Kaizero

Nothing better than witnessing a fellow GIF connoisseur, I salute you telling your story with nothing else than prime giffage

For some reason I ended up looking at how the U20 World Cup had developed when I saw it listed as I scrolled through Flashscore and something peculiar caught my eye, can anyone with better knowledge of Ineternational Women's Football explain to me how the fuck this ended up being the match-up for the Final? North Korea had a goal difference of 17-2 after their three matches in the group stage, knocked nine past Costa Rica, six past Argentina and two past the Netherlands before going on to knock Mexico out in the Round of 16. After that, they destroyed Germany in the Quarter Finals, setting up a Semi Final against the 1.01 pre-tournament favorite against the USA - but apparently sent them packing to the Loser's Final (Bronze) without breaking a sweat? Japan I understand, they've been a great national team in women's footy for decades. But what the fuck is up with North Korea completely annihilating the best U20 footy nations in women's football out of fucking nowhere?

Or would it...

Bring this and a steadicam rig would probably be overkill, though:

I have a GoPro Hero laying about somewhere. Not sure which number it is'v but it's 5-6 years old and never been used I have an absolute ton of camera/sound equipment, if there's some wants/needs people have I can see if i have something that'll work and bring whatever fits in my suitcase.

indicating ASAP

Almost makes it sound like the current European competitions aren't set up to be true competitions between league and/or cup champions, but rather a money making scheme rigged by some shady third party far removed from the original spirit of the sport

I actually think we're in agreement about the important parts here. The new format has completely removed any tension for most fans/casual viewers of teams that qualified for the CL proper. The "lowly" teams are happy to be there and getting to play major teams, as are their fans, they don't expect to go through and even finishing in the bottom eight sees them get to enter the Europa League, which is a tournament that's likely to be more on their level. All in all, this means the CL league stage will include no form of tension/hope for fans of those teams, they'll just be waiting to find out who they'll play in the EL knock-outs where there'll likely be some tension returning to the matchgoing/viewing experience. Then you have the mid-range teams, they'll either be a surprise stand-out finishing top eight or they'll advance by finishing in the middle of the "league". They'll go through regardless, so no tension for fans/casual match viewers through the CL league stage for those clubs either. Then there's the "elite" teams. They'll breeze through this idiotic format and finish top eight, be that all of them or one or two of them slipping up and having to play those two extra matches. No tension for anyone watching them either. The entire CL League format is devoid of tension, passion, excitement and maybe worst of all - it's blatantly set up the way it is to make it almost impossible to witness an underdog story where one of the worst teams (on paper) that have qualified for the tournament proper manages to put together a streak of wins that sees them qualify for the knockout stage. Those two extra "league" fixtures are there solely for the reason of being the death knell of all underdogs hope of reaching the knockouts ever again. The group stage format after the revamps UEFA did a few seasons ago where the group stage draw essentially got rigged by overly relying on the seeding system to ensure each group would consist of two major clubs and two mediocre/shit (by CL standards) clubs had already fucked up the CL grotesquely. I swear, football as we know it is getting closer and closer to getting completely ruined for the fans.

Respectfully disagree. The alternative for them not going all out to finish in the top eight will be having to play an additional 180 minutes of football, somehow smashed/crammed into an already insanely stacked fixture list. Not to mention those extra 180 minutes also mean the club has to jump over an additional hurdle where they could fall over, ending their CL ambitions before we've even gotten to March. Also, the matches on each side of the last group match for Man City (I know it'll likely not to be an issue for them to place in the top eight, they're just the example being used now ) would be Chelsea four days before the last group match and Arsenal three days after. If they don't advance directly to the Round of 16 by placing in the top eight, they'd also end up with a fixture congestion in February looking like this: 11/12th Feb - 1st Knockout 15th Feb - Newcastle United 18/19th Feb - 2nd Knockout 22nd Feb - Liverpool 25th Feb - Tottenham 4/5th Mar - Round of 16 8th Mar - Forest 11/12 Mar - Round of 16 15th Mar - Brighton All in all, finishing outside the top eight means that Man City would play 9 matches across 32 days, so one match essentially every third day. If they field a full strength team in the last group stage to push for a top eight finish and succeed, that changes to 7 matches across 28 days - which is still abhorrent and too many when taking the wellbeing of the players into consideration - but now its down to one match every fourth day instead, which could make all the difference against the teams currently lined up in their fixture list. All that said, after actually looking through their fixtures this season... Man City finishing outside the top 8 and being required to play two extra CL games would undeniably be absolutely great news for everyone of us that doesn't want Man City winning the PL for the 5th time in a row/7nd time in eight years - not to mention great news for us given our match against them would be smack dab in the middle of their 1st Round Knockout matches

This is how Man City lined up for their sixth group stage fixture against Crvena Zvezda in the 23/24 CL, having already secured their advancement to the knock-outs: Now, however, if we get to the eight league stage fixture and Man City needs to win to escape having to play two extra matches due to not finishing in the top eight - does anyone believe they'd put out a side like that and not their first choice eleven? At the same time, for casual viewers or their fans, that final fixture will have absolutely no meaning. Man City, by either finishing just inside top eight or just outside, will already have secured their advancement in the CL before kick-off in their final group match

