LGP Futbol Thread - (CL, EPL, Serie A, Liga, 2014 World Cup)

[GaryRissling]

Neymar. Check out what he does to the two defenders when he receives the ball. Megs the first, darts past the second and they both collide in a heap. Awesome stuff.

http://footballfunnys.lockerdome.com/media/101586032

[Gaucho]

Good stuff. Too bad Santos blew the lead.

[largegarlic]

Another really good Saturday morning EPL game...

I'm rooting for Spurs and Friedel/Dempsey, but I do (grudgingly) admit that Chelsea looks really good and is enjoyable to watch.

[Gaucho]

Hazard - Oscar - Mata is fun.

[largegarlic]

Hazard - Oscar - Mata is fun.

Indeed. They look nothing like the bunkering Chelsea that won the Champions League last season.

[Pavement]

Chelsea look good. Still early in the season but it looks like they will really give man utd and man city a run for their money in terms of the championship. Man utd 1-0 down to Stoke at the moment.

[Avyran]

As a Man U fan, this game is frustrating as heck. A defense that doesn't exist (Carrick + Evans? Really?) because of the injuries to the team (Jones, Smalling, Vidic). Kagawa, our #1 off-season signing (until RVP), being used out of position as a left midfielder instead of his prime position as attacking midfield, leaving a young left-back exposed by himself (Buttner... insert joke about Man U's butt being exposed, haha). Our goal so far came when Kagawa moved back into that area: he is great at finding seams around the penalty area and setting up chances, and his cross to Hernandez was lovely. But mainly our god-awful defending. I can understand Rooney replacing Kagawa, as he's shown to have really good synergy with Van Persie so far this season.

Ferguson played a weak defensive team, and it's really cost them so far.

As a fan of soccer, it's cool to see Braga come in & sucker-punch a giant. But the manner of these goals was sad. MLS-style defense.

[Gaucho]

Vidic is not easily replaced.

[Kraftster]

Playing "organized" soccer tomorrow for the first time in probably 10 years. Finally in at least passable shape to where I can play too. Cannot. Freakin. Wait.

[Gaucho]

I picture you as some sort of uncompromising defensive midfielder with a Keane-like mean streak. Amirite?

[jmh470]

Vidic is not easily replaced.

Especially when there was no one in the squad or brought in to replace him.

But, um, hey! Look! Robin van Persie! Yeah!

[Kraftster]

I picture you as some sort of uncompromising defensive midfielder with a Keane-like mean streak. Amirite?

Haha. Well, I don't quite know what adult Kraftster the soccer player will be like. I quit my junior year of high school to play golf instead because I was totally burnt out. The Kraftster back then did not have a mean streak, nor a particularly defensive bent. Outside midfield mainly. In the years after I quit I've thought a lot about how I would have played differently if I knew then what I know now and that image of how I'd play matches fairly accurately with your description, which I suppose makes sense since you never knew teenage Kraftster.

[Avyran]

Offense saved Man U today. Chicharito is really, really good.

[GaryRissling]

This is awesome news, IMO:

South American soccer governing body CONMEBOL will hold a special Copa America tournament in 2016 in the United States to commemorate the organization's 100th year.

CONMEBOL said at a meeting of its executive committee in the Argentine capital Wednesday that the tournament would include the 10 South American confederation teams, plus the United States, Mexico and four others from the CONCACAF region, which comprises North and Central America and the Caribbean.

http://soccernet.espn.go.com/news/story ... ca?cc=5901

[largegarlic]

I saw the Copa America thing too. That would indeed be awesome. A combined North/South America tournament in the US certainly wouldn't surpass the Euros, but it would greatly increase the hype and exposure of the Copa America and bring it closer to the Euros.

The US and Mexico would obviously be competitive in a combined field, but I worry a little bit about the other four CONCACAF teams proposed to be included. Going by the current hex, that would be Costa Rica, Honduras, Jamaica, and Panama. I can see Costa Rica and Honduras at least hanging with the weaker South American countries like Bolivia and Venezuela, but I'm not sure about teams like Jamaica and Panama.

