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Other Football - 2019/20


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Guest Pistonbroke
39 minutes ago, φαίνω said:

Bernardo Silva has been charged with misconduct by the FA over that tweet. 

 

I bet the fuckers just fine him. 

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Every 'big' club in the league outside of ourselves and Manchester City is absolutely horrific. 

 

We really should be winning at Old Trafford next month, regardless of it being their cup final.

 

A five point lead going into the home game with City would be a fantastic first third of the season. 

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56 minutes ago, El Rojo said:

Every 'big' club in the league outside of ourselves and Manchester City is absolutely horrific. 

 

We really should be winning at Old Trafford next month, regardless of it being their cup final.

 

A five point lead going into the home game with City would be a fantastic first third of the season. 

Can't take anything for granted mate. Wish we could. Hate to admit it but there IS some talent at United buried under all that shit and blubber. 

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12 hours ago, Lizzie Birdsworths Wrinkled Chopper said:

Fully convinced now the hamster wanted the United job and got blindsided when they offered it to the goblin hilariously prematurely.

 

All makes sense. His heart hasn’t been in it since even the Champions League final, when he was talking about it being a good way to say goodbye. Plus all these players drifting with one year left at the same time isn’t a coincidence. Epic mismanagement, almost as if someone has taken their eye off the ball and didn’t expect to still be there. That whole club is giving off the whiff of being in limbo at the moment.

 

He’ll still end up at United I reckon, when they eventually reluctantly give in to the reality of Solskjaer being laughably out of his depth, but he will hopefully be that bit more shop-soiled, weary and unsure of himself when he does. That would also lead to less surety and patience from United fans, having seen things at Spurs end on the sour note of having rusted and unravelled, rather than the light his time and squad building there was being looked at a year or two ago.

If they do sack Solksjaer and appoint Chubby, the natives may be happy for a while with a highly rated manager. But if there's little sign of improvement, the Mancs will be ready with the pitchforks shouting 'He's won nothing, why did he get the job?'

 

Another thing, on the issue of Spurs, is the question I've had about how would they deal with and build from having made it to a Champions League final in comparison to how Arsenal have done. Both reached the final in short time after completing their new stadium, and with a lot of good will, given they were teams breaking the old guard of regular finalists.

 

Thirteen years on, Arsenal have clearly not capitalised on that high mark in their career, only getting to one semifinal, two quarters, and thereafter the round of 16. At the time of the final, which was only months ago, with a new stadium, highly rated manager, and a squad of talented players, it looks like Spurs are not going to make any more of their achievement than Arsenal, but instead fall back down the ladder even faster.

 

He spoke about walking away if he'd won in Madrid, in which case, his reputation would have been dramatically enhanced enough to cover the lack of payoff from the rest of his 5 year contract which he'd signed just a year before. He would no doubt have also earned a handsome bonus for winning it, anyway. But walking away on a high, in glory is far different from walking away in embarrassment after recent results, mixed with the obvious frustrations he has and has aired, which he almost certainly wouldn't do. 

 

Who do Spurs get if Poch is sacked? When does it get bad enough for them? If they leave it until the end of the season, that would coincide with a raft of current players leaving at the end of their contracts, plus the possibility of Kane and possibly Son saying he's had enough, and open to offers elsewhere. From the position they were in just 24 months beforehand, that would mean an absolute wholesale clearout and reboot with a new manager and new players. But with Levy being notoriously tight, and with repayments for the stadium being a priority, how could they manage to appoint a new manager and sign players of the same quality that they'll be losing, on a payscale that's well below what other clubs offer? That's an impossible task. They would be starting from scratch again.

 

The new stadium was supposed to be their big statement, to get more crowds and revenue on league match days, and show off when play Champions League football, from which they would earn a hefty whack for the repayments. As things stand, with a massive overrun on completion and budget, that looks an even bigger gamble, however necessary. Unless they get their act together, the self sustaining act of playing in the CL and the appearance and prize money that comes from it is not going to continue. The attraction to high quality players will also not be there. If they're not in the CL and they don't pay big wages, their shiny new stadium is hardly going to dazzle anyone.

 

It'll be interesting watching. Spurs Spursing it doesn't come close.

 

 

 

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It's all been a house of cards for Spurs for a long time now. Their run to the CL final is probably the high point, and it's got them this new stadium as a reward which is a massive improvement even if everything goes tits up this season. But the amount of things that have needed to go their way to get to this point beggars belief. They've somehow convinced players like Eriksen, Alderweireld, Vertonghen, Son, etc to stick around for years, earning fractions of what they could get elsewhere. The plan was clearly to cash in on these lads while they still had some resale value, but that's backfired now.

