2018/19 Soccer Thread

You better find that video. You can't just give us blue balls and expect to leave this thread quietly.

LOL, there's something hilarious and perfect about Mourinho getting a comeback win on an own goal.

Also, I would've liked Sterling to go "Uh, I just fell over, it's not a penalty" but the number of players on earth who'd do that can probably be counted on one hand, so I'll simply point out that the ref pretty hilariously screwed that one up.

And finally, on poppies and one particular Irish player's refusal to wear one.

European Super League: Fifa says it would ban players from the World Cup

I'm pretty sure that translates to "you dare take a penny from us and our member confederations and we'll come after you with an axe."

Oh, and Sergio Ramos elbowed a Viktoria Plzen player in the face and got away with it.

Like, I know it's wrong to think these things, but if I had to choose one player to get Keane/Håland'ed....

I actually have a degree of grudging admiration for Ramos' decade of unrepentant sh*thousery, but I'll admit I've had Eric Dier's tackle on my Youtube "Watch Again" list pretty much constantly since the day after it happened.

Hope Wellbeck's okay.

Nice goal for Giroud, and Rangers cannot currently defend. The Europa League is kinda fun!

Fulham’s Slavisa Jokanovic: I don’t need to change – my team must work harder

Slavisa Jokanovic has come out fighting amid speculation that he is close to losing his job as Fulham manager, insisting he is the right man to drag the club from the foot of the Premier League and accusing his players of not showing enough effort and ambition during a run of six successive defeats in all competitions.

Jokanovic led Fulham to promotion via the play-offs in May and less than five months later is under mounting pressure, with Fulham’s former captain and current first-team coach Scott Parker linked with the manager’s post should, as some expect, Jokanovic be sacked during the international break which follows Sunday’s visit to Liverpool.

Eeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhhh. That said, there are about a billion things wrong right now, so he could be justifiably fired and the players could all be guilty of mucking it up because this team should not be as bad as it is right now.

I thought this was a good piece about Fulham's defensive problems (That I only just got around to reading).

https://medium.com/@thefutebolist/fu...

Really odd injury for Adam Smith. Went to take a freekick quickly, stopped, and did his knee. 8 minute delay to get him safely stretchered off. Newcastle looked pretty damn good in the first half though.

The first leg of the Copa Libertedores final is going to be something, shame I won't be able to watch

Roke wrote:

The first leg of the Copa Libertedores final is going to be something

Turns out that something was underwater!

Today, in incredibly dumb opinions:

Craig Burley believes England hosting a 'farewell' game for Wayne Rooney makes a mockery of their friendly match against the United States.

............

....IT'S A FRIENDLY. AN EXHIBITION MATCH.

WHAT ARE YOU EVEN TALKING ABOUT?

Prederick wrote:
Craig Burley believes England hosting a 'farewell' game for Wayne Rooney makes a mockery of their friendly match against the United States.

............

....IT'S A FRIENDLY. AN EXHIBITION MATCH.

WHAT ARE YOU EVEN TALKING ABOUT?

When that was announced I only saw the periphery of the tweeting about it and thought it was Manchester United holding an MLS-style friendly in the middle of their season to honour Rooney. When I found out it was England in a normal international friendly that was my exact reaction.

I gotta admit, I can't particularly imagine caring. It's not even a friendly in the run-up to a major tournament, it's a idle friendly against a 2nd-tier international side and qualifying for Euro 2020 hasn't even started yet. They could put Air Bud out there for all I care, and it's not like they're the USMNT, a rebuilding side that needs to be blooding new talent. They've got an established core and letting Grampa Rooney shuffle around for 90 minutes for some applause changes none of that.

Meanwhile....

Glad I didn't wake up for that, even if the performance in a 2-0 defeat can quite reasonably be called a significant improvement. I did not think at any point before the season that Fulham would be at the bottom of the table after a significant number of games played and could fairly be called the worst of the promoted sides.

No surprise in the Manchester Derby either, except for the realization that Sergio Aguero has been banging them in for City since 2011.

Mixed feelings today. Sad to see Slavisa go, happy that we got Claudio.

I do feel bad for Slavisa and will be forever thankful for the promotion. I thought he'd get until Christmas, but I can understand why he's gone. This is a team that was not expected to be staring down the barrel of relegation this soon, especially with a defense this god-awful. And certainly not for the outlay we put out in the last transfer window.

But, I am optimistic about Claudio. He very obviously has previous, and if he holds to form, not only will we avoid relegation, but you are now looking at your 2019/20 Premier League Champions!

Of course, now, I have to make the toughest decision: Do I start a new FM game and take over as Fulham manager myself?

Prederick wrote:

Of course, now, I have to make the toughest decision: Do I start a new FM game and take over as Fulham manager myself?

Yes.

Going to be interesting to see how Ranieri sets Fulham up.

I like how you pretty much sussed out that I was just looking for an excuse to use them.

I won't delete the LLM save, at least. However, #COYW!

Roke wrote:
Prederick wrote:

Of course, now, I have to make the toughest decision: Do I start a new FM game and take over as Fulham manager myself?

Yes.

Going to be interesting to see how Ranieri sets Fulham up.

I'm excited to see how this turns out. I like the choice.

