Football Thread 2017/18

[Liamness]

It would be a little strange from my perspective, there's got to be some "tax" involved in buying a player from a rival. He's played like dogshite under Mourinho before, I don't know why he'd want to sign a player who had previously let him down. Also £50m is a lot for any 29 year old. It's not like his displays of late put him in some category of players that are in short supply, whereupon transfer fees naturally stop making sense. There must be other, better, options.

 

Also it's a bit of a weird move from Chelsea if they agree to it, they're not exactly stacked at centre mid, even with Bakayoko coming in.

[Plissken]

There is little rhyme or reason to big money transfers any more. Just owners and (some) managers collecting the latest set of shiny baubles.

[Mr Do 71]

England women go 2-0 up against the Spainish señoritas.

[Fry Crayola]

Spain had 78% possession. That's almost insane.

 

(Insane, of course, being over 100%)

[feltmonkey]

They were helped by a very strange bit of refereeing. The ref gave a penalty for handball, and changed her mind a few minutes later. It looked as if she was talked out of it by the England players, although that can't actually be what happened. Spain were understandably annoyed.

 

http://m.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/40701230

[ukdazs]

Cancelled out the wrongly disallowed goal in the first half. The ref was poor all night.

[feltmonkey]

Yes, the disallowed goal was weird too. 

[Commander Jameson]

That was ball-to-hand though, surely? The England player was stretching to clear the ball, got to it and it went straight into her hand. I thought the ref got the decision right in the end (and was pleased to see the original decision reversed).

[feltmonkey]

Yeah, I agree. It's still very unusual for a referee to reverse a decision as a player is preparing to take a penalty.

[The Fox]

If Real Madrid sign Mbappe, is it safe to say that they have assembled the best squad ever seen in modern club football?

 

You can argue a couple of teams from the last 25 years have had better first XIs (Barca 2011 for instance), but I'm not sure anyone has had this level of strength in depth before. They haven't spent outlandishly in recent years either; even Mbappe would be largely offset by departures of Morata, James and Danilo.

[Loik V credern]

Bayern Munich in 2015/16 maybe ?

[Fry Crayola]

Celtic drew at home to Rosenborg and accounts are the visitors were the better side. Oh, how I wish that had been Dundalk there. 

[ryodi]

It might be slightly more difficult to find a stream this season

 

 

[glb]

Working for a broadcaster, I'd be delighted if all illegal streams were taken down. However, broadcasters also have a responsibility to make access to sport affordable for everyone who wants to watch, which just doesn't happen.

 

I'd like to think the Premier League is being noble but in reality they want to be able to drive up the price of licensing their content by championing the exclusivity.

[McFly]

I was listening to TalkSport this morning and they were talking about Coutinho maybe going to Barcelona for £80m - 100m. The markets obviously bonkers, but i can kinda deal with it for guys that are winners by which i mean theyve been a big part of a team winning major trophys. But my issue with Coutinho and Alexis Sanchez for that matter, aswell is that both Arsenal and Liverpool havent been close to winning the league, so how good are these guys really? And why are people wanting to pay so much for them? I'd want a one man team for £80m not 13 goals a season.

[Dudley]

8 hours ago, glb said:

Working for a broadcaster, I'd be delighted if all illegal streams were taken down. However, broadcasters also have a responsibility to make access to sport affordable for everyone who wants to watch, which just doesn't happen.

 

I'd like to think the Premier League is being noble but in reality they want to be able to drive up the price of licensing their content by championing the exclusivity.

 

And of course, if your team is playing a match at 3pm on Saturday, literally the only way to watch them is illegal.

[Seanfl9]

50 minutes ago, Dudley said:

 

And of course, if your team is playing a match at 3pm on Saturday, literally the only way to watch them is illegal.

Move to the US and get cable. They have red button access for EVERY single premier league game 

[Guest]

4 hours ago, McFly said:

I was listening to TalkSport this morning and they were talking about Coutinho maybe going to Barcelona for £80m - 100m. The markets obviously bonkers, but i can kinda deal with it for guys that are winners by which i mean theyve been a big part of a team winning major trophys. But my issue with Coutinho and Alexis Sanchez for that matter, aswell is that both Arsenal and Liverpool havent been close to winning the league, so how good are these guys really? And why are people wanting to pay so much for them? I'd want a one man team for £80m not 13 goals a season.

