Re: Rest of the Football World Thread

by Hapless_Hans Wed Mar 04, 2015 6:36 pm

Natalie Portman wrote:
In order to succeed in PL, you need Pace over possession, tempo over over team shape. PL teams build their teams based on that, and in Europe (a completely different ball game), their style gets found out.

That's the part I don't get. It's the same discussion we had in General Section regarding different league's "styles", or the preconceptions about them.

If a game based on pace at the expense of other elements gets "found out in Europe", why would you NEED that style in order to succeed in the PL?
Why couldn't a good 'possession' team just as easily 'find out' those teams in the Prem?

by windkick Wed Mar 04, 2015 6:50 pm

yea, pretty sure Barcas possession game would work against anybody (doesn't mean they would always win).

Point is if you are REALLY good at your style, then you should be able to impose it on other teams regardless of what style they try put on you. Problem with EPL teams is that they sort of bitch out when they play in UCL as oppose to the likes of Stoke or whatever. Instead of going in trying to impose a tactic, they go in more worried about the other team dominating them....and they end up getting a bad result. We have seen Arsenal and other teams able to crank it up vs the big teams when they don't show up scared, but that's usually far in between

It's almost as if the influx of money made the clubs in the EPL think that if they buy quality, that it will equal wins. Like they hope these players they buy will come in and just get it done, as oppose to inserting a set tactic into the team for the players to follow. So when they come across more organized sides, they get trashed (i mean Bilbao trashed Utd..given the status of the sides, that shouldn't of been so one sided)

by neuro11 Thu Mar 05, 2015 1:23 pm

Winter is Coming wrote:^What does that have to do with anything? Chelsea before Roman were in the semi-final and since then they have been quite good in Europe regardless of how they get the result, a long with United they are the team they keep the English flag up in Europe for the past few years. there is no excuse for City been 4-5 years and have flopped hard the only thing they've done is make it out of the group stages as an achievement in the last 2-3 years.

Chelsea had been in the group of mostly average clubs since their reborn consistently every season. Check at their group stage opponents and compare with M.City's. And dont forget Mou and Hiddink two PTB specialist coached them in first six years. that ofcourse matters. Some clubs might not want to get the result in a ugly way.

by The Franchise Thu Mar 05, 2015 10:43 pm

Kick wrote:
The Franchise wrote:I have to say how awful the PL standards are.

Man Utd haven't had 5 good performances all season, sit in the top 4.

Arsenal are all over the place, begging to finish outside the top 4...but they wont.

Look at Man City when they play us, or Bayern last year...the gap is so big. Man City looked not much better than your average La Liga side vs us.

Chelsea people consider a strong team, and for good reason, they are. However, vs Spurs this did nothing...their best players like Hazard, Cesc and Costa totally invisible or giving balls away easily and often. Nothing interesting about their performance. Obviously, they win via 2 deflected goals. And generally I have watched them alot this season and seldom do they give a good performance. They will get results, even against the best teams in the world...and its no surprise they look how they look with Mourinho as their coach, but man, the "gold standard" of the PL never looked so bad.

I would agree with that, But Barca, Bayern and Madrid tend to buy up all the super stars, making it somewhat difficult to achieve that status.

Also, City has always been a team which romps the EPL but does terribly in Europe. They just don't have the team to compete there.

I dont think the best PL teams lack star power. I dont think that is their problem.

Is signing Lewandowski, Gotze and Benatia any more star driven than signing Costa, Cesc and Courtois? I dont think it really is.

Utd just signed Di Maria and Falcao. The Falcao I knew of before injury was not much if any less of a star than Saurez and on all accounts Di Maria is better than anyone else we signed, and you could argue maybe Madrid signed also.

