No one knows how he came up with that - at no point during the entire scene was any Italian behind the last Scottish defender. No goal.
65th minute: Scotland equalize. This was actually offside, though hard to see.
Injury time: Italy, who by now seem happy enough with the draw actually, get awarded a highly dubious free kick that leads to them going up 2-1.

Synopsis on German tv (three hours after the game), in chronological order:
Weeping Scotland fans.
Scottish players coming out again 15 minutes after the game.
Endless harping on the strange free kick.
Italian 2-1
More harping on the strange free kick, complete with short excerpts from interviews and a castaway remark about how Italy "always" seem to have that kind of luck.
Italian 1-0.
The handplay scene - they admitted it wasn't really a penalty, I'll grant 'em that.
The game's best chance besides the goals (for Scotland, in the 45th minute)
Scotland's 1-1, shown from an angle where you couldn't guess the offside unless you knew about it beforehand, with no mention of offside.
Italian 2-1 again.
Some sanctimonious words about how success might cool tempers in Italy - as if club tifosi cared about the national team. Especially when there's more important issues around. As if the police should be allowed to get away with murder (literally, in case you haven't heard). Now that's when I really blew my top.
(Notice they left out the incorrectly called off Italian goal entirely.)

I dunno if this is really just lazyness (and maybe disappointment that Scotland didn't make it. Something I can sympathize with 100%. They deserved it.) or still sour grapes about losing the World Cup semifinal or whatever, but either way I'd like to see some heads rolling. Which won't happen of course.

It was the wierdest game I have seen in a long time.

Ditto, sad news for Scotland, too bad.

Half-time in the England-Croatia game and we're losing 2-0. We are so lunchmeat...

Well you've just been given a penalty for no apparent reason.

Wow, looks like none of the four teams from the United Kingdom will be qualifying. Fun stuff.

Spoke about 1 minute to soon.

:(

And you were right all along (unless Andorra score in the next..oh.. 55 seconds.)

I don't that it has ever happened before that none of the British Isles nations qualified for a major tournie. In 1994 there was Ireland only; and that is last one England missed and I can't remember any before that...

Well Wales (out already) drew with Germany. Which is good as it means people here (North Wales is actually a Football area) will be happy tomorrow.

Re; England... obviously Mr Dreadful Combover needs to be fired. From a cannon.

Euro '84 in France.

Lessons learned I guess.

For Scotland it means we get to be second tier seed in the '10 draw. Which means only one team should be theoretically better than us rather than 3 :D

Probably one of the worst England performances I have ever seen. Well, at least since the halcyon days (ho ho) of Graham Taylor.

Guess the big discussion now is who will take over from Steve McClaren. I doubt Lippi or Mourinho will go for it/get offered the job, but Allardyce or Pearce would be a flipping disaster. I say Dario Gradi. You heard. Dario Gradi. I am not kidding. Think about it, what have we got to lose, plus he's one of the few coaches in this country who understands tactics (beyond "lob the ball and see what happens") and can actually, y'know, coach players.

I nominate my cat. She's been dead for two years now, but she would still do a better job than Mr Really Really Really Bad Combover.

At least we can have a summer with out wall to wall saturation coverage on every London based TV channel (ducks)

What about a deck chair? Deck chair for England manager!

Hang McClaren, dreadful dreadful dreadful.

Sat and thought about it... This is not a hindsight issue, I've always argued with the Ex-Pat colony in Austin that I often watch matches with that Beckham was top notch and would always perform when challenged, this was proven in a major way last night, his crossing service was designed for a man like Crouch (who need more playing time, even when Rooney is healthy) I've said it and I've always said it, tonight was prime example


I just don't know, I tried very very hard to like McClaren, but he's made it impossible, the rookie goalkeeper in the biggest game of the campaign, dueling egos with a more than viable Beckham, and an overall black cloud over the whole thing.

Good Riddance, Mourinho for the job if you ask me.





And could Carson been any more horrible? not a punch but a parry?

I can't see Mourinho being offered the job, great as it would be... he's too much of a maverick for the FA, and the FA always prefers a yes-man. It's the main reason Brian Clough never became England manager.

As for Carson, yes, it was incredibly dumb to put a rookie keeper in goal for arguably the most important match of the qualifying campaign. However, if anything, I think it reflects a bigger malaise, namely that of England not having an international class keeper to speak of.

Yes, yes... I can see why people would prefer a deck chair to McClaren. I certainly would!

In related news, the ranks of the unemployed have just swelled by two.

Who also went? Venables? That's good news, I was worried the FA might actually install him as McClaren's replacement. Give me a deck chair or a deceased cat any day...

The best thing that I saw on TV yesterday was Jewel Staite beating a guy up on Stargate Atlantis.

The worst thing was this match...

The deck chair should be put in goal. It'll do a better service there than the dead cat, and about average for a post-Seaman England keeper.

I'm really feeling Jose getting the job, I'm no expert but with such heavy heavy favour for him already, with no qualms visible on the street about a non-english manager I really think the FA may look out the window and see a mob that has to be satisfied, by more than just sacking the fall-guy.


Jose would be the best, I'd put them as favourites out fornt for the WC if he was hired.

O'Neil has always bugged me, he's got heart but not success to follow it.

I think Redknapp and Coppell would do a decent job but they certainly don't project a very friendly picture that fits European competition if you ask me.


Beckham needs to be backed by whoever it is, he has another World Cup in him, and had he been used properly by McClaren England would have qualified.

Yeah, the crook got the sack as well.

Btw, I am currently very angry. This is because I've just found out how much McClaren has been paid by the FA for the indignity of being sacked.


The best (or worst?) part of that is that its true.

New FIFA world rankings out

England - 12th - 2nd Seed
Scotland - 14th - 2nd Seed
Northern Ireland 32nd- 3rd Seed
Ireland - 35th 3rd Seed
Wales - 58th 4th Seed

Can't wait for the draw :)

Mourinho has said no. Ah well. O'Neill also, but then I always thought he was a little overrated.

Apparently, Klinsmann has now entered the frey. This could get interesting...