Croatia coach Zlatko Dalic to speak to Dejan Lovren after Ramos elbow brag

The Croatia coach, Zlatko Dalic, has said he will speak to Dejan Lovren after the Liverpool defender appeared to brag on social media about deliberately elbowing Sergio Ramos during the victory over Spain on Thursday.

And by "speak to" I assume he means "Nominate him for the Grand Oder of King Tomislav"

how's this nation's league thing work again?

tried to watch Portugal v Italy but couldn't find a Canadian channel covering it + feeds kept just dying.

https://www.uefa.com/uefanationsleague/news/newsid=2581785.html

Portugal is hosting the finals in June? maybe an excuse to go. O wait England qualified? might want to avoid those travelling fans ;P

My favorite Nations League note:

With the weekend's results, Switzerland is now technically the top ranked French speaking country, top ranked German speaking country, and top ranked Italian speaking country.

(And also the top ranked Balkan country, if you wanna get specific about it.)

Qatar would help Middle East peace by sharing 2022 World Cup, says Infantino

“Maybe football is a way to build bridges. We have seen as well with the bidding for 2026, the right to organise the World Cup was awarded to three countries [the USA, Canada and Mexico] which I think also don’t have the very best political or diplomatic relationships. But football makes miracles, as we know.”

Despite global outrage at Saudi Arabia following the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Infantino said that discussions about sharing World Cup matches could help Saudi Arabia “evolve” and have “a nice impact.”

“Obviously the relationship with [Qatar’s] neighbouring countries is a factor which is complicating the situation; on the other [hand], even though there are complicated or difficult diplomatic relations, when it comes to football people talk to each other,” Infantino said.

Infantino pointed out that despite the blockade Qatari teams were still playing football in Asian Football Confederation competitions against teams from the other countries in the Gulf and wider Middle East.

“Be positive about it: we can do something for the world – and for football. It could happen, anything could happen. Let’s take it step by step. Yes, maybe the chances are small but I am a very optimistic person generally, so we will see the situation.”

I have no idea if he's an idiot or just a duplicitous sh*t (or both), but good GOD do I ever hate the people who'll come up with some god-awful, unworkable idea that doesn't address or have any hope of solving the problem, but then defend it entirely on the premise that they're trying to solve the problem, therefore it is good.

Godzilla Blitz wrote:

Well, then!

Fulham 3 - 2 Southhampton

Some lovely attacking play and some truely Sunday League level defending. Long way to go for Fulham but if they can keep attacking like they did at times in that match they might yet survive.

ALL HAIL RANIERI.

Meanwhile, City win, Tottenham beat Chelsea handily, Real Madrid lose (to Eibar!), Barcelona draw, and the Copa Libertadoes Superclasico final is going about as well as you'd expect.

Sorbicol wrote:
Godzilla Blitz wrote:

Well, then!

Fulham 3 - 2 Southhampton

Some lovely attacking play and some truely Sunday League level defending. Long way to go for Fulham but if they can keep attacking like they did at times in that match they might yet survive.

Sometimes a team needs to believe in themselves. Ranieri seems well suited for this sort underdog role.

I find it interesting that he's masterfully flipped the focus as well. Much of the earlier talk I heard was how Fulham was underperforming, having spent 100 million over the summer. Ranieri has inverted that, saying maybe a miracle is possible if everyone works hard. He's changed the perspective from "we're failing and performing well below expectations" to "staying up would be a great accomplishment, we can do this if we work hard".

I'm excited to see how this goes.

Also, may I be the first to make the "Take a bow, Son" joke? Because that goal was quite nice.

Prederick wrote:

ALL HAIL RANIERI.

Meanwhile, City win, Tottenham beat Chelsea handily, Real Madrid lose (to Eibar!), Barcelona draw, and the Copa Libertadoes Superclasico final is going about as well as you'd expect.

That actually was good for Barcelona. Losing until the 90 minute mark against Atlético which would move them to first place.

Manchester United! Still quite crap!

Lyon! Still somehow capable of infuriating Manchester City!

In fan news, they're talking about moving the Copa Libertadores final out of Argentina entirely. It's really sad that a small (but significant) percentage of jackasses can continue ruining things like this, a fair amount of the aftermath stuff I've read has regular Argentinian fans wholly embarassed by this entire disaster. As someone I saw on Twitter put it, this final was supposed to be an opportunity to showcase Argentine football to the world, and unfortunately, it did.

In other news of fans acting like assholes, AEK Athens should get absolutely clobbered for this. This is quite genuinely a "you're lucky no-one died" situation, but UEFA will probably do nothing when I'd argue AEK deserves, at a bare minimum, to play their European games behind closed doors for a while.

Anyone else looking forward to PSG and Liverpool?

PSG gets eliminated with a loss and a Napoli win. A Liverpool loss sets up a must-win in the next match should Napoli win tomorrow. Huge game for both clubs.

Godzilla Blitz wrote:

Anyone else looking forward to PSG and Liverpool?

As a Liverpool fan, maybe a bit more "terrified" than "looking forward to," given what happened with Red Star Belgrade, but on the upside at least even with a loss our destiny is still in our own hands?

It's funny. As terrible as United certainly have looked, they've qualified with a game to spare and could still top the group. Things could still go profoundly badly for Liverpool. Like, "not even in the Europa League" badly.