 

They gave some time to a young striker who'd been knocking round the reserves and underwhelming in his loans and reaped the benefits as he turned himself into a top ten player in the world in his position. I know people say you have to give young players chances, but Kane's development would be like us giving Jerome Sinclair chances under Rodgers and seeing him turn into 2008 Fernando Torres. No one predicted how well Kane would do. That saved them another fortune in wages + transfer fee.

 

They got a a manager to replace Tactics Tim Sherwood who has turned out to be able to not only develop the very talented lads like Kane and Alli but who has managed to get decent form out of league one standard players like Eric Dier. Given Levy's past record with choosing managers there was no guarantee Pochettino was gonna be up to standard but he's succeeded hugely there. There's still question marks over his input in the transfer market and I think he relies a lot on refs in the Premier League being quite lenient with physical play, I wouldn't put him in the very top tier of managers, but he's night and day compared to the likes of Redknapp, Villas Boas or Sherwood.

 

Any of these things go even slightly differently and we're talking about Spurs as an upper mid table team who may occasionally challenge for a top four place, not a perennial Champions League club who reached the final last year.

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Silva and Mendy are probably friends. Silva probably isn't someone who is racist like Alf Garnett or the Lazio ultras.

 

However, it was a racist thing to do and he should be punished accordingly. I'm not sure it warrants a 6 game ban (hopefully he gets a 25 game ban) but it needs to be something that will really hit him hard and a fine won't do that.

 

It's funny but his thing was deliberately a racist slur and wasn't done in the heat of battle like Luis Suarez. Suarez called Evra a negrito which isn't a racist slur where he is from, but in our country would be deemed a racist remark and he was punished by an FA and a middle England that couldn't wait to take him down.

 

The likes of Sterling are the ones who have pissed me off. He is the first to mouth off about racism and has been given the role as ambassador for black youth by the press. I get he is probably friends with Silva, but he doesn't have to condone what he has done. He's the biggest disgrace of the whole episode.

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The chubby Hamster has brought all this on himself by talking shit at the end of last season about how he would move on if the won the CL. That sends a shit message to the players that the manager doesnt really want to be there and is looking to jump ship so why would they fight tooth an nail for him?

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Guest Pistonbroke

I personally think Poch needs time away from the game, even if it is only six months. He should walk away from Spurs and take time out now. Plenty of top teams will be clamouring for his services as he is a decent manager. Leaving Spurs now and walking into another team could be disastrous for both parties.  

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3 minutes ago, Pistonbroke said:

I personally think Poch needs time away from the game, even if it is only six months. He should walk away from Spurs and take time out now. Plenty of top teams will be clamouring for his services as he is a decent manager. Leaving Spurs now and walking into another team could be disastrous for both parties.  

Get him off to Manchester immediately.

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Guest Pistonbroke
2 minutes ago, φαίνω said:

Get him off to Manchester immediately.

 

The problem with that is the Mancs could benefit long term by players following him. I was reading earlier that Son said he wanted to leave Spurs but stayed purely because of Poch. 

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Just now, Pistonbroke said:

 

The problem with that is the Mancs could benefit long term by players following him. I was reading earlier that Son said he wanted to leave Spurs but stayed purely because of Poch. 

Hmmm, on second thoughts he needs some time off. 

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2 hours ago, Baltar said:

Spuds fans are so fickle, so many wanting Poch out. He's done brilliantly there considering they never had big budgets to match the other clubs in the top 4. Spurs can kiss goodbye to regular top 4 finishes if Poch leaves.

They were always either 4th or 5th in the years before Poch -- Redknapp got them in twice.

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3 hours ago, joe_fishfish said:

I wouldn't put him in the very top tier of managers, but he's night and day compared to the likes of Redknapp, Villas Boas or Sherwood.

I’m not so sure he is. Better? Yeah, but Redknapp is - or was, given his most recent work - also far superior to the other two. Compare Pochettino to Redknapp and I’m not so sure he’s a drastic improvement. Spurs had never qualified for the CL in its current form until he took over with them bottom of the league, and went on to finish 4th twice out of three full seasons, only being denied a CL spot second time around because of Chelsea winning the thing. Similarly, he did well at Southampton, but that was maintained for a further three seasons until Mark Hughes went and sparked everything up in his usual fashion.
 

I think Pochettino's true level remains a bit of a mystery; could be someone who found himself in the right job at the right time, or he could have a bit more about him. I don’t think he’d be a sure thing with a Man Utd-scale rebuilding job or successfully massaging the sentient ego that is Real Madrid.

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