Ah, I wondered when that name'd get mentioned here. Obviously, the idea was foremost at every silly German sports journalist's mind the moment... well, the moment England first looked in trouble actually. ::)

Group 8
Italy [:( Worst Draw Possible, but then the last time we played competitively was one of our greatest sporting moments]
Bulgaria [Besides Berbatov and petrov in the Premiership, I don't know anything about them.]
Rep. Ireland
Cyprus [:( 4th time in 5 consecutive draws that we've been drawn together. Lately we look like cowboys playing against them.]
Georgia [:-\ Highest ranked of the 5th seeds, not sure how well we'll get on in sunny Tblisi]
Montenegro [Best of the 6th seeds, but if they start taking points off us, then this whole endeavour is fairly futile]

2nd place is possible. But then if we don't turn things around so is 4th.

---

Some of the others...

Group 6
Croatia
England
Ukraine
Belarus
Kazakhstan
Andorra

England should be very happy with this.

Got plum draws from almost all those seeding pots - including Croatia. Will give the England fans another chance to boo the Croatian anthem in Wembley - what was all that about? (In fact, what was really confusing was John Motson on the BBC saying that it was well received ???)

Group 9
Netherlands
Scotland
Norway
Macedonia
Iceland

Could have been better, but on current form Scotland would have to anticipate getting out of the group.

Group 4
Germany
Russia
Finland
Wales
Azerbaijan
Liechtenstein

Unlikely Wales will be able to do much damage here. Don't see any difficulty for Germany.

Group 3 
Czech Republic
Poland
Northern Ireland
Slovakia
Slovenia
San Marino

The North face tricky ties in Eastern Europe. I don't expect them to make the top 2, but they're just after doing very well in a much tougher group so who knows.

Only winners qualify.. and the worst placed runner up is out without a play-off. Knowing our luck that would be us.

If we make second; at this point third will be probably be our best shot.

Sweden lucked out, but I still have a bad feeling about this...we SHOULD take second place after Portugal, but anything can happen. After qualfying for 5 tournaments in a row it has to end sometime...

No. I'm almost 100% sure that that will be Scotland. ;D

I know 1 thing for sure: Austria won´t participate in the 2010 World Cup. Not when we are in a qualification group with France, Serbia and Romania ... :P

And for the Euro 2008 I´m not very optimistic either. But let´s wait for Dec. 2 first to see which opponents we are getting ... I´m hoping for Portugal, Netherlands and Germany. ;)

Why? You think there's a chance the UEFA might get hip to the fact that there are no eleven different Austrian footballers anymore, and strike you from the list of participants? ;D

I think it is fair to say that Harry Redknapp will not be the next England manager. Ahem.

Quite. Nothing proven yet, but you don't hire someone under active criminal investigation. End of.

Sheesh what a mess, if it had to be an English manager it would be him though, I hope he comes out clean but I don't think that will be the case, Jose looks like he's back in the hunt for the job so good times.

Good results for English clubs this week, have to have something to look forward to...

Late winner for Celtic tonight :) Fingers crossed we can be in Europe past Christmas!

It would take nothing short of a miracle (or something extremely dodgy happening) for Redknapp to come out of this clean. He's as bent as hell and everyone knows it.

Yeah pretty much.

Indeed. My reaction was mainly one of "Well, whaddya know". I don't think anyone was in any way surprised by this.

Euro 2008 Draw:

Group A:

Switzerland
Czech Republic
Portugal
Turkey

Group B:

Austria
Croatia
Germany
Poland

Group C:

Holland
Italy
Romania
France       

Group D:

Greece
Sweden
Spain
Russia

All eyes on Group C, anything could happen.
Group D is also wide open but with lesser quality.

Looking forward to it.

All those groups look interesting imo... lets just hope it will be better than the previous international tournaments.

Early Prediction:
A1 vs B2 - Portugal vs Croatia
B1 vs A2 - Germany vs Switzerland
C1 vs D2 - France vs Sweden
D1 vs C2 - Spain vs Italy

W1 vs W2 - Croatia vs Germany
W3 vs W4 - Italy vs France

Final: Germany vs Italy

Though in reality this is just educated guessing.

Group C is a group of death if ever I saw one. My heart goes out to Romania who had a pretty good seeding group (being safe from Germany, Spain and Portugal) and yet ended up with ultra-tough competition. Fancy Holland and France ending up in the same group...

As for predictions, I'd predict the following teams to go through, in the order given:

A: Portugal, Switzerland (I really like the Czechs but they disappointed me real bad in the WC and Switzerland is underestimated. Hosts always do better, though less so in the EC than in the WC)

B: Germany, Croatia (looks like the safest prediction...Austria is, no offence to HarryHaller, by far the worse team in the tournament and Poland always suck once they get to the tournament. I don't see Germany and Croatia missing out)

C: France, Italy (have to go with my heart on this one. I'd prefer it to be France, Holland, but I won't go with my heart that much. I'm afraid it could well be Italy, France or Italy, Holland though...tough group to predict obviously)

D: Spain, Sweden (well...I had to predict Sweden don't I? ;) We did get a fairly easy group which could easily have been a lot worse. Spain will probably take the top spot and it's pretty wide open behind them. I do think Greece is on its way down though. Surprise champions seldom do well in defending their title. Russia is simply quality-wise worse than Sweden. I have a bad feeling that we will end up doing badly this tournament but I won't go as far as predicting my home country getting knocked out when we shouldn't!)

That would give the same quarterfinals as Gully Foyle, I just realized! Great minds think alike...I think Portugal beats Croatia though and...we have almost exactly the same line-up as in the WC semi-finals. Hm. Seems very unlikely. Ok, let's go with Croatia. I have to predict France over Italy this time around though since I hate the Italian team and if it's France vs Germany in the final I'm happy with either team winning, really. I would expect Germany though, to be honest.

Group C is the best group of death ever.

Feeling really good about Germany's chances though. :D

While the English FA have went and nabbed Fabio Capello - a manager with a mostly very successful record at multiple clubs; Mark Lawrenson said on Today FM earlier today that he has it on 'very good authority' that the FAI have offered the Irish job to Terry Venables! (A man whose record has consistently gotten worse since his spell at Barcelona 20 years ago.)

