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Should be. Looked good when he came on against Spurs at the weekend, so he's getting there. Capello was picking Upson ahead of him last season though which baffled me. I've said for ages that I think Upson is a yard dog that should be nowhere near the England side, it's not just Jags that is a better option than him imo.

I think us putting Heitinga in the middle so we could actually win the ball in midfield was a bigger factor. Before that we had 5 attacking players across the middle. I thought 2-2 would have been a fair result. Good game though, both sides played some nice stuff.

He might be right, but making any sort of public response to Bellamy just showed, once again, what an unprofessional tosser he is. A bit of dignified silence after weeks of being splashed over the front of every rag in the country wouldn't have gone amiss. He's too thick and selfish to realise that though.

It's not hard at all. This is their first win in 8 or something. They are shit. We've just rolled over and died like a gang of shithouses.

Absolutely fucking disgraceful. I can't tell you how much I don't want to bother going to Spurs at the weekend after watching that utter, utter shite. Moyes is a total fucking idiot when it comes to Europe. 12 yr olds on FM10 are more tactically aware. Unless he does it on purpose. "Lads, we've got a makeshift, unfit defence and no midfielders that can win a tackle or head a ball. So, what we want to do is invite loads of pressure onto ourselves by sitting back and whenever we get it, whack it in the air so that the midfield have no influence on the game whatsoever. Pull this off and we'll have no more long flights & shitty coach trips on a Thursday"

Arrogant twats

Bridge should never have been near the squad in the first place.

careful, you may get told to get over it. In which case, replace Barry with Lescott.

Porto, Sporting, and Benfica are all decent teams. There's not much to say at all for the 13 or so others though. They are horrifically bad. Similar to Holland in that sense. I'd agree with all of those except for Romania. Then again they have some decent teams that have been getting results in Europe of late. edit: Holland is definitely worse than Portugal actually. Except Holland only really has ever had Ajax and Psv, at least now Portugal has Braga making some decent movements while Holland has Twente. AZ & Feyenoord are decent outfits They are but I'd debate if either play in the Champions League or even the Uefa cup with much regularity. PSV and Ajax certainly don't. I think a lot of people underestimate Portugal as a league. I would say they are a lot better than Braga. Bigger clubs? Yes. Especially in Feyenoords case. Better teams? No.

Benitez would be sacked after one season at Madrid.

I personally think Caicedo is woeful. He scored a few goals, mostly as a sub iirc, when City had injuries but his actual play and ability looked very poor. Isn't he only at Malaga because Sporting Lisbon didn't want him anymore and ripped up his loan deal?

agreed. though i think a system where clubs can only borrow to a certain percentage of turnover would come in first (which is along the lines of what platini wants to bring in). nominated squads of limited size would be a fantastic start. I don't really like the turnover idea though because there will still be a big financial disparity between clubs e.g. Man Utds turnover dwarfs Spurs so they are allowed more money to build a squad. Spurs meanwhile, dwarf Wigans turnover and will again have way more to spend on wages & transfers.

yes, i do actually have access to the internet. from the little ive seen of him recently, he still looks to have good energy levels, knows how do to his DM role better than alan smith and would do a job to reestablish us in the league, imo. of course ashley might not sanction his transfer if past events and current newspaper gossip is anything to go by, which would be a pity as experience would be useful in a situation like next season, provided we go up. iirc there were rumours the other summer that he turned us down for Panathaniakos because he didn't want to play for an English team other than Arsenal

I think central contracts for players would be a disaster. Salary caps & max squad sizes implemented UEFA-wide would be brilliant though.

I don't see the point in buying Chester whatsoever. They've drifted into non-league wilderness and nearly everybody that lives there supports Everton or Liverpool and to a lesser extent, the Manc clubs. A lot of the few fans they did have were driven away by Vaughan, all the financial problems, relegation etc

Fabianski clearly knows he isn't playing for Man Utd. If he didn't give the ball to ref he would probably be penalised with a red card. Maybe the goal wasn't a controversial one, but the ref was still s***. It was clearly a penalty for fouled on Rosicky right before the second goal. And Fabregas deserved much more protection from the ref today. I don't think Fabianski had much choice, with the ref being so close to him. Maybe he could have delayed it a bit more, but if he'd kicked it away, he'd have been in real trouble. The one who was clearly not 100% tuned in was Campbell, and you do wonder about his mental fitness for the top level. He just stood there lost in despair rather than doing what was needed ie standing by the ball to prevent a quick take. In the post-match interview Campbell blamed the ref for standing in his way Nevermind the fact you didn't have a clue what was going on until they were already taking it, eh Sol?

Fabianski clearly knows he isn't playing for Man Utd. If he didn't give the ball to ref he would probably be penalised with a red card. Maybe the goal wasn't a controversial one, but the ref was still s***. It was clearly a penalty for fouled on Rosicky right before the second goal. And Fabregas deserved much more protection from the ref today. Fabregas is an absolute cunt. Porto didn't foul him enough for my liking.

I'm not sure that being thrust into the CL with an inferior set of players is necessarily beneficial. Lets just have the same four teams every year then. Nobody else even try. And forget the extra 20m quid or whatever it is, that's not beneficial at all really.

Even though this would be beneficial to Everton I wouldn't like to see it happen.

I like him. It's like interviewing some fella in the pub post-match.

Yeah, great find for Bolton. Where did they get him from again? Some Korean team for about 70 pence. Great signing by Megson.

If Arteta couldn't even get a call up for a friendly match after being up there with the best midfielders in the league for about 4 years then I don't see how any other Spanish player that isn't at a 'top 4' team could get a look in either. As mint as Arteta is, I couldn't see him getting in the Spain squad. Purely because its outrageously good. I'm not saying he should get in the squad for tournaments or anything, of course he shouldn't. Fabregas can't even get a start for most games. My point is all the centre mids that have been given chances in friendly matches who are no better than Arteta because they are domestic based.

If Arteta couldn't even get a call up for a friendly match after being up there with the best midfielders in the league for about 4 years then I don't see how any other Spanish player that isn't at a 'top 4' team could get a look in either.

He was crap at the back end of his Chelsea career as well (not that he had much of one) He's been atrocious this season in particular and put in probably the worst England performance I've ever seen against Croatia the other year. Lescott got all the flak from the tabloids the following day because he didn't play for a Sky 4 team though.

fyp