The College Dropout

How does their fantastic achievement for the last 3 years (they lost to Inter in the CL final of 2010 btw) make them the invincible team of the century? They were not even invincible in those 3 years? Name me another club side that has had as incredible a run as they have. Running away with league again and again, wiping away teams in Europe, playing superb football and dominating every match they play, regardless of the result. No team has ever done what they did. None. MJ's Bulls went 72-10 once, and they're considered an invincible team, even though they lost ten games that season. Individual losses don't matter when you win everything in the style and way that Barca did. They didn't sneak 1-0 wins to win the title, they smashed teams right, left and center. They is the sort of post that proves the Barca overhype. They were not smashing teams left right and centre, they were fantastic aye but there were also many wins with just the one goal margin. I don't know bout MJ Bulls being called invincible let alone team of the century, but to me Barca need to do much more to get such hyped up titles like team of the century. Team of the decade maybe, even then teams like Man Utd and Milan would give them a close run for the money. Do you even know teams that played say before the 1970s? Who is your team of the century, then? My opinion is that in football, and in every sport, it's harder and harder to dominate because technological advances in physical training and informational advances in dieting and such has meant that most of the top tier players are physically at the same level. This means that there are more 'top' players than before. Which means that it is harder to dominate. So for a team to do so today, it is much more impressive than to have done it 40 years ago, when there were 8 teams in the European Cup and you only needed to win a few matches to win it. Everyone plays football today, so there are more good players today than ever before, purely because the pool of talent is greater than before. This is simply statistics and probability. So to dominate today in the way Barca and Messi have is incredibly impressive. What they've done is unmatched in the proper context. If someone says 'what about the Real team that won 5 straight CLs?' then they have no clue about statistics. Would say there's been a genuine dip in quality over the last 5 years like. Brazilian & Dutch players aren't what they once was. African lads are just battering rams these days too. Hasn't been an African Okocha in a long time. It comes and goes, other countries filling in... For example I don't think there's been such an amount of class Spanish players in the story of our footie. Some outstanding German lads that don't fit in the usual German workhorse mold too, Argentina has a bunch of great players too, despite what their NT suggests... Personally I think football is in great shape, the problem is that the best talent gets gobbled up by a smaller amount of clubs compared to 20 years ago. Agreed on Spain and Germany. But Germany have always produced top players, same with Argentina. I look at the Euro Championships and I feel there's only 2-3 top quality teams (that i know of).

Of course its all conjecture, but I think playing HBA instead of Obertan gainst Spurs would have at least kept their defenders on their toes. With Obertan, their fullback was overlapping and we were under wave and wave of attacks. Personally I don't think it would have made any difference to the fullback getting forward at all. If Ben Arfa was a traditional wide man perhaps, but he constantly floats inside attempting to find space for a dribble or pass. Don't get me wrong this isn't a criticism, you only have to look at Mata at Chelsea as an example of a wide playmaker who does this very well, it's intelligant play and makes him a constant threat throughout the game. During the game the forwards had so little of the ball and were so poor when they did I doubt Ben Arfa would have influenced the game at all. I would have played him over Obertan of course, but I doubt it would have impacted on the result. I thought this was obvious. We didn't have the ball for any period any attacking changes would've made little difference. I've said this before but I really wonder how long some of you have been following football or if you've played in any sports. There's no point a boxer worrying about his weak left handed body shot if he doesn't protect himself. This wasn't a case of giving Spurs too much respect. We went man for man and started pretty high up and they DESTROYED us.

How does their fantastic achievement for the last 3 years (they lost to Inter in the CL final of 2010 btw) make them the invincible team of the century? They were not even invincible in those 3 years? Name me another club side that has had as incredible a run as they have. Running away with league again and again, wiping away teams in Europe, playing superb football and dominating every match they play, regardless of the result. No team has ever done what they did. None. MJ's Bulls went 72-10 once, and they're considered an invincible team, even though they lost ten games that season. Individual losses don't matter when you win everything in the style and way that Barca did. They didn't sneak 1-0 wins to win the title, they smashed teams right, left and center. They is the sort of post that proves the Barca overhype. They were not smashing teams left right and centre, they were fantastic aye but there were also many wins with just the one goal margin. I don't know bout MJ Bulls being called invincible let alone team of the century, but to me Barca need to do much more to get such hyped up titles like team of the century. Team of the decade maybe, even then teams like Man Utd and Milan would give them a close run for the money. Do you even know teams that played say before the 1970s? Who is your team of the century, then? My opinion is that in football, and in every sport, it's harder and harder to dominate because technological advances in physical training and informational advances in dieting and such has meant that most of the top tier players are physically at the same level. This means that there are more 'top' players than before. Which means that it is harder to dominate. So for a team to do so today, it is much more impressive than to have done it 40 years ago, when there were 8 teams in the European Cup and you only needed to win a few matches to win it. Everyone plays football today, so there are more good players today than ever before, purely because the pool of talent is greater than before. This is simply statistics and probability. So to dominate today in the way Barca and Messi have is incredibly impressive. What they've done is unmatched in the proper context. If someone says 'what about the Real team that won 5 straight CLs?' then they have no clue about statistics. Would say there's been a genuine dip in quality over the last 5 years like. Brazilian & Dutch players aren't what they once was. African lads are just battering rams these days too. Hasn't been an African Okocha in a long time.