So much for South Africa 2010... :'(

Lock your tills. Now.

Already way ahead of you...

I really don't understand this move (well actually I do, FAI desperation\anti-buckstoppingness.) and I can't get why anyone thinks Venables is a good coach. After his most recent appointments even the English rag media has stopped going "OMG VENABLES!!!111" every time the English managers position is up for grabs.

Giovanni Trapattoni appointed Ireland manager (http://www.ireland.com/sports/soccer/2008/0213/1202509798296.html)
;D

Must say I'm quite happy with the appointment - particularly as Venables was the strong favourite up until about 2 weeks ago. Certainly Trapattoni is the most qualified candidate to have been seriously linked with the job.

First game in charge: Friendly v Serbia (Home) 24 May
First competitive game: World Cup Qualifier v Georgia (Away) 6 September 2008
Notable upcoming: World Cup Qualifier v Italy (Away) 6 June 2009

Here's hoping the good times will come again!

Good move for the team, I hope this is the beginning of a turnaround for Ireland.

()


;D

Go Aberdeen!

We shall hopefully make the World Cup in 2010! Wasn't Mick McCarthy manager prior to the 2006 World Cup?

Prior to, during, and just after the 2002 World Cup (Korea/Japan) - the setting for the 2nd Irish Civil War (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Roy_Keane_Saipan_incident). McCarthy was fired after a disaterous start to the Euro 2004 Qualifiers - though the fallout from Saipan meant it was probably inevitable anyway.

Then we had Brian Kerr who did okay-ish, but was unable to meet expectations. In 2006, Steve Staunton was appointed, who was simply incompetent and so let go late last year.

I am so happy today. Manchester United thumped Arsenal 4-0 in the 5th round of the FA Cup. My Dad's boss will be so pissed off ;D. Also, Barnsley defeated Liverpool 2-1. I wonder when Rafael Benítez will be sacked or decide to leave Liverpool, they have been underperforming this year.

YES YES YES YES YES



Atta boy Lampard

Tomorrow's the big day - tomorrow will be the day I've been waiting for all year, and that has seemed so tantalizingly close several times - tomorrow Bayern will be finally eliminated from the UEFA Cup!

It will be interesting to see Manchester United and Chelsea fight for the Champions League in Moscow. Hopefully United will win the Champions League and the Premier League as well :).

BTW: Is it me or is Newcastle winning some games under Keegan? I know my Dad and I are shocked.

Well this should do it - I don't think any team, even a German has ever overcome a  four-goal lead in an European competition.
Though if it were Liverpool, I wouldn't discount them...

Munich was some level of awful I've never seen, how embarrassing.

Though one must admire the finishing ability of Zenit.

Quite, my level of football hackery has certain clubs above reproach, and I'm incapable of understanding when someone like Zenit takes them behind the shed.

WE WON!!!!!!

AND SUNDERLAND STAYED UP!!!!

DOUBLE WOOT!!!!

Great game, I told everyone before hand, Chelsea is my team, but I want Giggs to score the winner for Man Utd.



What'ya know.... What a hero....

Tomorrow is the Scottish title decider.

If Celtic win against Dundee United, they take the title. If Rangers hammer Aberdeen (say 6-0) they would win, depending on the Celtic result. Otherwise Celtic would win on goal difference.

In other news, a few weeks ago my local team Hamilton Academicals made it into the top flight :)

Ryan Giggs is actually my favourite player for United, not because the man is pure genius but he used to date my Aunty Orla back in the early 1990's, which is pretty cool.

So what is the top league over in Europe now that NFL Europa has folded, or is that continent stuck with soccer and rugby?

WOW

Rangers have choked in the SPL at expense of their European Cup quest and hopefully they will continue their form.

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES!

Excuse me

:)

Awesome! They were so far behind. 

A few serious upsets this year:

Ireland 0+1
Scotland 1 + 1
England 4 + 5
Netherlands 1 + 5
Belgium 0 + 2
France 3 + 4
Spain 4 + 4
Portugal 2 + 5
Norway 0 + 2
Sweden 0 + 1
Finland 0 + 1
Denmark 1 + 3
Germany 2 + 6
Switzerland 1 + 3
Austria 0 + 2
Italy 4 + 4
Poland 0 + 2
Czech Republic 0 + 2
Slovakia 0 + 3
Croatia 0 + 2
Serbia 0 + 2
Greece 1 + 1
Turkey 1 + 3
Cyprus 1 + 2
Israel 0 + 1
Bulgaria 0 + 3
Romania 2 + 5
Ukraine 2 + 1
Belarus 1 + 0
Lithuania 0+1
Russia 1 + 3

Serie A started today! Watching Inter vs. Sampdoria. I'll root for Inter since those were one of the teams I considering "supporting" this season. I'm just going to stick with AC Milan though.

It's the first Old Firm of the season tomorrow. Should be fun :)

4-1 to the Hammers!

St. Pat's did really well to qualify in what otherwise looks like a difficult year for Irish league football. Hertha Berlin should tear them asunder in the first round proper, unfortunately.

Please don't say that ever again. It's either just "Hertha", or "Hertha BSC".

2-1 Bologna  :(

The day after Keegan, Curbs goes too... (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/w/west_ham_utd/7596106.stm)

Wow !

I just heard in the news that Austria beat France 3:1 ... :P

France slump as Italy struggle

September 07, 2008

FRANCE, the 1998 world champions, suffered an embarrassing 3-1 defeat to lowly Austria in a nightmare start to their 2010 World Cup qualifying campaign.

On a night when reputations counted for little, defending champions Italy needed a last-minute goal to beat Cyprus 2-1 while England could only defeat little Andorra, the 186th team in the world rankings, 2-0.

Elsewhere, European champions Spain managed a 1-0 win over Bosnia-Herzegovina but former champions Germany went on a goal rampage demolishing Liechtenstein 6-0 and 2006 World Cup semi-finalists Portugal saw off Malta 4-0.

