Tackles, balls and Seaman - The footie thread

[Jim]

A very, very competetive fight for second place?

Another good performance, and another 3 points.

It look like the Liverpool game in a week and a halfs time will have real meaning to it...

[Izzy]

So, how do you all think 06/07 season will be like?

1.Chelsea
2. Portsmouth

d'oh

I wonder what Portsmouth's new cash will lead to - are we going to be a league filled with Russian billionaires, Chelsea are bad enough but Portsmouth too? Insult to injury.

Villa are about to be bought too - Doug Ellis has kept them down for decades, they will surely become a firm top 6-7 side free of his influence.

[Jim]

Nah, the Portsmouth injection isn't going to be anywhere near the scale of what happened when Abromavich took over at Chelsea.

[Izzy]

Nah, the Portsmouth injection isn't going to be anywhere near the scale of what happened when Abromavich took over at Chelsea.

I hope so, rumour has it they'll have 100 mill to spend - don't know enough about this Russia dude yet to say whether i believe this or not.

If Chelsea would learn some moderation next season could be the best for decades, this season has been pretty good too

[MadmanDan]

PL today isn't quite what it used to be. Today the PL is split into two divisions, one with one team and the other with 19 teams.

Yesterday we all were shown again that neither Man U or Gunners is what they used to be.

I'm not sure, but I think that in ManU's winning seasons of the past years, they had about as many points as thay do now at this stage of the season...so they are what they used to be (in the PL at least), but what they used to be isn't enough anymore.

[SwedeChildO'Mine]

It's not just about points. And I'd guess that you could only mean 02/03 when you compared points to date cause 99/00 & 00/01 they won the PL comfortably.

If you're looking at MU's midfield today you cannot say they're as good as they used to be. Giggs-O'Shea-Fletcher-Ronaldo played latest game and with that midfield it's no surprise that Red Devils failed in Europe.

[Jamie]

If you're looking at MU's midfield today you cannot say they're as good as they used to be. Giggs-O'Shea-Fletcher-Ronaldo played latest game and with that midfield it's no surprise that Red Devils failed in Europe.

Very true, if you look at successful Man Us of old they always had a solid midfield, and I firmly believe that's the only area, they'll need to improve next season to actually take the title from Chelsea. With Rooney and Van Nistelrooy they have one of the best striking forces in Europe, Rio seems to be getting back to his best, Wes Brown's showing significant improvement, Heinze will be back in the side and Neville is and always has been a 'Mr. Reliable' for us, so next season will be our year I think. Chelsea can't remain lucky forever.

[Izzy]

Chelsea can't remain lucky forever.

U think their success is down to....luck?

Check the premiership table - is that really luck?

Thats the result of skill and money - the money is never going to run out, and that buys the skill

We've got years more of Chelsea winning the league, i can honestly say that i expect them to take the league every year for the next decade unless another team gets a massive cash injection....

[2NaFish]

Chelsea can't remain lucky forever.

U think their success is down to....luck?

Check the premiership table - is that really luck?

Thats the result of skill and money - the money is never going to run out, and that buys the skill

We've got years more of Chelsea winning the league, i can honestly say that i expect them to take the league every year for the next decade unless another team gets a massive cash injection....

come on Pompey.

[2NaFish]

Baaaaahahahahaha. Just heard the funniest thing in a long time. My team, Hearts, have just tabled offers for liverpool's Mo Sissoko and their goalie Reina. Plus Traore, Le Tallec and Mellor.

Has the world gone completly mad?

[SwedeChildO'Mine]

Chelsea's biggest skill is to score a winning goal in the last 15 minutes of a match.

I hope they will get out of that habit against Bar?a.

[Danny Top Hat]

I hope Barca thrash them.

[Izzy]

Baaaaahahahahaha. Just heard the funniest thing in a long time. My team, Hearts, have just tabled offers for liverpool's Mo Sissoko and their goalie Reina. Plus Traore, Le Tallec and Mellor.

Has the world gone completly mad?

Where did u read that - but more importantly, why did u bother to?

[Izzy]

I hope Barca thrash them.

Lol, when they met at Stamford bridge - Barcelona were so arrogant, and got soundly taken apart

[2NaFish]

Baaaaahahahahaha. Just heard the funniest thing in a long time. My team, Hearts, have just tabled offers for liverpool's Mo Sissoko and their goalie Reina. Plus Traore, Le Tallec and Mellor.

Has the world gone completly mad?

Where did u read that - but more importantly, why did u bother to?

http://sport.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=24&id=19122006

The scotsman is not a rag paper and doesnt, usually, bullshit. Basically our new sugar daddy, Vladimir Romanov, also owns FK Kauanas of lithuania. Liverpool played Kaunas in the qualifying rounds of this year's CL. When they played Romanov got talking to Rick Parry and they've been doing a few deals (we're getting Potter and another couple of youngsters. Is potter any good?). Romanov has very high (actually, ridiculously high ambitions) for Hearts. The jury is still out on him tho; but the audacity of trying to sign sissoko shows the guy is either serious; or seriously crazy.

meller, le tallec story, etc - http://sport.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=24&id=22322006

[Izzy]

Baaaaahahahahaha. Just heard the funniest thing in a long time. My team, Hearts, have just tabled offers for liverpool's Mo Sissoko and their goalie Reina. Plus Traore, Le Tallec and Mellor.

Has the world gone completly mad?