I get what your saying anyway, but like I said, and no disrespect to Chelsea, but you could add Messi to Chelsea and some how Mourinho will find a way to suck the fun out of the game. Chelsea have more than enough talent and interesting players to plye a far more interesting game and play in more interesting matches...but dont. Which is fine, but as a semi natural.. I obviously hate.

by The Franchise Thu Mar 05, 2015 10:46 pm

Natalie Portman wrote:It's that in PL and CL you need different elements to succeed. Between 04-09, Premier League had outstanding individuals who covered for that fact and allowed teams to be effective in both competitions. Since Madrid's Ronaldo transfer and emergence of Pep's Barca and change in dynamics of the market, there has been a turn-around.

In order to succeed in PL, you need Pace over possession, tempo over over team shape. PL teams build their teams based on that, and in Europe (a completely different ball game), their style gets found out.

Ferguson's team were all about pace and tempo and it cleaned out the PL but were often disappointing in Europe up until the last few seasons. Benitez' Liverpool were more European team, but struggled to make the same impact in the league (because of lack of pace and tempo).

Finding the right balance isn't easy. Mourinho is the closest to that at this moment, because they are a mixture of two styles, and their outstanding individual quality in 1 vs 1 battles see them nick PL wins, that a team with lesser financial ability wouldn't be able to match.

I very much agree with this, great post.

by The Franchise Thu Mar 05, 2015 10:56 pm

Hapless_Hans wrote:
Natalie Portman wrote:
In order to succeed in PL, you need Pace over possession, tempo over over team shape. PL teams build their teams based on that, and in Europe (a completely different ball game), their style gets found out.

That's the part I don't get. It's the same discussion we had in General Section regarding different league's "styles", or the preconceptions about them.

If a game based on pace at the expense of other elements gets "found out in Europe", why would you NEED that style in order to succeed in the PL?
Why couldn't a good 'possession' team just as easily 'find out' those teams in the Prem?

He can speak for himself, but what I understood of it or my take on it is that you dont need that style to succeed in the PL...just, its one which is known to work an is relatively easy to implement.

Possession and positioning requires alot more tactical thought and teaching than free wheeling "pace and tempo". I dont want to suggest that PL coaches dont have tactical knowledge and sophistication, but you do find alot more coaches arent coaches...but are "managers" (usually from the old school, guys like Mark Hughes, Steve Bruce, Woy, Pardew, Fat Sam and many others)who dont really coach the team and who's ideas of football are alot simpler and more about individuals than systems.

How does this relate to top teams?

I think many of these teams recognise the general nature of the PL and their teams morph into a more skilled, higher quality version of these teams. City for example, do they even have an identity? Since the day Robinho stepped foot in the door untill now I honestly cant say I know what kind of football they wanted to play.

by Kick Fri Mar 06, 2015 12:37 am

The Franchise wrote:
Natalie Portman wrote:It's that in PL and CL you need different elements to succeed. Between 04-09, Premier League had outstanding individuals who covered for that fact and allowed teams to be effective in both competitions. Since Madrid's Ronaldo transfer and emergence of Pep's Barca and change in dynamics of the market, there has been a turn-around.

In order to succeed in PL, you need Pace over possession, tempo over over team shape. PL teams build their teams based on that, and in Europe (a completely different ball game), their style gets found out.

Ferguson's team were all about pace and tempo and it cleaned out the PL but were often disappointing in Europe up until the last few seasons. Benitez' Liverpool were more European team, but struggled to make the same impact in the league (because of lack of pace and tempo).

Finding the right balance isn't easy. Mourinho is the closest to that at this moment, because they are a mixture of two styles, and their outstanding individual quality in 1 vs 1 battles see them nick PL wins, that a team with lesser financial ability wouldn't be able to match.

I very much agree with this, great post.

I can agree with that, too. It is almost exactly what I was going to say.

Also, my comment about buying players was more directed at superstars, than star players.

Barca has Messi Neymar Suarez, Real has Ronaldo, James and Benzema, Bayern has Robben, Ribery Neuer, Lahm et al.

Arsenal only really has Ozil and Sanchez, Utd only has ADM and Rooney, City: Aguero Silva and Yaya. Chelsea probably has the most with Cech, Courtois, Matic, Cesc and Hazard.