Of course its all conjecture, but I think playing HBA instead of Obertan gainst Spurs would have at least kept their defenders on their toes. With Obertan, their fullback was overlapping and we were under wave and wave of attacks.

Good player.

They also form the nucleus of the reigning European and World Champions. There's not much hyperbole in that.

Overall supremacy is based over 2-5 years. That's why winning consecutive league titles is the true mark of a great side. Man United have been the best team in England for 5 years but they haven't won the league every year. It will take 2 years of Barca finishing 2nd and not winning the CL for them to no longer be the best side in the world.

Please understand my point. I'm not talking one PL medal, or one CL final, or warming the bench for Brazil. Gareth Barry will be 31 if City win the league. He certainly won't win it 4 times or play in 3 Champions League finals. Michael Carrick has played over 40 games a year for Man United, central midfield, winning leagues and playing Champions League finals. He's better than Gareth Barry but he has less caps. Fergie's no fool. He's had his share of average players and he moves them on or benches them. Carrick's been a regular for 6 years coinciding with there best run in fergie's time.

Players who just aren't that good are not chosen to start 3 Champion League finals for Manchester United. This is not a John O'Shea "squad player" situation. The best club team of all time had Sebastiano Rossi in goal, an average keeper who never got a single cap but played in 3 Champion League finals. The best International team of all time had a poor keeper in Felix. Not even the very best teams have a top class player in each position and this Man Utd certainly isn't an all time great, even compared to their own teams. Says alot about the standard of football currently that they've been the second best team over the last few years with so many mediocrities like Wes Brown and Anderson. But then Liverpool got to finals a few years ago with a team full of them and Dida played in 3 finals and so on. Loads of players have played in CL finals without being that good. He's not a goalkeeper, he plays central midfield. Name the poor central midfielders of those teams. Liverpool didn't win 3 league titles back to back coinciding with the signing of Igor Biscan. We are talking about a team that has won the league 4/5 times out the last 6. They are not carrying many passengers in the first eleven man, let alone in midfield get a grip. Did Wes Brown/O'Shea start in all 3 finals? He's not a great. He doesn't impose himself enough. But he's good enough to start for the English national side. We need more players in Carrick's mould and less of the blockbuster stuff started by Beckham. Players comfortable with short and mid-range passing. Wilshere's a good start.

Players who just aren't that good are not chosen to start 3 Champion League finals for Manchester United. This is not a John O'Shea "squad player" situation.

The same players had already proven they were. Liverpool hadn't for 15 years and clearly weren't the best in Europe. liverpool weren't the best team on merseyside that year (i think) Nope. Everton finished 4th and Liverpool had to get special dispensation (bitch and moan) to be let into the CL as winners It was Everton who got special dispensation really. UEFA wanted Liverpool in and Everton like when they set the precedent when Real won the tournament but finished outside the spot. Real went in and I think Zaragoza got the UEFA. The FA/PL wouldn't have Everton not go through.

That's utter s**** imo incidentally...the downturn of the England team can be traced back to when Sven felt he had to include Lampard and pushed Scholes out left and into International retirement. Lampard and Gerrard never worked in tandem, at least with Scholes central, we had the 5-1 in Germany to fall back on. Lampard replaced a player he was nowhere near as good as, and also because of his playing style nullified Gerrard. Euro 2004 was the best chance of winning i can remember with Scholes on the left, he had plenty of time before Lampard and Gerrard came along to make an impact and hardly did anything, we got Euro 00 to show for it. He didn't score for something like 30 games by the end. Erm... Paul Scholes was the least of our problems in Euro 2000. Unlike the others, he has an overall game and can play possession football. The Michael Carrick/Paul Scholes(latter years) type of player isn't valued in British football.

He's been immense since returning.

Raylors delivery makes him very dangerous going forward tbf and he's scored a good few goals. Davide is only marginally better defensively but he's much better in possession.

It was like. Any team we fielded in a 4-4-2 was going to get there arses handed to them. We went man for man and initially played pretty high up. We would've lost with a more defensive team but not at that extreme score.

The fans don't pick the side dimwit! And if it's so obvious, why didn't he change to 4-5-1 after ten minutes? This too. In fact rather than the fans and press coming out against 4-5-1 if anything there's been far more clamour for it this season, ie when people wanted Ben Arfa in behind Ba. Anyway it's a f***ing idiotic thing to come out with - like he's trying ever so hard to be in the right by telling everyone else they were to blame. It's never a positive move once managers get into that mindset so hope he snaps out of it sharpish. Yep after 10 minutes he needed to change it defensively. Wave and wave of Spurs attack.

Cheick did himself proud tbh. There's always next year.

Destiny for Zambia like. If it wasn't obvious when they beat Ghana, it was when Didier skied the peno.

It's obvious he's wank at them like. He can't shoot or pass anyway. Zero tekkers.

It's class tbg.

Gervinho has no tekkers like.

Was either going over or be shit.

Yep. Terrible pen like.

Ivorian keeper could've saved a couple. The Zambian GK's pen wasn't the best and neither was that one.

The best penalties are close to being the worst. That one there.. unstoppable... pretty close to a miss too.