Joey Barton marches into Spain and takes control of the Teresa Herrera Trophy

[TaylorJ_01]

Deportivo got any surprises in store in terms of youth talent?

 

There's some youth there but we're struggling with the talent bit.  Got a young centre back (Rochela 20) who has won trophies with Spain's youngsters and a potentially decent centre midfielder in Juan Dominguez (20). Adrian(22) has played and scored for Spain's U20's and U21's and scored against Barca in the league a couple of seasons ago but lacks consistancy and like half our squad, picks up more than his fair share of injuries. Not sure if 23 still counts as young but if so, Guardado is one of our best players. He's a Mexican International, pretty quick and gets involved in set pieces. He should play the 2nd half tonight.

Some of our loan signings are quite young and half decent. Ruben Perez is 21 and looks pretty comfortable on the ball in the centre of midfield but only seen him for 45 mins against Cardiff last weekend. Urreta (20) is supposed to be a very good left winger but looked pretty pants against Cardiff. Michel (22) is an attacking midfielder on loan from Valencia and looks like he could be a very good player in time. The loanees will all probably start tonight.

 

Yeah, Guardado looks to be a good player, hope he plays. Can't say I've seen much/any of the others (apart from Michel, but he isn't yours). Cheers for the info

[TaylorJ_01]

Routledge and Barton set to start, Jonas on the bench. Hopefully he'll get a bit of game time. Biggest game of his career tbh.

[Disco]

As long as nobody (particularly Enrique, Coloccini, Carroll, Jonas and Routledge) gets injured not arsed in the slightest about the score.

[ponsaelius]

As long as nobody (particularly Enrique, Coloccini, Carroll, Jonas and Routledge) gets injured not arsed in the slightest about the score.

 

Have you seen the fucking trophy mate. The players must leave their blood on the pitch in order to bring that thing back!

[Kasper]

As long as nobody (particularly Enrique, Coloccini, Carroll, Jonas and Routledge) gets injured not arsed in the slightest about the score.

 

Have you seen the fucking trophy mate. The players must leave their blood on the pitch in order to bring that thing back!

 

Amen.

[Optimistic Nut]

Winning that trophy >>>>>>> Premier League survival

[Guest BlacknWhiteArmy]

As long as nobody (particularly Enrique, Coloccini, Carroll, Jonas and Routledge) gets injured not arsed in the slightest about the score.

 

Have you seen the f***ing trophy mate. The players must leave their blood on the pitch in order to bring that thing back!

 

[Flip]

As long as nobody (particularly Enrique, Coloccini, Carroll, Jonas and Routledge) gets injured not arsed in the slightest about the score.

 

Have you seen the f***ing trophy mate. The players must leave their blood on the pitch in order to bring that thing back!

 

 

I will cry like a baby if we don't bring that home.

 

I hope they'll have a parade if we win it.

[Super Duper Branko Strupar]

As long as nobody (particularly Enrique, Coloccini, Carroll, Jonas and Routledge) gets injured not arsed in the slightest about the score.

 

Have you seen the f***ing trophy mate. The players must leave their blood on the pitch in order to bring that thing back!

 

 

I will cry like a baby if we don't bring that home.

 

I hope they'll have a parade if we win it.

 

Can you take it on the plane as hand luggage or will it cost extra with the extra weight? Would Ashley even fork out that extra to bring it home?

[Disco]

As long as nobody (particularly Enrique, Coloccini, Carroll, Jonas and Routledge) gets injured not arsed in the slightest about the score.

 

Have you seen the f***ing trophy mate. The players must leave their blood on the pitch in order to bring that thing back!

 

 

I will cry like a baby if we don't bring that home.

 

I hope they'll have a parade if we win it.

 

Can you take it on the plane as hand luggage or will it cost extra with the extra weight? Would Ashley even fork out that extra to bring it home?

 

Probably getting the boat over from Pompey to Bilbao if Ashley has owt to do with it.

[Segun Oluwaniyi]

That trophy is actually quite beautiful. I actually much prefer it to horrible silverware they hand out when you win the Premiership or Ligue 1.

 

weren't Deportivo on the brink of finanacial disaster recently? I recall something about them being relegated or enter administration.

