Whoopee F***ing do, millionares kicking a bit of spherical leather about for 90 mins.

Sorry Dude Its baseball & hockey here........ All making tooooooooooo much money as far as i'm concerned. We the fans paying for it.....

WTF can we do....................AZAR

YEA!!!!
4 outta 4 for arsenal. 34 more to go
come on guys u lot can do it again
kick ManU's a**

triangular sandwichs taste better than square ones

premeirship rubbish. it's local teams that matter, regardless of where they are in the League or the Premiership. Most new players come up from local youth teams, and local teams will remain the wellspring of footballing talent in this country. Even the big Prem outfits, who have their own excellent youth training schenes and armies of talent scouts, still rely on recruitment from small clubs to fill their junior ranks.

I support Stoke City FC and I'm very proud of it; we'll prob never get in the Prem, and I'd rather we didn't, football is imo more interesting and exciting out of the Prem, on the whole.

@@@Radio Free Tawakalnistan
well maybe your right, but i dont think its as exicting as a premiership game. & there is also no tv coverage for most if not all of them.

ps: nice to see your muslim

triangular sandwichs taste better than square ones

Edited by - LithiumBrick on 9/1/2004 6:13:28 AM

@ lithium, he isnt.

I might well be though.

In another thread I posted a comment from an ex-great in basket ball about the sad state of things today in the US professional game.

In terms of your footie, has there been a change in the way the game is played at the professional level that contrasts the game today from, say, 20 years ago?

very much so. i imagine much of the same criticisms can be levied at both our footballs (ours being the correct and proper one though )

salaries - astronomical and actually could be considered obscene. lads of 17 and 18 earning more in a week than someone whose worked hard all his life gets in a year? this also creates a tremendous gulf between the Prem and the League, as most League teams simply can't afford those superstar wages.

sponsorship - all-pervading, on and off the pitch. want to sell something? relate it to football and throw in a few MUFC players, that'll do nicely.

on the postive side, the game has gone from a long ball up and down the pitch style to a more fluid style. And the days of 10 man defences have gone. This is partly because English teams were lagging behind the continentals in tactics, and also because the increasing number of highly talented foreigners have brought their own styles of play with them and this has been taken up by their teammates.

howver the main trend I see continuing is the gap between the prem and the League widening even further, and more small clubs going under because of money problems. The small clubs will readily sell a talented player just to get cash for their infrastructure, and this means a talent drain from the lower divisions.

When you say 10 man defense.... is that a reference to the Italian style of play?

When you say more fluid a game, would that be more in line with the Brazilian approach?

Whatever happened to German soccer? It seems to have turned into a cookie cutter sport, every team seems to play the sam way ... or am I just uninformed?

Whilst i live at the oposite end of the country to my team Newcastle, we are in absouloute dissaray. I will not be happy of they bring in ANY english manager from the Premiership. Unless it was Harry Redknapp. If we were prepared to spend 20million squid on ho banging rooney, we should go out, beg Marcello Lippi to come and manage us and buy Jaap Stam to replace Jon Woodgate nag dammit!!. I don't think we'll get top five this year. However, my local side Aldershot did look promising last year as did Farnborough, and Woking, and Reading. Since all this garbage that has happened up on Tyneside, my opinion of footie has gone down hill. Sir Bobby should have never been fired. It's the likes of Alan Shearer, Keiron Dyer and all their millions which are destroying Newcastle Utd, as it certainly wasn't Sir Bobby.

Anyway, they way our Blue Comrades Chelski are playing, they are going to be the only club that can challenge the Gooners this season.

I would say the Italian game is very much midfield actually indy. With the italian sides they don't like the ball around the box so i find, when i watch their games, they keep it in the middle of the park. As for Germany, well, their footbal sides have entered some form af abyss or something. The national team is so so weak now. Everyone used to be afraid of the German side with the ol' war horses Lothar Matteaus and Andreas Moller. The just don't have it anymore. Clearly evident at Euro 2004.

Edited by - Bret Bretonian on 9/1/2004 2:47:16 PM

@Ed,

1. ha-bloody-ha. it was actually a reference to the late and unlamented 10-man Liverpool defence of the 70s and 80s. Arsenal used to be quite guilty of it as well.

2. No. As if i'd compare any aspect of the English game to Brazilian football.

3. German football is moribund at the moment. The Bundesliga is ever so boring now.

people witter on about how exciting the prem is, i don't think it is at all. Local matches migth be technically less proficient but they're often more exciting for being unpredictable.

(incidentally i happen to be a former supporter and former local resident of the only team in the English League that refused to play an FA Cup tie... because the pies hadn't turned up.)

@ taw

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3. German football is moribund at the moment.

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no objection, sir

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The Bundesliga is ever so boring now.

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do you want me to link it to a german FL-site ??



I don't care a beep beep about my rank

Edited by - zazie on 9/6/2004 5:02:12 AM

I wasn't particularly singling out Germany; a lot of European football is incredibly dull at the moment. Being of Italian descent I follw Seria A & B and there are better games in B, as A is dominated bt technically proficient but defensively minded teams that just grind away. And our Prem is heading the same way, at the top at any rate.