Where did u read that - but more importantly, why did u bother to?

http://sport.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=24&id=19122006

The scotsman is not a rag paper and doesnt, usually, bullshit. Basically our new sugar daddy, Vladimir Romanov, also owns FK Kauanas of lithuania. Liverpool played Kaunas in the qualifying rounds of this year's CL. When they played Romanov got talking to Rick Parry and they've been doing a few deals (we're getting Potter and another couple of youngsters. Is potter any good?). Romanov has very high (actually, ridiculously high ambitions) for Hearts. The jury is still out on him tho; but the audacity of trying to sign sissoko shows the guy is either serious; or seriously crazy.

meller, le tallec story, etc - http://sport.scotsman.com/topics.cfm?tid=24&id=22322006

Your welcome to the whole lot!... but Reina isn't going anywhere - i imagine they mean Dudek, someone heard 'Liverpool's goalkeeper' and guessed wrong - Dudek is afterall leaving in January.

[2NaFish]

No, romanov made an offer for Reina and sissoko. They were both dismissed out of hand, but it was definetly Reina. I wouldn't want him anyway. Our goalie right now is top drawer. My bet is he'll take over from van der sar in 18 months time if fergie is still at old trafford.

[Jamie]

U think their success is down to....luck?

Yes, an average mid-table team gets taken over by a random multi-millionaire who injects insane amounts of money into the side, and with that money lures in one of the brightest (yet arrogant, pompous and annoying) managers in Europe who in turn buys (several) new squads and leaves only a few of the players at the club before in it's regular starting line-up, and begins to win endless amount of football matches extremely tightly and by using obnoxious defensive tactics for 75 minutes, score a sloppy goal and defend again for another 15 minutes, they build up this reputation as being this unbeatable side, which intimidates teams both in England and abroad who go to play Chelsea with heads down thinking there is no chance in beating them, so therefore suffer at the hands of their own baseless nervousness; only helped by Chelsea beating the greatest club in Europe, and perhaps the world (Barcelona) in the champions league, in a tie they should really have lost, thus furthering this "unbeatable" illusion around them. They are called the best footballing force in England for a considerable amount of time, but are really the luckiest.

Check the premiership table - is that really luck?

Yes I would say so, it has been proven by Man U, that they are beatable, a team that you seem to think is terrible, so in a mixture of your own logic and common sense, they can be beaten by anyone who displayed the confidence Man U did that day. In my honest opinion that's all it will take to beat Chelsea, the realisation that they are beatable and the confidence that they will be beaten. The same illusion surrounded Arsenal when they went on their 49 match unbeaten run, and United proved they could be beaten too. All it will require is for everyone else bar Man U to realise that there is no such thing as an unbeatable football team.

Thats the result of skill and money - the money is never going to run out, and that buys the skill

It's the result of a good back four, an awful lot of money and an unending supply of deceptive arrogance. Chelsea believe they are the best team in the world, so everyone else does too, they are not.

We've got years more of Chelsea winning the league, i can honestly say that i expect them to take the league every year for the next decade unless another team gets a massive cash injection....

Not at all, Chelsea will be knocked off their high horse sooner or later, when, as I've already stated, people realise they are beatable. And a cash injection means nothing unless the team is a solid unit, you can have all the footballing talent in the world in your side but you won't get anywhere if your team don't function well together, I think Real Madrid's recent troubles are proof of that.

[2NaFish]

so it was luck that chelsea have been almost totally dominant for 18 months. yet logically deduced that man utd beat them.

could it not be the other way around? I guess liverpool have been a very "lucky" team the last few months too.

If you don't lose goals, you can't lose games.

Abramovich going to chelsea may have been fortunate (not luck. Luck is random and unfathomable.) Anything that has happened since has been down to the people at chelsea being the best.

[Jamie]

so it was luck that chelsea have been almost totally dominant for 18 months. yet logically deduced that man utd beat them.

No, I said it's logically deduced that if Man U can beat them, then anyone can. They've only been dominant because noone in the Premiership thinks they can beat them, the one team (Man U) that were confident enough to believe they could beat Chelsea did beat them. Before pretty much every Chelsea match I've watched recently, the manager of the opposing side is pesimistic about his chances of beating Chelsea, and often adopts certain tactics to try and beat them, United strapped up their boots, played their normal 4-4-2 and went out believing they'd win, and they did. My point is that so could anyone else.

could it not be the other way around? I guess liverpool have been a very "lucky" team the last few months too.

Well Liverpool haven't had some multi-million pound take over and a complete re-populisation of their club and haven't created some false aura of been unbeatable in the past few months, so as much as it pains me to say it (as a United fan) no, they have not been lucky, their success has been well earned.

If you don't lose goals, you can't lose games.

Obviously true, but do you think a side that for a large proportion (granted not all) of their playing defends for extended periods, and scores in the dying moments of the game dominating a major footballing league is either entertaining or good for the game? Well my answer would certainly be no, as it would if the question of multi-millionaires buying the championship was posed to me. But that's beside the point.

Abramovich going to chelsea may have been fortunate (not luck. Luck is random and unfathomable.) Anything that has happened since has been down to the people at chelsea being the best.

Abromovich going to Chelsea was indeed fortunate but since then his money has brought them great luck;in the transfer market. So without his vast quantity of money, half the people that you claim to be "the best" wouldn't even be at Chelsea right now.