After a dismal Euro 2008 finals, where they failed to get out of the group stages, France again hit the rocks with a 3-1 Group Seven loss in Vienna against Austria with the defeat again throwing the future of coach Raymond Domenech into doubt.

Goals by Marc Janko and Rene Aufhauser before the break put the hosts firmly in front but Sidney Govou got one back for France on the hour.

A converted penalty by Andreas Ivanschitz in the 72nd minute sealed France's fate.

France now face a tough home assignment against Serbia on Thursday (EST) with Domenech desperately in need of a win.

"It's difficult to analyse what happened immediately. I will have to look at the match again to see what exactly happened," said Domenech.

In Larnaca, defending champions Italy needed a last-minute goal to eke out a 2-1 victory against lowly Cyprus in Group Eight.

Antonio Di Natale, with his second of the night, secured an undeserved three points after Cyprus had ran Italy ragged at times on a balmy Mediterranean evening.

"There was little difference between the two sides, Cyprus were unlucky many times. We could have lost this game," said Italy coach Marcello Lippi in the first competitive match of his second spell in charge.

In the same group, the Republic of Ireland, who are coached by Lippi's compatriot Giovanni Trapattoni, beat Georgia 2-1.

England's World Cup campaign also got off to a stuttering start against Andorra's part-timers in Barcelona.

Fabio Capello's first competitive game in charge ended in a lacklustre and tense 2-0 win with supersub Joe Cole delivering the three points.

"People think that this should be an easy game but they got 10 men behind the ball and made it difficult on a very sticky pitch," said Cole.

England now travel to Zagreb on Wednesday to face Group Six rivals Croatia who opened their campaign with a 3-0 win over Kazakhstan.

Portugal saw off little Malta 4-0 to top Group One but it was only late in the game that they really dominated.

A Brian Said own-goal gave the Portuguese a 25th-minute lead before Hugo Almeida, Simao and Nani added to the total in the last 30 minutes.

Spain, with Vicente del Bosque having taken over from Luis Aragones, opened their Group Five campaign with a 1-0 win over Bosnia-Herzegovina in Murcia.

Missing the injured Fernando Torres and David Silva, they needed a 58th-minute goal from David Villa, who had missed a first-half penalty, to secure the three points.

In the same group, Turkey beat Armenia 2-0 in a highly-charged encounter in Yerevan.

In Group Four, striker Lukas Podolski gave the perfect answer to last week's accusation of "whining" with two goals as Germany beat Liechtenstein 6-0.

The 23-year-old Bayern Munich forward struck either side of half-time to lead Germany's charge and he has now scored 30 goals for his country in 56 matches.

Scotland wilted in 35-degree heat in Skopje and fell to a 1-0 defeat in Group Nine to Macedonia.

Ilco Naumoski gave Macedonia a fifth-minute lead which they clung onto to leave Scotland boss George Burley still looking for his first win.

"We were disappointed to lose but for the whole of the second-half I thought we dominated the game," Burley said.

Scotland now travel to Iceland on Thursday (EST) where a win will be crucial from a group where the Netherlands are expected to clinch top spot.

In Group Three, where the Czech Republic and Poland are tipped to dominate, Northern Ireland lost 2-1 against Slovakia in Bratislava. Poland could only draw 1-1 at home to Slovenia.

In Cardiff, teenage striker Samuel Vokes came off the bench to score a late winner as Wales beat Azerbaijan 1-0 in Group Four.

Only the nine group winners are assured of places in the finals with the eight best runners-up playing off for the remaining four spots.

http://www.foxsports.com.au/story/0,8659,24307152-23210,00.html

We have a World Cup qualifying thread in the Off Topic section, just so you know.  ;)

Yeah yeah yeah England

UEFA have approved an Irish and Scottish proposal for the European Championships to be extended to having 24 teams.

 - Irish Times Report (http://www.irishtimes.com/sports/soccer/2008/0926/1222411837625.html)

While I certainly welcome Bulgaria's 50% chance increase of qualifying, I'm not quite sure that this is a good thing. This may dilute the tournaments quality and 24 is a terrible number for a tournament, as the 1982 - 1994 World cups proved.

About time. Maybe Scotland can bloody qualify UEFA has a large membership and the competition set up lagged behind the expansion.

Ugh.

Giancarlo Abete, head of the Italian Football Association, wants a ban on Italian fans travelling to away games following further trouble involving Italian fans at the game with Bulgaria on Saturday.

- Reuters (http://uk.reuters.com/article/worldFootballNews/idUKLD20453720081013)

The action was obviously inappropriate but to ban fans from travelling? Uh...no. Good luck with that.

What's the difference between Tottenham and a triangle?

The grammatical number? Is this an antisemitic joke?

Because, otherwise, I give up. :)

A triangle has more points.

Oh, heh.

Until tonight, Eintracht Frankfurt had as many points as a triangle... thankfully, we've doubled the count now. With some high drama too - playing better than the opponent but still painfully harmlessly for 80 minutes, then getting the 0-1, coming back two minutes later, and scoring the winner in injury time.

Man was this needed.

HAHAHA

Not an original joke mind you...

Italy vs. Greece - Friendly - Right now

Thank God my Dad saw this in the paper today.  :)  Otherwise, I would have missed it. 

...or not "right now." Apparently, this is just replay of the game and our Italian forum member ruined the result for me.  :P

Lippi breaks record by going undefeated in 31 straight games as Italy's head coach!  :)

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/SPORT/football/11/19/friendly.italy/ (http://edition.cnn.com/2008/SPORT/football/11/19/friendly.italy/)

West Ham got a point at Anfield, West Ham got a point at Anfield...

:)

West Ham got a point at Stamford Bridge, Stamford Bridge... :)

All the top four drew this weekend, oddly enough

We managed to win the other day...

Serie A...

Atalanta finds a way to beat Inter 3-1 but my Napoli loses to last place Chievo Verona! Unbelievable.

I suppose you heard about Kaka.

That's just crazy money...

West Ham beat Fulham 3-1 today. Without Bellamy, who wants out.