If Utd had, say Ronaldo and someone like Robben, they'd have a lot of indivual brilliance and would probably be a better team.

If Arsenal had Messi and Neymar, they'd have an amazing front 4 and probably be performing much better.

That is the kind of thing I was talking about, as oppose to the lack of stars in the EPL.

by BarrileteCosmico Fri Mar 06, 2015 12:45 am

Is City really representative of the entire PL? Would any other top team in the PL play against us with such naive tactics?

by windkick Wed Mar 11, 2015 2:07 pm

Real Madrid aren't look too scary.

Plus the fact the players themselves are talking as if they world is collapsing on them. They look frustrated, fatigued, and lack of confidence. Couldn't be a better time to play them this month

by The Franchise Wed Mar 11, 2015 2:15 pm

Or...its perfect time for them to turn it around.

They look so bad that you know its not true. They know its not true, they just need a big result to go their way and it looks like we are it for them.

We obviously wont lay down and die for them, we need to compound their misery.

But yeah, I can almost never taken previous form into consideration for this game. There are some exceptions but this isnt it.

What is 100% true though is Iker is truly poor and their defence is very breach able.

by windkick Wed Mar 11, 2015 3:40 pm

yea I thought playing Iker just for the cup games worked better for them last season than playing him every single game like they do this one. I mean the guy has been on the receiving end of some serious blunders the past 3 or so years and they just refuse to throw in the towel on his time....which is good for us lol. I mean it's not like he proved his point to be a world beater at the world cup...not sure why they went into this season deciding to give him his number 1 spot back after being benched by both Carlo and Mourinho last 2 or so seasons

by Great Leader Sprucenuce Wed Mar 11, 2015 5:18 pm

BarrileteCosmico wrote:Is City really representative of the entire PL? Would any other top team in the PL play against us with such naive tactics?

Nope, not even we would lol. I have been saying for years that City are perfectly built for PL but are poorly built for the CL. It doesn't mean they are crap, just that their squad is very imbalanced and correcting that balance isn't easy and quite frankly even if they did they would probably worse in the PL.

by Winter is Coming Wed Mar 11, 2015 10:04 pm

PSG played really well with 10 men against Chelsea. Cavani really screwed them over. The red card didn't help them. Still 10 minutes to go but it seems like PSG are out of juice.

Also Thiago Silva smh

by Winter is Coming Wed Mar 11, 2015 10:18 pm

I'm crying. PSG PSG PSG

by The Franchise Thu Mar 12, 2015 12:46 pm

Couldnt be more happy without Barca being involved, what a great day to see Chelsea out.

The ref was totally unfair, everything went Chelsea's way...pen which didnt even seem to touch Silva's hand, a bogus red, Costa getting away with everything, Luiz and others getting cards for nothing and no foul calls.

Mou defensive football costing his team yet again, an extra player for 90 minutes and they dont dominate, they dont create anything special and look at their goals....set peice scrambles and penalties.

But major respect to PSG, they have alot of heart and spirit behind all that money and not every team (even great teams) could find a way to win that.

Great result.

by Valkyrja Thu Mar 12, 2015 3:20 pm

Chelsea had a legit penalty when Luiz tripped Costa in the first half iirc. The ref was shit on both sides

by Donuts Thu Mar 12, 2015 6:43 pm

the ref screwed over PSG far more than they did to chelsea..

unless you think a penalty not getting called is equivalent to a iffy penalty given and a red card early in the game.

by Winter is Coming Thu Mar 12, 2015 7:10 pm

If the red card wasn't given as it shouldn't have been that Costa PK claim wouldn't have exist as PSG would've had 11 men and not been in such a panic, because they were in the first 5-10 mins when they went a man down.

by CBarca Fri Mar 13, 2015 6:37 am

Only saw it once but it wasn't even a very strong penalty shout either.

Also Costa should have been sent off as well. Fair maybe that you have the point that Chelsea suffered some, buy let's be honest...the ref favored Chelsea in probably 85-95% of calls.