This is actually a misconception. The new format adds two league games that now could actually matter for the "big clubs" who are always expected to coast through the group stages. In the previous format, those teams usually had their advancing to the next round sorted after game 4, at most after game 5 - leaving the fifth/sixth group games meaningless for them, thus allowing them to field their reserves/U21s in them, saving their best players those extra 90/180 minutes. Now, however, if you don't place in the top eight - you get another extra two games to play, and these two are no longer group matches but knock-outs, meaning you can't risk fielding too many ressies/youths in your starting line-up for them. That leaves us with the much desired and obvious aim for the "top clubs" to finish in the top eight of the new CL League system, skipping those two extra matches. However, the race for top eight will be helluva lot tighter than the race for the top two spots in the old CL system where groups of four were still a thing. If one or more of the top clubs slip on a banana peel in their first 5-6 fixtures, like Barcelona did against Monaco today, suddenly the extra two games in the league end up mattering instead of being a rare exhibition match where the depth players notch a first team appearance. All in all the new CL system does the exact opposite of what FIFPro and the players themselves are crying out for, which is a less congested fixture list to allow them time to recuperate completely after matches instead of playing 90+ minutes twice a week way into January, only for the "best teams" to continue playing twice a week until near the end of the season - an end of the season which will immediately be followed by the new, idiotic, FIFA Club World Cup, further exploiting the players and putting their longevity as professional footballers at risk due to fatigue related injuries and similar. This all brings us to the inevitable conclusion; that the new CL format makes games mean much less for the supporters/viewers as their club has a 2 in 3 chance of advancing anyway - yet at the same time making the games mean much more for the clubs at the expense of the players

They did. They accepted a forced relegation to the 4th tier where the current state of their finances would allow them to participate, going bust in the French league system is apparently a bit different to when it happens in the UK as it doesn't require you to start again as a phoenix club way down the league pyramid (or buy the league license of another club to skip a few steps on said pyramid). To my understanding it means the club that went bust get a forced relegation to the level of the French league pyramid where the club's finances are acceptable for them to participate, in turn promoting the clubs that would be next in line for promotion (based on last season) from the tiers they jump past down the pyramid. My info is based on me skimming through some Wiki articles about it a few weeks ago, so take it all with a grain of salt until someone with better knowledge of the French league system either confirms/debunks what I've just said That said, if it is how their league system handles clubs that "go bust", I dare say it's one of the best ways I've seen it dealt with by any FA so far. Much better to just move the club going bust down to a level where the club doesn't have to liquidate and "restart" as a phoenix club that in turn will need to fight it out in the courts to be allowed to retain "their" club history/achievements/honors. The AFC Wimbledon/MK Dons debacle is the perfect example of what a nightmare that is, thankfully today AFC Wimbledon retain the trophies/honors that Wimbledon FC achieved and MK Dons have no historical records/honours in their "history" prior to their first official match, played August 7th 2004. That it took three years for AFC Wimbledon (officially the London Borough of Merton) to get the 1988 FA Cup trophy replica returned to them by MK Dons, to me, feels like pure insanity.

English players have almost felt like they've been vaccinated against the mere thought of playing football anywhere else than on the British Isles, so every time I see some news about an English player signing for a team outside the UK I genuinely feel some kind of joy because of it

Copied your question and asked the same one verbatim, got this answer: Have to admit I'm not that fond of an AI asking me about my opinion after answering a question I asked it

https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11095/13206331/jay-stansfield-birmingham-city-complete-league-one-record-deal-to-sign-striker-from-fulham#:~:text=Birmingham City have broken the,the deal to sign Stansfield. https://www.goal.com/en/lists/birmingham-tom-brady-league-one-transfer-record-splurge-on-fulham-jay-stansfield-fee-rise/blt041c37873e422ce6 https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/birmingham-wrexham-jay-stansfield-morrison-33675514

Brady owns Birmingham.

£15 million, you mean.

The person providing the opportunity to "pirate" intellectual property is breaking the law in a much more serious manner than the person watching as they are the ones committing the act of piracy. That said, those watching are also breaking the law, just not in as serious a manner as the originator(s). Imagine a pirate ship back in the day, the Captain orders the crew to attack a merchant vessel. The Captain and the active pirates are clearly commiting more serious criminality than a deckhand remaining on the pirate vessel as the piracy happens. However, once the deckhand spends his share of the crew's booty on land, he's guilty as well - even if he didn't board the merchant vessel at all. "International" Copyright Law is enforcable under the 1971 Berne Convention, which Saudi Arabia are a signatory of.

If I'm not mistaken, one of their pre-season fixtures against mediocre opposition sold more tickets than the best selling Chelsea/Man City USA pre-season match.

Friend of Becks, who in turn is a friend of Brady, I'd imagine.

Probably many more opening wide for this than you imagine, people that had never watched a football match in their life have started watching over there thanks to Welcome to Wrexham.

It is. To their credit, McElhenney/Reynolds refused even entertaining the idea and straight up refused to discuss it saying they wouldn't do something like that to the fans of their club.

Such a weird world we live in these days when Tom Brady, David Beckham, Rob McElhenney and Ryan Reynolds are in the stands to watch Birmingham - Wrexham play out a League One fixture