[Super Duper Branko Strupar]

I quite like it myself

 

http://www.uefa.com/multimediafiles/photo/footballeurope/footballeurope/497029_mediumsquare.jpg

 

[Ishmael]

I shall be gutted if we don't win that trophy tonight.  Gutted.

[Super Duper Branko Strupar]

And the PL trophy is magnificent! I've always loved it!

 

http://lapremier.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/premier-league-trophy.jpg

[Guest Heneage]

I'm still amazed Guardardo went for so cheap. My Mexican friend said he was a fantastic player and expected teams to pay Atlas at least 15m.

[Village Idiot]

That trophy is actually quite beautiful. I actually much prefer it to horrible silverware they hand out when you win the Premiership or Ligue 1.

 

weren't Deportivo on the brink of finanacial disaster recently? I recall something about them being relegated or enter administration.

 

Yes they were in pretty bad shape. Those €20m NUFC paid them for Colo/Xisco helped a lot I think... They have shed some wage fat and sold some important players like Filipe Luís and Colo, so they are light years from being the side that won La Liga early in the decade, but I think they'll stabilize as a midtable side and be able to wear off the financial storm. I guess Deporik will have a better knowledge of where they stand now.

[Guest deporik]

Depor are still in a bad way but not quite as bad as they were. To be honest, it's hard to put an exact figure on the debt because Lendoiro isn't one of the most transparent of businessmen. Last estimates were approx 120m.

The sad thing is, we are now a breeder club. If any of our players look decent, we're forced to sell them and we end up getting in a loanee who gets plenty of playing time, improves and then goes back to whover they came from.

 

We're kind of treading water at the moment but so long as we can keep floating in the top division, we should get back to a situation where we're not financially rapded by bigger clubs.

[Village Idiot]

To be honest, I think you have been spoilt by the last twenty years. Truth is that Depor are a rather small club financially-wise and you couldn't afford to keep playing the caliber of players you've been accostumed to since the days of Bebeto and Co. You can't compete with the likes of Sevilla, Valencia, Atlético... with their stadiums and revenues they pull compared to yours.

 

Lendoiro has done wonders to make it last as long as it did, and sure it's been a hell of a ride. League, cups, CL semis... Were you around during the times of O Bruixo?

[Guest neesy111]

Deportivo winning the title in 2000, was one the biggest shock's/achievements of the last decade in european football

[Village Idiot]

Donato, Djalminha, Mackaay, Fran, Mauro Silva, Conceiçao... that side was canny. Would easily be a top European side still today.

[ElDiablo]

3-3

[chicago_shearer]

Deportivo winning the title in 2000, was one the biggest shock's/achievements of the last decade in european football

 

That's sad really.  It's a shit state of affairs when you have 80 odd clubs playing top division football in England, Spain, and Italy every year but the same five or six clubs winning. 

[Guest deporik]

To be honest, I think you have been spoilt by the last twenty years. Truth is that Depor are a rather small club financially-wise and you couldn't afford to keep playing the caliber of players you've been accostumed to since the days of Bebeto and Co.

 

Lendoiro has done wonders to make it last as long as it did.

 

I agree with you to a point. I don't think our financial problems go back as far as Bebeto and Mauro (Super Depor days). But then when we got into the "Euro Depor" days, we spent big and now we're paying for it.  Since Bebeto left, our spending has well exceeded our selling. In the 6 seasons from 96/97 to 02/03 we spent a total of 248m and sold 110m worth of players.

 

Depor aren't a big club, you're right. The city has a population of about 250,000 and with Galicia being one of the poorest regions of Spain, it's not that unusual to see crowds below 15,000 in the Riazor. I think Lendoiro has done brilliantly in the past but his ability to rub so many people up the wrong way and his stubbornness has maybe not helped our current situation. I get the feeling that his wallet is held together tighter than a gnat's ass.

 

The Porto semi-final defeat was probably the make or break point and we froze and broke. If we'd have won that game against Mourinho's mob instead of going down to a penalty at home, we may have had the momentum to go on to better things and who knows where we would be now.

 

As it is, that was the end of an era and I just count ourselves lucky that we didn't pay a price as heavy as Leeds Utd did.

[nufcmichael]

I remember som nice games last year, Aalborg - Deportivo hehe

[James]

I want us to win the trophy.

 

Then when we secure survival, run around SJP with that trophy like a bunch of loons.