Amazing game by PSG. Felt awful to support a club like PSG but when against Chelsea it felt great. I'm still glowing from it 1 day later.

by The Franchise Fri Mar 13, 2015 12:27 pm

Costa most certainly should have seen red. The foul on Silva in which he got the yellow was obviously was than what Ibra did and questionably worth more than a yellow by itself. But more than that, he pushed Marquinhos to the floor for no apparent reason and on another occasion tossed someone else (forget who) on the ground.

Ref bad on both sides Laughing

F outta here. That pen shout was nothing and even so doesnt balance out anything.

by alexjanosik Sun Mar 15, 2015 5:59 am

I watch Bayern a lot and it is interesting to see the evolution of Pep.Partly forced by injuries,he is now playing a midfield of Schweini and Alaba with Rode slightly upfront.Having watched them all of last season and this,it is painfully obvious why he wanted Thiago.Bayern's other midfielders are just not very creative or elite passers.They are also not very good under pressure.They are good but not Xavi or Iniesta who can pick precision passes even under extreme pressure.Bayern's midfielders tend to lose the ball when pressured.They also dont have the final ball in them.Pep wanted Thiago to make him the Xavi of Bayern but injuries have spoilt his plans.It is a shame as Thiago truly has Xaviesta potential.
I think this is where Goetze has also disappointed.I expected a lot more from Goetze and he has been extremely underwhelming.He is extremely passive and I dont even notice him on the pitch.I only realize that he is playing when he is being substituted.I would like to hear hans opinion but so far Goetze has underwhelmed.I dont think he will ever become the player everyone expects him to become.I think it is clear why Pep wanted Neymar over Goetze as so far atleast,the Brazilian has proven to be far more capable of playing up to his billing.
It is also interesting that Pep seems to have given up on the false 9 idea.I am not sure whether it is due to a lack of personnel or because pep realizes the tactic doesnt work against organized buses.Maybe he wanted Goetze to play the false 9 but his underwhelming performances forced him to reconsider.Would welcome hans opinion on this.

by Valkyrja Sun Mar 15, 2015 10:57 am

Gotze has failed to live up to the potential he showed years ago. When I first saw him at 18 I thought that by 22 he would be a BDO contender. At the moment he isn't even top 5 in his group of age because Neymar,Hazard,Isco,James and Verratti are better than him. There are also the likes of Lucas and Pogba .. His biggest mistake was living BVB. Not playing his favorite position and not being a regular at Bayern have also played their part in his regress.

by Donuts Sun Mar 15, 2015 6:36 pm

you're biggest mistake is that you rate players based on their chances on winning the BDO.

which is dumb in a current period where Messi is only just 27 and Ronaldo just turned 30 let alone that award doesn't really say anything based on skill.

by alexjanosik Mon Mar 16, 2015 1:51 pm

Nobody expects him to win the BDO when Messi is around.But people certainly expected more from him.I really thought he would kick on from scoring the WC winning goal but so far he has been really disappointing this season.Stats may say otherwise but his play has been underwhelming.

by The Franchise Mon Mar 16, 2015 3:52 pm

I never was very enamored with Gotze.

Had a discussion with a friend on this at the time we first saw him so my opinion is easy to remember. We agreed we was a technically sound, neat and tidy player with some moments of skill...but not a special player, not someone who I ever thought would be one of the best.

Still got time to show im wrong but I just aint seeing such a special talent, I never have.

by Winter is Coming Mon Mar 16, 2015 4:22 pm

I have to slightly agree with you. I believe he was a special player at Dortmund and he did show some glimpse of brilliance, however perhaps that was due to him being one of the top 3 players there. As far as it goes for his performance with Bayern and Germany I haven't been blown away by it and he gets upstaged by better players on those squads.

Perhaps hans can shed better light, I'm sure injuries, new team, style of play etc maybe factors. He's only 22, so still can reach that level.

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