Lord Above Chelsea just sacked big Fil



Chelsea is my favourite Prem. team, and I liked Scolari, I'm somewhat mixed on his firing, he seemed to be unable to pull Chelsea out of their winter slump that that they've had for a few seasons now, but he wasn't doing any worse. I can see why he's gone, I think he deserved more time, but more importantly I hope RA knows his already erratic reputation is now firmly in the toilet, as Chelsea is quickly going to resemble an Italian revolving door, the next manager needs a full season plus to make or break.


And.... to make things absolutely hilarious.... Guus Hiddink (not hilarious, capable, but a poor fit IMO) and Avram Grant are said to be in the top of the running.



Personally... why isn't Abramovich throwing money at Slaven Bilić?

Yeah, Abramovich is not a patient man.

West Ham ended their unbeaten streak. Since it was against Manchester United, it was only 1-0 and their keeper got a British record for length of playing while keeping a clean sheet, I'm not upset.

Napoli fires Reja...and hires Donadoni.

Now I totally believe that Napoli clearly needed some new leadership. I think they've won literally one game since December but I am no fan of Donadoni. I hope he proves me wrong this time.

Well, United will probably win the league, but The Kop will remember this for years. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/7922069.stm)

4-1 loss and at home too. :)

Before tonight's game, I wouldn't have though I'd be able to say that Italy would be lucky to get away with a draw.

Total disgrace. They defend a lead for eighty minutes and can't hang out at the very end. Unreal. This is especially irritating because I can't stand Trapattoni.

Anyway, now I'm a little worried. Who knows if they'll decide to throw away another game against one of the real joke teams and with a loss in Dublin possible...

I'm really disappointed.

That's a pleasant result. :)

Though that game must have been awfully boring to watch.

So I've heard. I didn't even get to really watch it. It's not on GolTV until 10 tonight and the live stream wasn't working so I had to watch on ESPN GameCast. Towards the very end (right when I typically start to worry because they're usually defending a one goal lead...), I saw that a goal was scored. Idiotic ESPN had to color yellow assigned to Italy and blue assigned to Ireland (genius move, right?). I see a blue spot appear on the screen and thinking it was a goal for us, I let out a cheer. Ten seconds later, well...I let out a different reaction.

It's okay Phil. Italy is still going to qualify easily. It doesn't matter how ugly the qualification is, as long as you do.

I thought this NYT article was fun:


http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/01/sports/soccer/01soccer.html?_r=1&ref=global

We don't "qualify easily" by pulling shit like this. I'm really worried about a Euro 2008 repeat - not sure about qualification until the final games and then a disappointing result in the actual tournament.


The classic Italian defensive strategy has annoyed me to no end.

Ha, Austria won 2:1 against Romania ... :P

Are we not sucking anymore ?

Excruciating would've been my word of choice.

After the Italian goal, we dominated the game - overall we had more than 65% possession, a ridiculous amount. Italy didn't get a second shot on target. The second half was played within the Italian half - and yet we couldn't score and struggled to create many decent chances.

Romania seems to suck.

Ah yes, that kind of game. But what do you expect when someone's sent off that early and his team's in the lead?

What was the Red Card about, btw? Was it justified?

My problem isn't with the Italians in this instance (though their general extreme-defensiveness and inclination towards falling over rather easily annoy me generally).
My issue is why we created so few good chances...and with the selection...and with the initial gameplan...


'Highlights' (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeUmvNslboo) (Sending-off at around 0:25)
Probably not a sending off - but not an easy decision for the referee.

The red card was complete bullshit. We had to play 87 minutes without one of our new stars. I'm the first to blame the very conservative defensive strategy for problems and that's why we conceded a goal so late but when you have us playing with only ten men for basically the whole game after a bad call...

Red Cards for these elbow thingies - unless it's really, really obviously pure malice and/or nowhere near the ball - generally get on my tits.

Shearer's brief stay at the Toon hasn't started well- lost 2-0 to Chelsea.

In other news, West Ham beat Sunderland 2-0.

Never mind Al, we'll be playing you again next season, that's for sure. You're probably safe.

2-1 against Cottbus.

We're exactly where we belong at 12th place. There's one or two teams above us that aren't obviously better, and one team below us that isn't obviously miles worse.

Still a weird game; we went down and came back during the first 15 minutes by two penalties that few people would have awarded.

Probably, yeah. Just about. Our fixtures after (but certainly not including!) the next one don't look quite as bad as Newcastle's.

Luckily for you, Hull seem to be constantly sinking... I think it will be 2 from those 4 (3 NE clubs + Hull) which will go down... I think Stoke surprisingly are safe. Hopefully Liverpool will win the league.

You'll have something to celebrate in Sunderland, that's for sure.

Nice one-one, Hammers!

Hopefully, we'll be in Europe next season.

We beat Hull 1-0. Should have won by more, but a win is a win...

We beat Gladbach 4-1. Should have won by a lot less, incidentally.

Man U have been knocked out of the FA Cup on penalties. By Everton..

There goes the quintuple...

Champions Leage, Cup, League, League Cup and... what's the fifth title?

Oh, btw...
Hamburg's next fixtures on the hunt for the triple:

Wed 22nd Apr German Cup semifinal, at home vs Bremen
Sat 25th Apr some league fixture (away to Dortmund)
Thu 30th Apr UEFA Cup semifinal, first leg, away to Bremen
Sun 3rd May some league fixture (at home vs Hertha)
Thu 7th May UEFA Cup semifinal, second leg, at home vs Bremen
Sun 10th May league fixture, away to Bremen

Lol.

They won the World Club Championship earlier (in January, I think).

:)

Napoli remains winless. They haven't won a game since January.

Here's what I predict: They'll beat defending (and most likely 2008-2009) Champions Inter next week and, of course, that'll be the game I can't watch live (family party).

I like how you pretend any of us follow/care about Italian clubs.  :)

Haha! And the best part is that I only post about my club and that's only to say they have been royally sucking.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Vzt2QVjpa0&feature=popular

O. M. G.

And as youtube videos from the Bundesliga don't survive long...

http://soccergoalvids.blogspot.com/2009/04/bayer-leverkusen-vs-karlsruhe-0-1.html

Napoli wins!

