Village Idiot

Doesn't change zip if we don't win.

FFS what a save from Elche's keeper.

Real Madrid have been at their Lisboa hotel since they beat Bayern.

Luís Enrique was caught meeting with our DoF this week, so it's pretty much a given at this point. Regarding Laporte, he joined Athletic when he was 16. You don't actually need to be *born* there, just to live there since bairn, but it's probably a bit of a stretch of his policy. EDIT: Actually, I just checked, and although he moved to Bilbao when he was 16, he lived in the French part of the Basque country since he was a bairn, so it's not that much of a stretch.

Man, he had Javier Mascherano and Tévez and still managed to almost relegate West Ham. He should never, ever talk about his second PL season in there When he benched both and had football sensations Nigel Reo-Coker and Marlon Harewood starting instead

I know he's been rather shit since he left us, but Rijkaard

Anyway, it's just Arbeloa talking about himself and his career. Who the f*** cares about Arbeloa talking about himself and his career? He only has a few quotes about some players and managers he's worked with, but nothing surprising. 1) Ronaldo (the fat one) often asked which team they were playing against before taking the pitch. 2) Benítez is a very methodic, almost obsessive, manager but doesn't cultivate his relationship with the players. 3) Xabi Alonso doesn't easily get along with others. 4) The relationship between Mourinho and the players deteriorated significantly during his last season at Real Madrid. 5) He doesn't want to speak about Casillas (sort of implying that they can't stand each other) He paints a bit of a cutthroat view of football "I don't need to be an example to anybody" - when talking about unsporting behavior to get an advantage. Also how your dressing room mates are also rivals that can take your place, that football is actually an individual sport where the thing that matters the most is how you perform since you don't control what others do.

Man, that's fucking long

Redknapp is the quintessential chequebook manager, pair him with your owner and it will be a fun ride.

Laporte's been very good. He's been linked with us.

It worked for Lionel. The problem of youth football is that you're playing against people of similar age to you, it helps immensely to test yourself against veteran, competitive players, even in a poor league. But yeah, I'd never do it in England.

Owt to do with having B teams in the regular football pyramid though. B teams are really a great platform to give young players experience at a professional level, and big and small teams have benefited from them alike. In Spain it sorta works (I would bar them from playing in our Second Division though), because of our football pyramid being an actual pyramid, so Segunda B is made up of 80 teams and B teams end up being a small % of the division. I believe it would be a terrible idea in England as eventually a bunch of B teams would take spots at the top of the Football League. In Spain, B teams emerged naturally as initially they were just regular teams with whom the "A" teams entered loaning agreements with. It's at least in part to do with having B teams in the regular football pyramid (although individual TV contracts are a more obvious factor). B teams are a good platform to give young players professional football...of course they are, but the teams that benefit are the ones they play for. The bigger sides. If a big team can keep all those players and give them regular football then that gives them an advantage - an inequality - over a team that does not have that opportunity. You can't pretend otherwise. With no B teams many of those players would be getting games for other teams. It might well result in better training for more youngsters and a better national team - that's what you'd expect at least. We just have to decide whether it's a price worth paying. I don't think it is. All sides have B teams. You make it look like only Barça and Real Madrid do. And despite them being currently in the Second Division, they have spent the most of their existence in Segunda B or lower (Barça B was in the 4th tier of Spanish football when Guardiola took over), alongside most of the other B teams. It's a good tool for smaller teams because they can offer pro football to youngsters that could otherwise go to Barça/Madrid academies. No - I'm fully aware that many Spanish clubs have B teams. When I talk about smaller teams I mean teams like Leyton Orient (my personal 'B' team), Oxford, Torquay etc etc, not Crystal Palace or West Brom. It's the teams in the lower divisions in England that I am inordinately proud of, and that would suffer most if we went down this road. As I said, the size of Spanish lower divisions reduces the impact B teams have in preventing the progress of proper teams. Actually, given the current state of our lower leagues, they are probably needed to fill them out... And yes, we have our own small historic teams but in Spain the following of clubs not at the top level is pretty terrible (which brings me to what I said in the first paragraph).

Incidentally, the Madrid city council wants to install a jumbo TV in Plaza del Sol so both sets of fans can watch the final together. Awful idea, unless they want to enclose it and turn it into a sort of Mad Max Thunderdome.