Liverpool would be laughing all the way to the bank with that kind of money for Coutinho

[dogsout]

I really doubt that. 

[glb]

11 hours ago, Seanfl9 said:

Move to the US and get cable. They have red button access for EVERY single premier league game 

 

Same with BeIn in the Middle East. Costs around $25 a month for EPL, La Liga, ECL and more albeit you do have to carefully avoid Richard Keys' pre and post-match blurting.

[Dudley]

 

12 hours ago, Seanfl9 said:

Move to the US and get cable. They have red button access for EVERY single premier league game 

 

Oh I know, that's how I watch it illegally

[hmm]

I don't think that anyone watching these streams is actually breaking a law. If they are, I'd be interested to know which one. In the past, individuals have always been targeted on the basis of distribution, since with torrents or Napster or whatever you are also uploading. 

 

The other way people are accessing games is to buy a subscription from the US or Canada or wherever and then use a VPN in order to access it. Again, no law being broken here that I can see - it's not illegal to violate TOS, especially ones you won't actually have agreed to anyway.

 

I strongly suspect the whole thing will go the way of other media before it, where the rights holders will vainly battle on in this manner for a while, failing to grasp that their fundamental issue is that they're not offering something that is sufficiently compelling or good enough value. People have been predicting that football finance will collapse every year since the PL was invented, but just on the basis of the never-ending inflation and general unsustainability thereof. This feels quite different; viewers are effectively rebelling en-masse, and I doubt they will be easily corralled again.

[The Fox]

Here's the Guardian's 'Premier League XI'.

 

Gerrard was obviously a fantastic player but let's be honest, his most notable PL contribution was slipping over to let Demba Ba through on goal. If you're putting weight principally on the league itself then he's a strange inclusion when you've got competition from Keane, Vieira, Scholes and Lampard, who all excelled while winning the league multiple times.

 

 

 

I think mine would be:

 

Schmeichel

G Neville

Terry

Ferdinand

Cole

Beckham

Lampard

Vieira

Ronaldo

Shearer

Henry

[Rsdio]

Rob Jones was a cracking player, but a bit of a strange choice.

 

Also, Henry over Andy Booth. Bizarre.

[Revival]

I had to go get some Cornflakes just so I could spit them out. Who suggested Rob Jones? There's got to be at least fifteen RWB you could easily choose ahead of him.

 

Cech

Petrescu

Cole

Terry

Carvalho

Makalele

Ballack

Essien

Lampard

Hazard

Drogba

 

#nobias 

 

[ckny]

33 minutes ago, The Fox said:

Here's the Guardian's 'Premier League XI'.

 

Gerrard was obviously a fantastic player but let's be honest, his most notable PL contribution was slipping over to let Demba Ba through on goal. If you're putting weight principally on the league itself then he's a strange inclusion when you've got competition from Keane, Vieira, Scholes and Lampard, who all excelled while winning the league multiple times.

 

 

 

I think mine would be:

 

Schmeichel

G Neville

Terry

Ferdinand

Cole

Beckham

Lampard

Vieira

Ronaldo

Shearer

Henry

 

I hate this game and wouldn't usually reply but Beckham's inclusion is an odd one in your team. Over Giggs or Scholes?

[Baring]

Who is Rob Jones? Newcastle? Wimbledon? Genuinely don't remember him. 

[Baring]

1 hour ago, ckny said:

 

I hate this game and wouldn't usually reply but Beckham's inclusion is an odd one in your team. Over Giggs or Scholes?

I can only assume its his formation. Lampard and Patrick would make an awesome pairing.

[Fry Crayola]

50 minutes ago, Baring said:

Who is Rob Jones? Newcastle? Wimbledon? Genuinely don't remember him. 

 

Liverpool right back throughout the nineties.

[bradigor]

Ryan Giggs was so far in Rob Jones' pocket, he is still in there!