I knew it. I just knew it would happen today. It was so appropriate that they (on a fourteen game losing/tie streak) beat the champions (who have only lost three or four games all season) on the day when I couldn't follow/watch it live. Go figure!

Amazing. Absolutely amazing.  :)

Going to be an interesting last day in the English Premier League.

I hope Sunderland stay up. We'll actually be sending someone down in all likelihood- Middlesbrough.

Yeah,if they go down after all that might finish Al off.

Hope he's back soon.

I never thought I'd be so happy immediately after losing to Chelsea...

HE'S POSTING AGAIN!

And you found the only hint I dropped in public right away! Though I told Afleitch via pm, too.

Yep. Feels almost strange to do normal things again, actually.

(Chelsea fan) Rooting great guns for United tonight.

I was worried about the strong start by United and then, almost out of no where, Barcelona scores. :)  Lovely start.

I agree -  a rare event indeed :)

3 mins remaining........

A München scenario for Manchester...??

...no.

Bother

And good rcomparatively harmless triumphs over evil on three consecutive rounds! (Though the evils got consecutively smaller)

The best part, of course, came at the end when we got to see Silvio up there.  ;)  Fini was even on the stage (but sort of behind Platini)! Barcelona's coach even went out of his way to shake his hand!

Love your signature image. Girls Aloud could play better than some Newcastle players.

(For those of you in the US and elsewhere, they're a Geordie pop group. You may have heard of Cheryl Cole).

I know you will take offense to this Phil, but as odious as Berlusconi is in Politics, he's even more odious in Football...

I also mimic what Lewis said, except in my view the scales of evil were ever increasing from the Quarter Finals onwards. Though who: Chelsea or Man Utd is more evil is difficult to decide.

Hey, I don't care. I'm a Napoli fan.  :)

That's not difficult. It's United.

United has been very very big even before the Big Evil Three-and-a-Half crystallized for good.

Besides, they still have a couple of players (Giggs, Scholes) who've been there for decades and were actually locally raised. And they beat Bayern on those fateful two minutes ten years and a couple of days ago. That's gotta count for something.

Speaking of ten years ago... The greatest day in World History.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fu%C3%9Fball-Bundesliga_1998%E2%80%9399

http://www.dfb.de/index.php?id=321583

http://www.dfb.de/index.php?id=321593

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vH1Ihv9k9Ss

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW5jiPvsDc8&feature=related

Eintracht won by the minimum margin they needed to overcome Nuremberg by goal difference? If this wasn't Germany and Kaiserslautern wasn't trying to get into the Champions league, this could have raised interesting questions ;)
While this was dramatic, the greatest day in World History wasn't 29 May 1999, but 17 November 1993:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emil_Kostadinov
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpwNv29XbbQ&feature=related

Yes. Also note when we scored all those goals, and take out your pocket calculator and look at where Nuremberg stood in the table after 33 rounds. :)
Lautern basically gave themselves up after the 2-1. It was a scorching hot day.

And of course that 5-1... on the 89th minute when you're still missing a goal to stay in... I still can't believe it.

I still can't believe it's now 10 years ago... talk about "it felt like only yesterday" (the European Cup final, not Frankfurt staying up ;p). Will I get into your bad books Lewis to say at the 89th Minute of the game my 11 year old self was getting ready to celebrate Bayern's imminent victory against the forces of darkness?

As for the earlier comment, United were always big in terms of supporters, even during that season in the 1970s (1974-75?) when they played in the second division they got some of the biggest crowds in the country. Even before the 90s United were probably the second most supported club in Ireland, behind Liverpool (that's switched now obviously).

But in terms of actual trophies not so much, obviously there was the European Cup but Nottingham Forest won that (twice!) and they also had to wait 26 years for their 8th league title in 1993; When Ferguson took over they were behind Everton and level with Aston Villa in the all time list. Now they are level 1st.

No. You don't know Bayern the way we do.
But for not caring about Frankfurt staying up that year, you do. Get into my bad books.
Here's one of them:

()

Some fun facts about the final:

1)It was the first time a final ended 2-0 since 1972 when Ajax beat Inter at Roterdam with the same score.

2)All three coaches who led Barcelona to victory, had already won the trophy as players (Cryuff, Rijkaard, Guardiola).

3)It was Manchester United's first defeat since May 2007 when they lost their semifinal against Milan in ''San Siro'' against Milan.

4)Barcelona became the first spanish team ever to achive the Treble.

5)Barcelona scored 32 goals on her way to the top, a record for a European champion. The previous best was Manchester United from 1999 (29 goals). But United played just 11 games instead of Barca's 13, so they still have the best average (2,63 against 2,46 for Barcelona).  

I never said I didn't care about Frankfurt staying up; just I don't remember it. Different. :P

And Encyclopedia Brown? (Funny as always o/c, and painfully true in a way).

The Bundesliga seems to often end dramatically though.

This is "best average" for "champions league" days only, I presume?
Real Madrid scored 20 goals in 7 matches on the road to becoming the first ever European Champions (just semi-randomly checking the first ever year), which is a higher average.

Of course.
We can't compare the old format with the current one.

Al has good reason to be happy. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/8282374.stm)

I currently don't. Much. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/eng_prem/8282382.stm)

Coming so close to beating the Forces of Darkness was... strange. Still. It's hard to beat the play-until-we-score injury time rule at Old Trafford...

Tragic news though... Portsmouth (one of my least favourite clubs for reasons that I can't quite remember now) managed to win the other day. Ending their impressive losing streak (seven games, seven losses).

Yep, the triangle/line/knife jokes have now expired for this season. Squares aren't as funny...

Argh! >:(

At least you still have the the playoffs, we need to beat Switzerland away and have Greece lose points at home against Luxembourg just to get to where you are.

Yeah - the Argh! was more about us conceding a sloppy late goal (again) rather than qualification - which TBTB have already decided to try and rig in favour of the higher ranked teams. Double Argh! >:( >:(

Just from looking over the names though, it seems possible that Ireland might actually end up in the upper half of the draft?

Not really, no. The seeded teams are going to be Russia, France, Greece and Portugal, in that order. It's based on FIFA rankings (which suck). Right now Portugal is ranked 17th. Ireland is 38th. The Ukraine is the highest ranked non-seeded team at 25th.