So they've got a history with this type of thing? It was coined after their last CL final in the 70s, when they surrendered a lead against Bayern in injury time. They sort of developed a tradition of being unlucky and defeatist since then.

They'll just keep their current nickname: "El Pupas" (loosely translatable as "star-crossed")

Owt to do with having B teams in the regular football pyramid though. B teams are really a great platform to give young players experience at a professional level, and big and small teams have benefited from them alike. In Spain it sorta works (I would bar them from playing in our Second Division though), because of our football pyramid being an actual pyramid, so Segunda B is made up of 80 teams and B teams end up being a small % of the division. I believe it would be a terrible idea in England as eventually a bunch of B teams would take spots at the top of the Football League. In Spain, B teams emerged naturally as initially they were just regular teams with whom the "A" teams entered loaning agreements with. It's at least in part to do with having B teams in the regular football pyramid (although individual TV contracts are a more obvious factor). B teams are a good platform to give young players professional football...of course they are, but the teams that benefit are the ones they play for. The bigger sides. If a big team can keep all those players and give them regular football then that gives them an advantage - an inequality - over a team that does not have that opportunity. You can't pretend otherwise. With no B teams many of those players would be getting games for other teams. It might well result in better training for more youngsters and a better national team - that's what you'd expect at least. We just have to decide whether it's a price worth paying. I don't think it is. All sides have B teams. You make it look like only Barça and Real Madrid do. And despite them being currently in the Second Division, they have spent the most of their existence in Segunda B or lower (Barça B was in the 4th tier of Spanish football when Guardiola took over), alongside most of the other B teams. It's a good tool for smaller teams because they can offer pro football to youngsters that could otherwise go to Barça/Madrid academies.

Dunno, I'm still scarred by your season in the C'ship, that was some turgid football in that division Our Second Division has certainly a very low tempo and lots of space, but I find it quite watchable. The fact there's little physicality allows entertaining players to shine - Valerón was like Zidane in there. But if you were referring to fans, yeah, there's little atmosphere and lots empty seats in there. Bar a few teams.

Owt to do with having B teams in the regular football pyramid though. B teams are really a great platform to give young players experience at a professional level, and big and small teams have benefited from them alike. In Spain it sorta works (I would bar them from playing in our Second Division though), because of our football pyramid being an actual pyramid, so Segunda B is made up of 80 teams and B teams end up being a small % of the division. I believe it would be a terrible idea in England as eventually a bunch of B teams would take spots at the top of the Football League. In Spain, B teams emerged naturally as initially they were just regular teams with whom the "A" teams entered loaning agreements with.

147 I spent almost two minutes figuring out how to spell Hyypia's name correctly

Key word here is "almost". It's always "almost" with Javi Guerra. That said, he's had a very good season. But he's 32 already so not much left in the tank by this point.

If we win our two next games we'll win the league. Ridiculous if it happened

He's easily one of the most positive and gung-ho managers I have ever seen. He actually gets a lot of flak for going to places like the Bernabéu and Camp Nou and attacking form the get-go, meaning Rayo gets stuffed often. He's amazingly upbeat, though, and makes a strong point of *never* changing his ways even in the face of relegation danger or to play for a draw in a tough game. He always plays to win. And it's worked for Rayo so far. Rayo's the only team that has won the possession stat against Barça since 2008 IIRC. I've been very impressed. Tbh he could do better than us, even in La Liga. Surely one of the sides with a chance for 4th next season will take a punt? All those sides' managers are safe, I believe. Valencia have surged under Pizzi even though it's been too little to late, so my bet is that he'll stay for the next season, Emery's in an European final and has managed to sneak Sevilla in the EL, Villarreal and Real Sociedad have had decent seasons, Athletic have managed CL football for the first time in two decades... can't see an opening.

Happens a lot in Spain too. Angry people will call back/post in your site while people that agree with you won't.

He's easily one of the most positive and gung-ho managers I have ever seen. He actually gets a lot of flak for going to places like the Bernabéu and Camp Nou and attacking form the get-go, meaning Rayo gets stuffed often. He's amazingly upbeat, though, and makes a strong point of *never* changing his ways even in the face of relegation danger or to play for a draw in a tough game. He always plays to win. And it's worked for Rayo so far. Rayo's the only team that has won the possession stat against Barça since 2008 IIRC.