[Avyran]

So, watching the Manchester City v. Swansea game, and City just scored... but Marcus Vorm injured his groin & required a stretcher to leave the pitch as well as a sub. The Man City fans just kept chanting and celebrating the goal, yelling at the Swansea fans while Vorm lay on the ground, even up until he was stretchered off the pitch.

Is that common? Coming from where I normally see fans get quiet in the case of a fairly serious injury (as Vorm's seemed to be), even if the player's on the away team, that seemed disrespectful to me, but perhaps I just haven't paid enough attention or seen a goal at the same time as the injury.

[Gaucho]

Pretty spectacular Merseyside derby.

[Gaucho]

I'm not rooting for players to get injured, of course, but in case of Luis Suraez I'm not really rooting against it either. Not very hard anyway.

Fatal injuries included.

[Gaucho]

Poor Fernando. Constantly branded a diver, he's being sent off for a non-dive and Rocco feels vindicated.

[Avyran]

Lots of questionable calls all of a sudden in the Chelsea / Man U game. The Ivanovic red card makes sense due to the last-man call (even though whether there was actually a foul there is highly questionable). The 2nd yellow to Torres for diving was not a dive, but instead a yellow on Evans for showing studs; perhaps Torres's reputation for diving got him that 2nd? Then the 3rd man U goal was likely offsides...

[Loaf31]

http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/2012/10/ ... rights-nbc

NBC acquires American TV rights to EPL

[Kraftster]

That's interesting. NBC Sports, with NHL and EPL, is going to be pretty impressive. Weren't there rumblings that they'd be looking to add MLB Playoffs when its up for bid again?

[largegarlic]

I saw the NBC Sports thing too. If I remember correctly, they acquired MLS rights and the rights to some US national team games. With hockey too, they have the ingredients to be a pretty interesting alternative to ESPN for those of us not that into baseball, basketball, football, and ESPN's ridiculous tabloid-like coverage of sports.

That said, I have mixed feelings about it because it represents another loss for Fox Soccer. I think the production value is better on NBC Sports than Fox Soccer, and NBC Sports is more widely available, but Fox Soccer is (obviously) 100% dedicated to showing nothing but soccer, and this puts another nail in their coffin. I often just leave Fox Soccer on in the background all morning on weekends, knowing that some interesting EPL or Serie A game is going to be on.

[Kraftster]

Yeah, that was the thought I had too.

[GaryRissling]

Getting back to Sunday's action in the prem, I first humbly submit an Ashley Young rant:

Ashley Young is the most useless and cowardly POS in the league. He is like Busquets, minus the ability. That he forced Clattenburg to send off Ivanovich rather than going through on goal reveals all you need to know about his attitude as an attacker and as a player. There was only the slightest amount of contact between him and Ivanovich, and IMO, he looked for the foul rather than going through on goal. If it were for a penalty, I probably could have understood him going to ground as he did, but he sacrificed a one v one with the keeper just for a 20 yard free kick and to get another professional sent off. He was beyond useless in the Euros (I seriously would have taken an aging Beckham over him), and he's crap, as well as a shameless diver, for utd.

OK, now my $0.02 on the officiating in the Liverpool and Chelsea games.
Offside calls are tough. Human eyes are incapable of 100% accuracy on offsides, and depending on the position of the ball relative to the position of the back line, it can require more than a small amount of personal judgment on the part of the AR. IMO these calls will even out over the course of the season, and there really isn't much than can be done without implementing technology.

The only really bad call though was the decision to give the second yellow to Torres. As a ref, you can't call what you don't see (with the possible exception of offsides, which necessitates the AR use his judgment), and there is no way that Clattenburg conclusively saw a dive. That was not a 50/50 call. If there was any doubt - as there had to have been, you can't give that second yellow.

That is also involved another disgraceful utd player - Johnny "De Jong" Evans, should have also been taken into account.

Evans should have received the yellow.