So the rankings are pretty much set in stone. Now, had Sweden been able to take out Denmark yesterday and knocked off Portugal, while Latvia beat Greece and took that second-place it could have been interesting.

Damn FIFA and their rankings and seedings.

Anyway, I saw Germany's game, Lewis. Great show, I must say. Özil seems like a real rising star. And the goal-keeping was top class.

And in case someone missed it, Sweden got knocked out yesterday. End of a great string of qualifications, matched only by Germany, Spain, Portugal, France and Italy among the European teams. I called it before the first game but I'm still not happy about it.

Yeah, I could only think of Russia and France as obviously higher-ranked teams when I wrote that, forgetting Portugal.

They needed it to be. Yeah, Özil's really good (despite looking like a startled frog).
I am yet to see a penalty awarded against Germany in the last ten minutes. I'm at over half a dozen possible ones and counting...
Wait - is that dried and dusted, or just exceedingly likely?

Sweden can only finished second if Portugal fail to beat Malta on Wednesday, so I'd say it is pretty near over.

Yeah, the first case was sort of straddling the line, but the second one seemed pretty clear-cut.

And now that I'm reminded, that guy Boateng is someone you need to get rid of. He didn't seem able to hold his part in the defense at all. I could see the eventual sending off a long way off.

And as regards Sweden, see Gully's response. Portugal is simply too good to fail to score against Malta (and Malta has not scored a single goal so far in the qualification). So I guess Sweden's chances are about 0.1% or so.

Meh, if we had just beaten the Faroer Islands in the first game, instead of playing a tie, then we would be 1 point behind France right now and we could have beaten France in Paris in the final game and moved past them into second place ...

If we beat France now in Paris, we'll remain 1-point behind them and fail to qualify.

Didn't have a particularly successful debut, that kid.

Play-Offs:
Ireland v France
Portugal v Bosnia-Herzogovina
Greece v Ukraine
Russia v Slovenia

Greece would have been prefered, but France probably would've been a reluctant second choice for me. We were in the same group for the last World Cup, drew in Paris and lost to a moment of Henry magic in Dublin. Out play-off record is pretty terrible though.

Is one out of four bad?

with Bosnia the sole lower pot qualifier, was my joke guess last night.

Well, technically it's only 1 out of 5: losing to Spain (1966), Netherlands (1996), Belgium (1998) and Turkey (2000); beating only Iran (2002).

Nah, I meant my guess.

:-[

I said from the start that we would make the play-offs and then fail as history dictated. And tbh, I can't see myself changing my mind now.

Ukraine and Russia to qualify. A bit unsure on Bosnia-Portugal; depends on which Portugal actually play.

Hear about Sunderland's victory against Liverpool?

Somebody chucked a beach ball on the pitch. As it came down, the white ball bounced off it and went in. They allowed the goal...

Already posted. Thread titled "best.goal.ever."

I noticed, but thanks for the point-out.

So I've, in turn, noticed. :)

Good that we take Ireland, finally we will have an adversary that will force us to show our value, if we have an actual one as a team. Psychologically, which is important, we tend to see Ireland as an actual danger, and dunno how Ireland feels but this plus the fact that we haven't a real team, that's good for them. Though we play the second match at home, and if Ireland got us by not far in their home, in our Stade de France, the last chance for the world cup, it could really push our players to give a lot.

And well, Lyon won Liverpool recently in their home, this is a psychological advantage in the country, a positive mood.

2nd goal for Cianni against Bayern. By now he has put all the goals of the match one against his camp, one for it, and a beautiful touch, a badger they call it.

And Bayern continues to collect the cards, red one now, wow, could become an interesting match.

After Lyon that owns Liverpool on their ground, Bordeaux to get the Bayern??

BAM

2nd penalty for Bordeaux, 2nd red for München.

And BAM

2nd missed penalty for Bordeaux... (!!)

5 mins remaining, 2-1 for Bordeaux...

Yay. Bordeaux wins.

One would hope that Bayern continue in that vein. They play us in the league on saturday and in the cup right after that. :)

Sure, make them continue in that vein, and then we (I'm not from Bordeaux but for a French any French club in the Champions League is "we") take them back in 14 days. :)

And we've just taken the lead. :D

EDIT: Didn't last long. :(

I think Russia will own Slovenia and France will edge it out against Ireland Domenech or no Domenech. Bosnia could surprise against Portugal, but I have a sense Portugal is finally pulling it together.

Greece v Ukraine should be a nail-biter though. My money is on the Ukraine, but not by a lot.

Wow, football's a game of two halves. I went out after the first half of West Ham v. Arsenal with the Hammers down 2-0. When I get home, we've drawn 2-2.

Well, a defeat for us would make us got rid of Domenech, which wouldn't be a bad thing...

Oh f***, Liverpool goals...

Yay! Equalization of Lyon!

West Ham got its first home win of the season last night. :)

New jersey of the French team:

()

What the hell is that? It's like if the stuffs in the middle were broken...

Tender 1 : 0 Fezzy

;D

Salzburg just beat Wr. Neustadt 3:2 and remains on top of the Austrian League.

Not that I really care ...

5-5 Marseille - Lyon!

Wow! Would we finally have a more competitive championship?!

This plus the fact French clubs lead in Champions League (well, except Marseille), the sport secretary who wanna more fiscal advantages to players to attract biggest players...French clubs are back??

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/internationals/8353964.stm

First thing I thought off when I heard that, was that this was also the way Hughie Gallacher killed himself.

RIP Robert Enke

Nobody in Germany can believe it, but it's true. :(

A good man. One of the nicer guys to play professional football. :(

Woe is Ireland...


One of the worst robberies I've ever seen...

Ireland 1
FIFA 2

()

There just aren't enough >:( ...

Yeah, that was ugly. Ireland would have deserved it.

Henry admittes it was a hand ball (twice) and apparently told the ref. But 'out of sight out of mind' in Ref-land. There is always a case for allowing the refs to review footage of an incident and there are reasons why they should not. I do feel Ireland were cheated.

