Football Thread 12

[Zoë Sumra]

Kicking off (heh) the new thread with a nearly-shock for Irish Premier side Shamrock Rovers:

... the best scoring chance in the first half fell to the hosts as Sean O'Connor cut in from the right-hand side before sending a low shot just wide.

Ronaldo played no further part in the second half as new Real coach Manuel Pellegrini made nine changes at half time.

Real looked more dangerous after the break, with Rafael van der Vaart going close twice, the second with a spectacular overhead kick. Rovers arguably had the better second-half chances though as striker Dessie Baker found himself twice with only goalkeeper Jerzy Dudek to beat. But Baker struck one first-touch effort high over the crossbar and lost control of his second chance before he could take a shot.

Former Lyons forward Benzema also had a scuffed shot cleared off the line, but he controlled a long ball expertly and coolly finished in the 87th minute to seal victory.

However, the Rovers coach, Michael O'Neill, said he could not believe how well his team played, considering all bar one are part-timers. O'Neill did not even play his strongest side as Rovers are in the thick of the League of Ireland title race and face leaders Bohemians this weekend.

"The reality is that the lads were disappointed to lose the game and to lose it so late in the game, but they can take immense credit for what they achieved tonight," O'Neill said.

Not long till most of the European leagues start the new season. I know we had a lot of EPL predictions in the last thread; anyone want to predict the Bundesliga/Serie A/La Liga/etc. top few?

[Multaniette]

Bundesliga

Winner - Wolfsburg

Runners up - vfb

dark horse - hoffenheim

La Liga

1. barcelona

2. madrid ®

dark horse - none

seria a

1. roma

2. juve

dark horse - inter

and backing my team PSV to do well in eredivisie :D

[Renasko]

Inter as a dark horse for a title they've...won 4 times in a row, is it? Hah.

[The Iceman of the North]

A Danish football player, Jonathan Richter from FC Nordsjælland, is held in artificial coma after being hit by lightning during a friendly match yesterday.

Danish footballer struck by lightning, in coma

[Nas!]

You may have taken Lampard, Joe Cole and Glen Johnson from us, but it is payback time, Chelsea!

At least until he's good enough to attract the attention of a big club like Chelsea, that is.

[Calibandar]

Another setback for Arsenal, Samir Nasri broke a leg and will be out for months, obviously. Maybe Wenger might consider a replacement, or revert back to a 14 year old talent.

[Renasko]

He'll not be out too long, fortunately enough. Arsenal won't need to sign anyone to directly replace him. What they do need to do is sign a defensive midfielder, however, if they're going to have any hopes of challenging this season.

[Ratatoskr]

Bundesliga

Winner - Wolfsburg

Runners up - vfb

dark horse - hoffenheim

No love for Bayern? I really like van Gaal so far.

I'd be shocked if Wolfsburg defended their title. I agree that Stuttgart will probably play a good role, provided they get an adequate replacement for Gomez. I really hope they can land Huntelaar, that'd be awsome.

Hoffenheim? No way they'll be anywhere as good as they've been in the first half of last season, but I believe they can do better than in the second half. OTOH, I can see them getting bogged down in a severe sophomore slump. One of the more unpredictable teams this year if you ask me.

[Jon AS]

No love for Bayern?

The only acceptable emotions towards Bayern are heartfelt loathing and cold indifference.

That said, you have to be delusional not to think that they are going to be mounting a title challenge, in fact, they are pretty much everyone's number one favourite to win.

Wolfsburg have kept their title winning team together (so far...), but lost Magath and certainly won't have an easy time defending their title, what with the Champions League also requiring some attention. Stuttgart might be up there, if they can replace Gomez, Bremen will probably be fighting for a CL spot (signing another good striker would be a good idea IMO), possibly more, while Schalke, Hamburg and Dortmund will be challenging for UEFA Cup spots. Hoffenheim should reasonably be expected to do so as well given that they've kept their team together and Ibisevic will be back, hopefully in the form of the first half of last season.

Leverkusen could be in this group, but Heynckes hardly inspires massive confidence at this point of his career and Helmes will be out for half the season.

Should be another interesting season, all things considered.

[Marcelo Rebelo Firqoralas]

La Liga

1. barcelona

2. madrid ®

dark horse - none

If Valencia gets to keep Villa and if they get their game working, I think they have a squad that is good enough to seriously challenge Real and Barca for the title. Of course, that has been just as true for the last couple of seasons, so the odds aren't that great. :)

seria a

1. roma

2. juve

dark horse - inter

Roma winning seems extremely unlikely. Inter looks like the favourites, even without Zlatan, but Juve will probably give them a good match.

[Iskaral Pust]

Another setback for Arsenal, Samir Nasri broke a leg and will be out for months, obviously. Maybe Wenger might consider a replacement, or revert back to a 14 year old talent.

While he's a very good player, they have several near-clones available. Unlike Adebayor.

[Renasko]

I can't see Adebayor's loss affecting Arsenal that badly. He had one great season with them, and a decidely average season last year. Being their chief forward player, it showed by their final finishishing place in the league. But with Eduardo back in the frame of things, I think Arsene sees him as filling the hole Adebayor has now left and leading the line this year. He'll fit more into their natural play, being a more moble player than Adebayor.

