English Premier League 2016-17

Domestic league and cup football
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AlanK
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Post by AlanK »

Michael S Collins wrote:Nice to see one of the top sports writers agreeing with me about Mourinho. 8)

Conte's skills have been questioned by this chap, Raymond Verheijen. Heard of him? Me neither. Apparently he's a "super coach", and so super he's unemployed and now goes on twitter to moan about Klopp and Conte being poor coaches. Strangely, LVG, who he worked with, and shares some of their mentality, isn't a poor coach! Funny, that!

I did once apply for the Crystal Palace job, but apparently being a chronic asthmatic with no links to the game is a bit of a handicap in these matters. :mrgreen: So write about football on Bert's site instead.
Ah, lad, and I had so hoped to take over at Barça when Pep left. Alas, my relationship with the Spanish language instead of with the Catalán language torpedoed my hopes in the final analysis. So I had to content myself with singing the Barça hymn and . . .writing about fútbol on Bert's site instead. :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen:
"Past performance is no guarantee of future results."
Michael S Collins
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Post by Michael S Collins »

AlanK wrote:
Ah, lad, and I had so hoped to take over at Barça when Pep left. Alas, my relationship with the Spanish language instead of with the Catalán language torpedoed my hopes in the final analysis. So I had to content myself with singing the Barça hymn and . . .writing about fútbol on Bert's site instead. :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen:
:mrgreen:

I did actually apply for the Palace job, though, Alan. It was in 2003, I wrote to the chairman including the line "My mum wants me to have a Summer job, and you sack managers after 6 weeks usually, so I can be in and out and back in time for school."

He never got back to me. :lol:
nemesys
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Post by nemesys »

Michael S Collins wrote:I did actually apply for the Palace job, though, Alan. It was in 2003, I wrote to the chairman including the line "My mum wants me to have a Summer job, and you sack managers after 6 weeks usually, so I can be in and out and back in time for school."

He never got back to me. :lol:
I applied for a position on Uefa.org something like about two decades ago I think. I also mentioned the (favorable) fact that I really liked football. No answers as well. :mrgreen:

Edit: yeah, of course, mid '90 does not make 30 years ago. I blame these blunders on always posting in here in an hurry, with little time to think twice about what you just posted. :-|
Last edited by nemesys on Sun Sep 25, 2016 21:25, edited 1 time in total.
Gone.
Thunder_PT
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Post by Thunder_PT »

I just want to clarify that the people who write about football I mentioned were the press, not us. :p

The premier league is packed with top managers now. For there to be winners there have to be losers and it's too easy to criticize those who'll inevitably fail. No matter how good they all are, only one can win the league and only 4 will make it to the CL. And there's far more focus on the ones losing than the ones winning. Where's the credit given to Guardiola by those who always claimed he only won because he was in a one sided league?

Last week they crucified Mourinho, if Mourinho ends up returning United to their former glory, they won't go back and say "sorry, we were wrong", they'll be too busy crucifying somebody else.
bugylibicska
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Post by bugylibicska »

Rodgers: Celtic would challenge at the top in England
29 September 2016

Celtic manager Brendan Rodgers believes the English Football League feel threatened by the notion of his side playing in England, where they would be "in the top four, top six clubs".

The EFL ruled out inviting Premier League "B" teams to be part of an expanded league structure as well as confirming clubs from "non-English leagues" will not be allowed to join - ruling out any possibility of Celtic joining the English league pyramid.

And Rodgers believes that the decision was taken because Celtic would be a threat due to the position of strength they would be in with the financial resources that would become available to them.

"If Celtic were in England, they would be in the top four, top six clubs there," said Rodgers.

"If you are another club playing in that league or the Championship, or League One, would you want that type of threat coming in? I don't think you'd want it and that's the reality.

"It is going to be difficult for Celtic to be in the English pyramid system because of the sheer scale of the club. Most of our games are packed out now.

"Can you imagine Celtic with that resource? It can go as far as it wants then. It would be frightening prospect but an exciting prospect."

Celtic played out a thrilling 3-3 draw with Premier League leaders Manchester City in the Champions League on Tuesday.
Thunder_PT
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Post by Thunder_PT »

Spurs beating City at half time (2-0). The PL needs this to get interesting, if Man City wins it'll start to look like a Bayern season.
Lorric
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Post by Lorric »

Thunder_PT wrote:Spurs beating City at half time (2-0). The PL needs this to get interesting, if Man City wins it'll start to look like a Bayern season.
1. City - 18
2. Tottenham - 17
3. Arsenal - 16
4. Liverpool - 16

The new season has only just begun... :smile1:
Thunder_PT
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Post by Thunder_PT »

Lorric wrote:
Thunder_PT wrote:Spurs beating City at half time (2-0). The PL needs this to get interesting, if Man City wins it'll start to look like a Bayern season.
1. City - 18
2. Tottenham - 17
3. Arsenal - 16
4. Liverpool - 16

