Village Idiot

I know what you're saying, but I'd hardly call 1-1 there in the first leg a particularly bad result. I know. Madrid will do them easily this year. Just that they managed to put up a fight.

Espanyol are better than us at this so I pretend it doesn't exist

Blackpool would win Serie A.

Real Madrid keeps his bad record at Gerland. Fair play to Lyon, I didn't think they'd get a decent result this year.

Actually I trust the yanks more to exact change in the FIFA than us Euros, our FAs will never bark in front of their master. Where's your sig from Kaizero?

To be frank, I hope some federation is daft enough to give him the nod, but I suspect they'll fear Blatter's reprisal.

Torres just needs a summer of rest, in my opinion. Injuries and non-stop international competitions every summer since 2008 have taken its toll.

Benzema scores with almost his first touch.

Van Der Vaart missed the big club train with Real Madrid. Can't see him going anywhere "better" than Spurs. As we all know, Bale is going to Inter for 40m in the summer, though.

IIRC each club can re-register one cup-tied player in Europe. Real Madrid had this issue when they signed Huntelaar and Lass in the January window two years ago and chose Lass.

Pablo Hernández has fallen out of favor at Valencia, weren't you linked with him at some point? (Might have been caughtoffside type link, mind)

That's pretty good given how dire they were. If his pace is still there he could get 15-ish in a team that doesn't spend the season chasing shadows.

Still had a decent return for Sunderland, didn't he?

weren't real madrid also massivly helped out by the municipality (?) when they 'sold' their training ground to the city of madrid ? Yes, they got their training ground re-zoned and then they sold it to the city, at a huge expense to the taxpayer. We actually tried to do the same but we have an honest city council

The saving banks that usually bankrolled Real Madrid and Barça's debt have now tighter lending regulations (Spanish bank regs are actually very tight, but they didn't apply to savings banks). Also it wasn't banks cozying up to Real Madrid as much as it was to Florentino Pérez. The bank that holds most of Real Madrid's debt is a big investor in Pérez's businesses (and Madrid's debt is a drop in the ocean compared to those)

I don't think we ever offered anything to Afobe, to be frank. But we did scout him indeed.

What's up with Carroll and all those surrogate father figures?

It's the labor law. Would need of some heavy lobbying to get it modified. Personally I don't mind Spanish clubs not being able to tie their youngsters with golden chains until they are 17, what I regret is how this doesn't apply to other nations that exploit it against us.

Sorry, I fail to see it as stealing. Surely Barca had the opportunity to keep him there? Or is there some kind of loophole I don't know about? There is a loophole. We can't offer 16 year olds professional contracts. English clubs can. Same way we lost Cesc (and Piqué, and Mérida, and Pacheco...).

David Luiz is great, but we were never linked with him. We really need a couple more CBs this summer. Our depth there is abysmal and Puyol can't go on forever. Hopefully one of Fontàs/Muniesa can make the step up too.

Seems his last injury has finally f***ed him up. Has the mobility of a tectonic plate now.

On more "Barça player going to England" news, our press reporting that Aston Villa is trying to get Gaby Milito from us (sorry brummie)

Also in 5 years time we'll be tapping him up left and right every time one of our players opens his mouth. This alone should prevent you from poaching more youngsters from us. We'll get Cesc to do it, too.

He's an athletic midfielder with good technique. Game based around power and pace, which makes me think he'll fit in England, and allows me to take some solace in the fact his dominance in our youth teams is probably because he is more developed than most other kids. [/wishful thinking] Mérida hasn't had a good season. But nobody at Atlético has. Still very young so it would be harsh to write him off yet.

Sevilla thrived under a similar policy (buy cheap, sell high) after getting promoted. They sold Sergio Ramos, Reyes, Baptista... and yet went on to win two back-to-back UEFA cups. But their transfer record during the period is unbelievable. Daniel Alves for 500k? Julio Baptista for €3m? Luís Fabiano for €3.5m?