However. if I was the manager, I'd be looking at bringing in another striker, but I don't know if Arsenal have the funds available for bringing in someone who'll help change the team significantly, IE like Arshavin. Can't wait to see more of him. :D

[Iskaral Pust]

I can't see Adebayor's loss affecting Arsenal that badly. He had one great season with them, and a decidely average season last year. Being their chief forward player, it showed by their final finishishing place in the league. But with Eduardo back in the frame of things, I think Arsene sees him as filling the hole Adebayor has now left and leading the line this year. He'll fit more into their natural play, being a more moble player than Adebayor.

However. if I was the manager, I'd be looking at bringing in another striker, but I don't know if Arsenal have the funds available for bringing in someone who'll help change the team significantly, IE like Arshavin. Can't wait to see more of him. :D

I like Arshavin too. I'm still bitterly disappointed that we spent $20m on Robbie Keane last summer instead of buying Arshavin.

[Calibandar]

Well if Eduardo is really back to fitness and ready to play full time again then I could see them not getting a replacement for Adebayor. They still have van Persie & Bendtner after all. But this way they're not gettting any stronger, whcih was what I was getting at earlier.

Losing Nasri, I agree he's not that critical a player and someone like Rosicky could probably replace him. But here again, how is the Czech's fitness?

Walcott seems pretty erratic to me too. Still, if they could play Arshavin-Van Persie-Eduardo upfront then that part looks ok. But since we know them to be so injury prone, seems to me you'd want to have some more players up there if you're going to challenge on 3 different fronts.

Xabi: That would be a major blow for Liverpool if he went to Madrid. I can see why Madrid would want him, and want Villa as well, but sofar no deal. Both of these players would make much more sense to me than Ribery.

Serie A:

It's got to be Inter & Juventus. Juve's made some good signings, like Diego from Werder Bremen. Milan has lost Kaka.

[Multaniette]

my predictions definitely had more than their share of wishful thinking involved in them. :P

but bayern aren't going to win - of course, being who they are, they'll always push for the top but i reckon wolfsburg et al. will be able to hold 'em off - as long as they don't loose their key players.

would love it if vfb could land huntelaar though. :D phenomenal talent.

valencia can beat real/barcelona on their day and compete on an almost equal footing for a while but i dont think they've got the squad depth to compete over the length of a whole season.

hoffenheim's fluke first season last year probably wont be replicated but i really rate ibisievic and i hope he recaptures his form.

[Jon AS]

hoffenheim's fluke first season last year probably wont be replicated but i really rate ibisievic and i hope he recaptures his form.

It wasn't that much of a fluke, really. They have a very strong squad, definitely in the top 8 or so of the league, and the fun thing in the Bundesliga is that it is almost impossible to predict which of the teams in that top layer of the league will do really well and who will miss out on European football.

[Alcibiades]

Did you guys see Arshavin is a midfielder now on fantasy.premierleague.com? /Drool.

[Sir Thursday]

Just got back from the Thailand v Liverpool match. It was an interesting experience, let's put it that way. Pretty much everyone in Thailand supports one of the big 4 teams in the EPL, so pretty much everyone in the stadium was wearing a Liverpool shirt of some description. When the players came out, it was the Liverpool players who got the cheers, not the Thais. So I was a little bemused (although not entirely surprised) that the loudest non-Torres related cheer of the night was for Thailand scoring to level the game 1-1. It was a nice goal too. Liverpool looked a bit sluggish after scoring early, but I guess they probably weren't used to the heat. After Thailand scored, Benitez threw Torres on (to by far and away the loudest cheers of the evening - that was who everyone came to see), and he looked by far and away the best player on the pitch - whenever he was on the ball he would be forcing his way past the undersized Thai defence, drew them all to him and then released the open man. But none of the open men could score, and in the end it was a draw.

Got soaked on the way back though, when it rains here in Bangkok it really, really pours.

Sir Thursday

[BLU-RAY]

I understand that it was just a training game/exhibition and whatnot, but Inter looked pretty shit last night. It was a fun game for the atmosphere, and because we were really close to the pitch, but Inter never really mounted an offense at all. And they were coming off a loss to Club America, who aren't exactly paragons of the game.

Of the Chelsea players, I was most impressed by Sturridge - mainly because everyone else did what was expected of them, and Inter weren't really making them work for it. But I thought Sturridge looked quite good. The new second-string keeper we've got didn't look so good, which doesn't bode well for the seven matches Cech will miss due to injury.

Be nice to get Joe Cole back in this side at some point.

Also, I highly don't recommend driving San Jose-La-Back in one 18 hour span.

[Celtigo]

I understand that it was just a training game/exhibition and whatnot, but Inter looked pretty shit last night. It was a fun game for the atmosphere, and because we were really close to the pitch, but Inter never really mounted an offense at all. And they were coming off a loss to Club America, who aren't exactly paragons of the game.

Of the Chelsea players, I was most impressed by Sturridge - mainly because everyone else did what was expected of them, and Inter weren't really making them work for it. But I thought Sturridge looked quite good. The new second-string keeper we've got didn't look so good, which doesn't bode well for the seven matches Cech will miss due to injury.

Be nice to get Joe Cole back in this side at some point.

Also, I highly don't recommend driving San Jose-La-Back in one 18 hour span.

gees man if you took 101 that could be a six hour trip each way. How was the Rose Bowl for soccer these days? I know its the current SoCal venue iof choice n our 2018/2022 bid.

Couldn't get tickets to the game in Baltimore, Chelsea-Milan, as it sold out the 70,000 seat stadium pretty quickly.

I did get tickets to Real Madrid-DC United, which has almost sold out 91,000 seat Fed EX field. Can't wait to boo the most hated team on the planet live :P