Village Idiot

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.

Dida -> Dindane -> Zidane

Incidentally my "all Spanish" team is 301 in the NUFC league. Fuck you Mourinho Took Mata out and brought Silva in, but I need cheap defenders/midfielders that play reliably and will play my wildcard next week to do some refurnishing once I get a better picture of whom starts for whom. Captain Soldado is allright though.

Same here. Waiting until the window shuts and then I'll do all the refurnishing. I had two transfers stored up and that's enough to take care of the Chelsea/AV problem.

Was never going to happen. Blaming Wenger for not winning cups is like blaming George Best for never winning a World Cup, incidentally. I know Laudrup/Martinez got Swansea/Wigan trophies, but cup draws involve an element of luck and Wenger has a very good record (only lost once or twice against lower division sides in 15+ years or something like that). Really hope Arsenal win something this year, he deserves it for slogging out with clubs with a lot more resources year-after-year. Well... yes and no. On the cup business Birmingham might have something to say, and 10 years ago Arsenal were in ManU's position. While neither can compete financially with the oil clubs (it's been long since ManU truly broke the bank), ManU has been able to keep winning trophies while Arsenal have been in a slow slide. Just 3-4 seasons ago they were still mounting a title challenge; now that doesn't look remotely possible. And I'm sure they didn't lose players like Cesc or Van Persie because they couldn't meet their wage demands. I'm not sure how the new stadium affected them financially, if the reports about their cash in hand are true, though, it seems they have thrifted their way into irrelevancy.

Can't find the current Serie A thread. Do we have one? Anyway, Rossi scored for Fiore in his Serie A debut, hope he can pull his career back together after those two horrible years

They already have Ba if they look for a good finisher that will do the job against the poor teams in the league though. Mou just loves grizzled veterans. I hope this means Lukaku will get another loan so I can pick him up in the Fantasy League.

Al "score 1000000 goals in Netherlands but don't get a look anywhere else" Hamdaoui to Málaga.

He was at the Calderón this weekend, he must be making a tour.

M'bia on loan from QPR to Sevilla, with a buyout clause. Presumably this is to replace Kondogbia who will be sold to Monaco tomorrow.

Naples to raise more transfer funds: http://www.football-italia.net/38834/napoli-sue-after-higuain-stitches

Higuaín's injury in pictures. http://estaticos01.marca.com/albumes/2013/08/27/accidente_higuain/1377608898_extras_albumes_0.jpg http://estaticos01.marca.com/albumes/2013/08/27/accidente_higuain/1377609005_extras_albumes_0.jpg http://estaticos01.marca.com/albumes/2013/08/27/accidente_higuain/1377608979_extras_albumes_0.jpg http://estaticos01.marca.com/albumes/2013/08/27/accidente_higuain/1377608958_extras_albumes_0.jpg http://estaticos01.marca.com/albumes/2013/08/27/accidente_higuain/1377608929_extras_albumes_0.jpg%5D Most posh football injury of all time?

That's just trolling, he'd never come to Barça I was surprised to see Ancelotti dropping him again, as you say, something's going on behind the stages. Personally I think there's very little between him and DL, and I still have Casillas as the best of the lot.

Casillas linked with a move away from Madrid after being dropped against Málaga. Arsenal and City linked.

Closest country to England -> Cheaper air fares.

I'm keeping track of my own predictions, in VI's league you'd be 5th with 4 points... I'm always optimistic...

Shopping window. You sold a player to Chelsea last window and are about to sell another to Arsenal. It's not too bad if managed well; Spurs have thrived on it.