Pata Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Making the top 8 is huge and can see it being interesting in weeks 7-8, actually more interesting than who make the next 16. It's just so far away that it's hard to get excited about these early rounds and the table won't tell anything for ages. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBrownBottle Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 3 hours ago, Kaizero said: I actually think we're in agreement about the important parts here. The new format has completely removed any tension for most fans/casual viewers of teams that qualified for the CL proper. The "lowly" teams are happy to be there and getting to play major teams, as are their fans, they don't expect to go through and even finishing in the bottom eight sees them get to enter the Europa League, which is a tournament that's likely to be more on their level. All in all, this means the CL league stage will include no form of tension/hope for fans of those teams, they'll just be waiting to find out who they'll play in the EL knock-outs where there'll likely be some tension returning to the matchgoing/viewing experience. Then you have the mid-range teams, they'll either be a surprise stand-out finishing top eight or they'll advance by finishing in the middle of the "league". They'll go through regardless, so no tension for fans/casual match viewers through the CL league stage for those clubs either. Then there's the "elite" teams. They'll breeze through this idiotic format and finish top eight, be that all of them or one or two of them slipping up and having to play those two extra matches. No tension for anyone watching them either. The entire CL League format is devoid of tension, passion, excitement and maybe worst of all - it's blatantly set up the way it is to make it almost impossible to witness an underdog story where one of the worst teams (on paper) that have qualified for the tournament proper manages to put together a streak of wins that sees them qualify for the knockout stage. Those two extra "league" fixtures are there solely for the reason of being the death knell of all underdogs hope of reaching the knockouts ever again. The group stage format after the revamps UEFA did a few seasons ago where the group stage draw essentially got rigged by overly relying on the seeding system to ensure each group would consist of two major clubs and two mediocre/shit (by CL standards) clubs had already fucked up the CL grotesquely. I swear, football as we know it is getting closer and closer to getting completely ruined for the fans. They could do something completely crazy, like having all of the champions of Europe play in a cup competition, and have straight knockouts - with no seeding in place. For everyone else, they could have another cup competition where the teams who didn’t win the league but finished high enough in the table qualify - and ensure that every country gets at least one team qualified. Then maybe a third competition, where all the cup winners play each other in straight knockouts similar to the one that the champions do. That all sounds completely mental, though. Would never work. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kaizero Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 9 minutes ago, TheBrownBottle said: They could do something completely crazy, like having all of the champions of Europe play in a cup competition, and have straight knockouts - with no seeding in place. For everyone else, they could have another cup competition where the teams who didn’t win the league but finished high enough in the table qualify - and ensure that every country gets at least one team qualified. Then maybe a third competition, where all the cup winners play each other in straight knockouts similar to the one that the champions do. That all sounds completely mental, though. Would never work. Almost makes it sound like the current European competitions aren't set up to be true competitions between league and/or cup champions, but rather a money making scheme rigged by some shady third party far removed from the original spirit of the sport Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pata Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 I think champions only CL would be very shit but agree that up to 5 teams from the same league is too much. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
ramirez Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 5 hours ago, Kaizero said: I actually think we're in agreement about the important parts here. The new format has completely removed any tension for most fans/casual viewers of teams that qualified for the CL proper. The "lowly" teams are happy to be there and getting to play major teams, as are their fans, they don't expect to go through and even finishing in the bottom eight sees them get to enter the Europa League, which is a tournament that's likely to be more on their level. All in all, this means the CL league stage will include no form of tension/hope for fans of those teams, they'll just be waiting to find out who they'll play in the EL knock-outs where there'll likely be some tension returning to the matchgoing/viewing experience. Then you have the mid-range teams, they'll either be a surprise stand-out finishing top eight or they'll advance by finishing in the middle of the "league". They'll go through regardless, so no tension for fans/casual match viewers through the CL league stage for those clubs either. Then there's the "elite" teams. They'll breeze through this idiotic format and finish top eight, be that all of them or one or two of them slipping up and having to play those two extra matches. No tension for anyone watching them either. The entire CL League format is devoid of tension, passion, excitement and maybe worst of all - it's blatantly set up the way it is to make it almost impossible to witness an underdog story where one of the worst teams (on paper) that have qualified for the tournament proper manages to put together a streak of wins that sees them qualify for the knockout stage. Those two extra "league" fixtures are there solely for the reason of being the death knell of all underdogs hope of reaching the knockouts ever again. The group stage format after the revamps UEFA did a few seasons ago where the group stage draw essentially got rigged by overly relying on the seeding system to ensure each group would consist of two major clubs and two mediocre/shit (by CL standards) clubs had already fucked up the CL grotesquely. I swear, football as we know it is getting closer and closer to getting completely ruined for the fans. Agree although you can’t drop into another competition now, that’s what would have made us overwhelming favourites for the conference. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
