Village Idiot

We like it rough. Neymar shone when he had somebody to play off from, rather than trying to dribble his way to goal. I like that actually, we need to get him involved.

Aye, he even posted about Spurs academy players moving on loan to other clubs, didn't he? I found him amusing, to be honest.

Need to do a better job of that though. We got much better in the second half once Atlético tired and we started moving the ball quicker, but otherwise we've been extremely flat. One thing I noticed is that Alba needs to let Neymar challenge a bit, whenever Neymar gets the ball Alba just runs past him on the side which doesn't give Neymar the freedom to challenge, because if he does and loses the ball it's a counter attack. Neymar needed that support though, most of the time it was him against the world. Messi drifted a lot to the right tonight, which left Ney isolated.

Need to do a better job of that though. We got much better in the second half once Atlético tired and we started moving the ball quicker, but otherwise we've been extremely flat.

It's our anthem. "Cant del Barça"

Well, this was quite awful.

Fucking shoot dammit.

We just can't have peaceful games with Madrid teams, can we?

Neymar slips again...

Yeah, the game was set so late as to not clash with the CL qualifiers.

They have had more shots on goal, if it weren't for Valdés we would be behind already. We are actually doing some stuff well, but it all freezes to a halt in the last third. EDIT: Neymar's "finish"

Villa is so great in this second striker role, dropping in between the lines, making stuff happen. We are quite shit so far. Regardless of how this ends, we need to improve massively.

I admit it's been a bit shit. Atlético defending well deep and us unable to break the lock.

What is this? A Brazilian making fun of religious surnames?

Looks like someone's been chopping logs on his face. Have you seen the lot? Since Mou and Pep left we are bereft of metrosexuals. Tata Martino or Pepe Mel won't be gracing Slim's Men thread anytime soon. And Martino came in 8th in the list

Simeone got voted "Most attractive La Liga manager" by some fashion mag today.

Their squad is pretty thin actually, they have retained most of their key players but they'll need a few bodies in defence and defensive midfield, imho. Oh yeah, Celtic's squad is p*ss poor now. They will be absolutely over the moon to get into the champions league, it means everything for them and means they can invest in more good young players to come through. They will do well to come third in their group this year, very well. I meant Real Sociedad. Guess I wasn't clear. Dortmund will be in pot 3. I know their coefficient isn't that good but it's ridiculous to have last year's finalists in pot 3

Their squad is pretty thin actually, they have retained most of their key players but they'll need a few bodies in defence and defensive midfield, imho.

Real Sociedad in tomorrow's draw They'll be in pot 3 IIRC so they can make out a pretty interesting group.

There go my dreams of ritual sheep slaughtering while the CL anthem is played

OL are a bit shit, but Real are missing way too many chances here.

Demichelis was a radically different player than the walking disaster he was at Munich. Looked way more assured and marshaled Málaga's defence well. He's probably there just as backup anyway. Pellegrini wants a veteran he trusts as they have no experienced replacements to Lescott/Kompany. If I'm not wrong he has more CL apps than any City defender.

Demichelis from Atlético to City for €5m. They picked him on a free... one month ago?

Remember him saying that he wasted too much time in this forum and he had to study or something to the effect.

Atlético have had a €5m bid for Alderweidel turned down. Ashley-tastic.