Nah, more than cheating, this is the problem of the referee who don't see the stuff, all the teams have been victim of it one day or an other, France as a team and in champions league several times too. There is nothing new here.

Now, that is yes, what we call an hold up, we have been largely dominated during the match, and the goal that qualifies us has been put on fault. And several faults!

Yeah, at the beginning of the action, 2 of our players were offside, and second 2 hands of Henry, and the second one is voluntary more of that.

The only problem here is that the referee doesn't see.

As I said in the other thread:

*supporting video for refereeing in football*

Now, the fact that here the hold-up has been so blatant (4 faults on the qualifying goal!) may help to progress the cause of video, and would prevent this in the future.

What can happen in the fire of the action i think it has more to do with the flaws of refereeing than with cheating. Though yes, Henry broke a rule, there is no question about that.

Anyways:


The worst in all of that it is that with the team and the coach we have, that would be a miracle that we go far in this world cup.

Yeah, the only positive stuff here would be to make progress the cause of the video.

Also, funny to have seen an Irish MP using this incident a motive to excite himself against FIFA, that's just mixing everything and not helping what's going on i think, Mr Allan Shatter.

And, well, the Irish federation of football isn't very smart too to ask for replaying the match, they know it won't happen, once the referee says the match is ended everything is finished. This story happened so much time, may this time help.

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=105334.0

Haha, now politics goes further into that, just saw on France24 that the Irish PM, Brian Cowen, asked for the match to be played again.

And of course, François Fillon (the French 'PM') to answer: 'governments haven't to interfere into sport competitions' (which is more easy for a French to say but that remains the good attitude).

By the way, Henry is very mocked on the French net...

And to be full about that, here, the ambiance is clearly to the mockery and to the 'unpride'. It is not really celebrated, not to say not at all. Seems just Domenech is happy...

Can someone explain why a football thread is in the International General Discussion about POLITICS?

I must say that i'd push it.

There aren't any reasons, really. It works fine in numerous other sports. And yeah, casebook example. This wasn't exactly visible from where the referee had to be.

Incidentally, Russia also got pretty much robbed. Though the ones even angrier than the Irish right now are the Egyptians, and the only cause for complaint they have is the referee treated the hilariously blatant and extended Algerian timewasting as it usually is rather than as it should (and was treated four days previously).

Football is more important than politics ;).

hahahahahahaha. We beat arsenal! ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D

After this I'll be quite happy to root against the French. Rather unusual, as I supported in all their matches in 2006 (well, excluding Togo).
Though I'm happy to see that the Irish didn't manage to escape the Bulgarian curse ;)

After Togo and until Italy, we've been great in 2006. Matches against Spain and Brazil were awesome.

Yes, certainly seeing one of the most overrated teams in the history of the world take the fall, especially after the match against Ghana (where Brazil received some... help) was on of the highlights of the tournament.

France not winning in 2006 was a major disappointment for me (right up there with Germany not winning Euro 2008).

If Brazil wins this World Cup I will really be pissed.

There is a very good chance that you pissed off ;) Brazil has a very good team and never before wins a European Team the World Cup outside Europe.

I like being pissed off, so I will be pissed off if the World Cup is won by a European or American nation. :P

Lyon loses. And it makes Liverpool out.

I know that all too well. But as stated elsewhere, I have been predicting Argentina for a long time... :D

Bordeaux wins La Juve 0-2. Yay yay yay.

Supporting Bordeaux amongst French teams, since their 1st match against Bayern, and also was supported their victory in the national championship last year.

Red Bull Salzburg just defeated Lazio Rome 2:1 @ home and now advances to the best 32 teams in the Europa League.

Ends the group of Salzburg, Lazio Rome, Villarreal and Levski Sofia unbeaten with 5 victories and is so far the only team to end the group stage with 15 points.

HSH Nordbank Arena, here we come !

Now the HSV (Hamburger Sportverein) plays Rapid Vienna at home.

In the first game Vienna trashed Hamburg 3:0 at home. Now they are seeking revenge.

Hamburg is currently 5th in the German Bundesliga, while Vienna is tied with Salzburg on top of the Austrian Bundesliga.

England gets a really easy World Cup group...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1950_World_Cup#Group_2
That's what they thought as well...

And they came second that year. Which would be enough now. :)

England have an amazing ability to fuck up, but I can't see how they can fail to get through that group. Unless, you know, match fixing.

I am pissed off! >:(

Group stage competitors 2010-11, Champions League plus Europa League, by country.

Scotland 1 + 0
England 4 + 2
Netherlands 2 + 3
Belgium 0 + 3
France 3 + 2
Spain 3 + 4
Portugal 2 + 2
Norway 0 + 1
Denmark 1 + 1
Germany 3 + 3
Switzerland 1 + 2
Austria 0 + 2
Italy 3 + 4
Poland 0 + 1
Czech Republic 0 + 1
Slovakia 1 + 0
Hungary 0 + 1
Croatia 0 + 2
Serbia 1 + 0
Romania 1 + 1
Bulgaria 0 + 2
Greece 1 + 3
Turkey 1 + 1
Israel 1 + 0
Belarus 0 + 1
Ukraine 1 + 3
Moldova 0 + 1
Russia 2 + 2

No country managed the maximum of 4+3. :D

Well France can only have 3 seats for Champions league. :P

Be sure we would have sent you a dangerous club like...Lille!...otherwise.

So does Germany... actually, Germany is the only country to have fulfilled their potential, and Stuttgart really, really deserved to go out against Bratislava.

Why are we talking about football on an International General Discussion board about politics?

This is a general discussion board. :P

FWIW, the answer is that somebody started the thread on this board, a long time ago, and it never got moved.

Brest, which comes from Ligue 2 this year and which hadn't been in Ligue 1 during a few decades, and which has one of the lowest budget, leads Ligue 1 for a few weeks, lol.

I prefer this goodie (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upC-GTwoYTQ&feature=related).

Not in Europe, but:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xeru2i_penalty-hallucinant-la-balle-desobe_sport?from=email_fr_HB

Talk of a curved free kick!

()

Worth £35,000,000?