54 Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 7 hours ago, Kaizero said: Respectfully disagree. The alternative for them not going all out to finish in the top eight will be having to play an additional 180 minutes of football, somehow smashed/crammed into an already insanely stacked fixture list. Not to mention those extra 180 minutes also mean the club has to jump over an additional hurdle where they could fall over, ending their CL ambitions before we've even gotten to March. Also, the matches on each side of the last group match for Man City (I know it'll likely not to be an issue for them to place in the top eight, they're just the example being used now ) would be Chelsea four days before the last group match and Arsenal three days after. If they don't advance directly to the Round of 16 by placing in the top eight, they'd also end up with a fixture congestion in February looking like this: 11/12th Feb - 1st Knockout 15th Feb - Newcastle United 18/19th Feb - 2nd Knockout 22nd Feb - Liverpool 25th Feb - Tottenham 4/5th Mar - Round of 16 8th Mar - Forest 11/12 Mar - Round of 16 15th Mar - Brighton All in all, finishing outside the top eight means that Man City would play 9 matches across 32 days, so one match essentially every third day. If they field a full strength team in the last group stage to push for a top eight finish and succeed, that changes to 7 matches across 28 days - which is still abhorrent and too many when taking the wellbeing of the players into consideration - but now its down to one match every fourth day instead, which could make all the difference against the teams currently lined up in their fixture list. All that said, after actually looking through their fixtures this season... Man City finishing outside the top 8 and being required to play two extra CL games would undeniably be absolutely great news for everyone of us that doesn't want Man City winning the PL for the 5th time in a row/7nd time in eight years - not to mention great news for us given our match against them would be smack dab in the middle of their 1st Round Knockout matches So just using Man City as an example, but you can apply it to any English Champions League team really. Between the November international break, and the March international break (112), and supposed they also progresses in the League and FA Cups, they'd play 33 games in that time, a game every 3.3 days. It's insane. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
BoSelecta Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Some top posting that @Kaizero , very interesting 👏🏻 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBrownBottle Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 6 hours ago, Pata said: I think champions only CL would be very shit but agree that up to 5 teams from the same league is too much. It wasn’t shit, though Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dokko Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Ref has been donkey shit in the Stoke V Hull game. Finally giving Hull something. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dokko Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Juan Juan (if anyone cares) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
joeyt Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Ben Gibson has been a proper old school bully in this game Forearm smashed someone in the face first half and got away with it, trod on someone's achilles to stop a breakaway (no yellow) and just got a yellow for dissent complaining about a really obvious penalty. Then manhandled one of the Hull's attackers who was on the edge of the box for the penalty Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
joeyt Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 State of this Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jewel Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 10 hours ago, TheBrownBottle said: It wasn’t shit, though it would be now, though. Since most leagues are no longer competitive in Europe anymore. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dokko Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 9 minutes ago, joeyt said: Ben Gibson has been a proper old school bully in this game Forearm smashed someone in the face first half and got away with it, trod on someone's achilles to stop a breakaway (no yellow) and just got a yellow for dissent complaining about a really obvious penalty. Then manhandled one of the Hull's attackers who was on the edge of the box for the penalty Hull have been abused all game. Deserved something out the game, shame Balloumi their RW isn't more mature as they'd be winning. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dokko Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 gerrin. Goal for the whole of playing football. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dokko Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Sorry it's Belloumi. Actually think he's got the tools to be a good prem player in a few years. Could be a Howe type player. Left footed (I think) RW as well. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dokko Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 1-3 Boooooooo's from the Sterk. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scoot Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Was 1-1 before I left the room. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
joeyt Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Nice 8-0 Saint Etienne Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fak Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Just now, joeyt said: Nice 8-0 Saint Etienne Dante still playing. 40 years old. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dokko Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Hull pass it really well. Playing out from the back with confidence. Could be a dark horse for promotion. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
leffe186 Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 Just catching up with the Hull game by skipping through. Some things never change - Stoke getting away with fucking murder at home. The penalty could have been two penalties and the fact Stoke have only got two yellow cards out of this is nuts. Gibson could have got four or five and a red to boot. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RodrigoRamos Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 I've never seen a team play a brand of football that reflects their location so well. Both the team and city of Stoke are relics from a bygone era, they haven't moved with the times, they're ugly as fuck and run down, everyone hates it, brexity as fuck, you forget it/they exist until you're reminded of how grim they are, with all that said, they're hard workers and salt of the earth folk Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBrownBottle Posted September 20 Share Posted September 20 53 minutes ago, Jewel said: it would be now, though. Since most leagues are no longer competitive in Europe anymore. The reason that they're not competitive is because of deathly dull 'Champions League'. Watching the same five or six teams in the QFs onwards year-on-year after a dull-as-dishwater group stage. I lost interest in it years ago. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
toon25 Posted Saturday at 11:16 Share Posted Saturday at 11:16 Genuinely can't bring myself to be watching Chelsea. Felix, Neto and Nkunku on the bench and they're still not an elite club Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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