The new season has only just begun... :smile1:
Yeah, but if Man City had won they'd be 5 points clear, having visited both Old Trafford and WHL. That's why I said the PL needed this, now it looks interesting, Spurs showed some title credentials there and the others aren't far behind.
Michael S Collins
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Post by Michael S Collins »

Liverpool are my picks to win the title this season, I said in pre-season and still think. Klopp Factor.
Todor
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Post by Todor »

Michael S Collins wrote:Liverpool are my picks to win the title this season, I said in pre-season and still think. Klopp Factor.
Unless they got plagued by injuries like in his last season with Dortmund. All this gegenpressing goes with a heavy price tag.
bugylibicska
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Post by bugylibicska »

Premier League does not need to be saved from its own greed
by Letters Today

Unlike your muddled editorial (Football needs to be saved from its own greed by curbing pay-TV, 29 September) I am proud of English football. The Premier League is exciting and competitive. That’s why it is watched on TV (yes, and paid for) by millions of football fans worldwide. I watched last season’s exciting climax on holiday in Albania and was joined in the hotel bar by many locals who were enthralled that the title race had boiled down to Leicester City and Tottenham Hotspur and was not the usual carve up between big money, brand name clubs.

The Premier League television rights deal helped to bring this about. So-called lesser teams no longer have to sell their best players to their privileged richer rivals. A long, gruelling season with no easy games ensures the team that wins the English league has earned it, not bought it. This partially explains why English teams find it harder to win European titles.

Manchester United has won the English top flight title 20 times. Compare this with the European “one- or two-horse leagues” you laud in your editorial. Bayern Munich has won 41% of all Bundesliga titles. Real Madrid and Barcelona between them have won an astonishing 66% of La Liga titles. They control all of their own TV rights money and consequently attract most of the world-brand big money sponsors. They receive financial backing from state and regional governments. They have been involved in dodgy, lucrative land deals to earn more cash and even persuaded the Spanish government to amend tax law to help attract foreign players.

The Spanish system is designed to keep the chosen at the top. The English Premier League came close to following this model. Now the extra money in the Premier League has changed the status quo and I am glad.

My team nearly won the title last season and will have another good go this season with their many talented young English players. The beautiful game is thriving; even outside the bubble of the Manchester Guardian.
Adrian Townsend
Garsington, Oxfordshire

• In a sporting variant on Andy Warhol’s 15 minutes of fame, it seems possible that every English resident will in time be given a chance to manage the national football team. I eagerly anticipate my turn, although I fear that I could be a long way down the selection list, well behind merchant bankers, retiring MPs and others with proven experience in circumventing the rules in the interests of personal wealth accumulation.
Paul Bream
Wallsend
Thunder_PT
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Post by Thunder_PT »

bugylibicska wrote:Bayern Munich has won 41% of all Bundesliga titles. Real Madrid and Barcelona between them have won an astonishing 66% of La Liga titles.
Kinda undermines his own point, I bet most English fans would guess Barça and Real won 90% between them and Bayern won 75%. That on average we have an outsider winning the league in Spain every 3 seasons and that Bayern haven't even won half of the titles will come as a surprise for most.

This is typical short memory syndrome. Or rather, they only started having a look at what's happening outside England when Guardiola's Barcelona were raping their teams, and then Bayern in turn raped Barcelona. Had they started earlier, they would have seen the super Depor, the amazing Valencia of Benítez and quite a few different German champions. Sure, things got a little less balanced recently, but it's not like it's been going on for 20 years, it could easily change again. We've always had cycles of dominance in every league, England included. They all end eventually, even the ones where the gap seemed irreversibly large (Rosenborg, Lyon...).

It may even change faster than people expect, Barça just lost in a matchday where Real drew, leaving us with a very interesting table in Spain, not less balanced than the super competitive PL. And Ancelotti isn't exactly a league specialist.
SteffenM
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Post by SteffenM »

Thunder_PT wrote:Spurs beating City at half time (2-0). The PL needs this to get interesting, if Man City wins it'll start to look like a Bayern season.
Well both yes and no.
Sure this is increase the interest, and also I have sympathy for Spurs and quite less for Man City, so I am also quite positive.

But from an eventuel 7 wins out of 7 and then till a Bayern og PSG season, there is still some steps to go.

Also EPL haven't had a clear winner in my memory. And on the other hand, at least with my struggerling memory, can't remeber others then PSG, Bayern, APOEL, BATE, Zagreb, Celtic, TNS, Lincoln Red Imps etc. winning their respective leagues. I think there is a major different between one season and continuous seasons.
Lorric
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Post by Lorric »

I've said before how much I rate him. Bob Bradley is now a Premier League manager:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/37542434

I expect to see significant improvement at Swansea.
Lorric
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Post by Lorric »

Lorric wrote:I've said before how much I rate him. Bob Bradley is now a Premier League manager:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/37542434

I expect to see significant improvement at Swansea.
Looking around it seems like I'm the only person in England who thinks this is in any way a good move. This has very much enhanced my interest in this, I'm quite excited to see if I turn out to be right and seemingly everyone else wrong.
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