i know, but as a fan, it ruined my afternoon, ha ha ha


that would be nice but... don't write off juventus so quickly...


actually in style of play w/ the magnetic legs & mad dribbling i'd pair ribery with la pulga, although they play in different roles and their teams take different shapes.

e.g.
this one from proposed formations march 12



i couldn't find a better one of bayern but let's try this one for their more-or-less first team

although yesterday they started like this



on the wings i think ribery is better than pedro or alexis sanchez. iniesta's role is more like kroos maybe, and iniesta is better. xavi/busquets vs. schweinsteiger/javi martinez, barca is better (the spaniards should probably have more varied names, dammit-- xavi, javi, xabi.. ayayay...).

alaba > alba though, lahm > dani alves, neuer > valdes, piqué > badstuber > puyol (old). oh i am getting headaches. more of this later.

i think xavi/iniesta/messi are the axis that fuels barca though and they are hard to stop, and without badstuber and javi martinez would be a bitch to even try stopping them. but who knows. bayern i think has better defenders.

what time is this draw?

The draw is 11.00am GMT. You're West Coast, right? Isn't that 4am? You can find out the results over breakfast.

Re the player-for-player comparison. Your assessment seems fair, although the sheer fluidity of Barca's set up makes individual comparisons even harder than normal. I don't think david Villa, for example, would make many top ten strikers lists but he's perfect for Barca.

Re Juventus, they're definitely dark horses but I can't help thinking (probably wrongly) that the team that stops Pirlo effectively stops Juve. Saying that, Juve are probably my all time favourite continental side so I'd love to see them do well, even though I'd still prefer to see the final battled out between the two supposedly best sides - which for me remains Barca and Bayern.

Man this thread reached new geek levels...and I love it.

waitaminute...why was robben on the left?

ribéry was out injured. lacking any other substitute, they put robben there, but he gravitated back to his natural position, which is also mueller's. at times they switched and it was shit. then they just fucking overlapped. this effectively narrowed and cluttered bayern's attack, which is why (in my opinion anyway) yesterday's results were so shit.

if you follow bayern, you'll see that out front they can easily swap mandzukic/mueller for gomez/robben [center+right]. but ribery always always starts on the left.

i've talked often of bayern's deep bench but this is where it's lacking-- nobody can cover for ribéry. alaba probably more or less could, but he's needed on defense. and while other people get more glory or news coverage, i find the ribéry/alaba pair to create an awesome dynamic on bayern's left.

-----

ps- if i was henyckes i'd start training alaba/contento on the left to cover when ribery is absent, as contento already subs for alaba on defense and alaba has proven good on the attack (he even scored recently vs... oh i forget)

Another great game I had to miss. Lame. Hella lame.

To be honest, it wasn't that great a game. The last five minutes were exciting and the few minutes after the first goal, when Arsenal looked like they might conceivably pull it off. Other than that though, it just felt like Bayern weren't bad enough to lose and Arsenal weren't good enough to win. Barca vs Milan was the one you really missed out on.

Pft the Arsenal game is so yesterday. I was talking about the Tottenham game.

true, it was a shit game, at least for bayern-- ugh! if you can catch a replay of barca/milan however, heart-stopping stuff!

ps also found out galatasaray knocked out schalke after all. eh, schalke is in the weeds this year-- except they recently beat dortmund ha ha ha.

pps- what spurs game?

The europa league game.

Inter Milan 4-Tottenham 1 (agg 4-4)

Cassano 20′ Palacio 52′Gallas 75′ (og)Alvarez 110′

Adebayor 96′

Talk about a tense game!

oh, cool! i'll try to watch that tonight--in spite of the spoilers! (i have this website that keeps replays for 8 days).

i normally write off europa league matches due to limited RAM but those are two nice teams.

Damn! I'd have liked to have seen that.

So the Champions League Draw just happened:

Bayern vs Juve
PSG vs Barca
Real vs Galatasaray
Malaga vs Dortmund

Would've rather Juve stayed away from Bayern (and vice versa) but otherwise glad the main contenders have avoided each other.

oh shiiiiiiittttt!!!!

the only one i'm 99% sure will advance to the semis is real madrid



and by that photo i mean this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKIZkE1BZ8c

Bayern and Juve looks epic and could go either way. This is the tie I'm most looking forward to. Will Pirlo break German hearts again?

PSG will be without Zlatan in the first leg so that has to make Barca even stronger favourites.

Can't see anything but a Real win over Galatasaray.

I saw Malaga the other week and, while they only drew, they look very decent. Although over two legs you have to favour Dortmund.

bayern munich plays bayer leverkusen in about 90 minutes from now. leverkusen are good and could give bayern another defeat after last week's arsenal match (the horror). it should be interesting.

yes, yes, bayern/bayer-- confusing. one is a place (bavaria), the other is the brand of aspirin.

FUCKING LOVE EVERTON!

2-0 win over Manchester City! Brilliant. Although I feel like deja vu is kicking in at the moment. Last year we lost a big f.a cup match (Liverpool you scum pigs), the next week we ruin a manchesters team's chances at winning the league (our 4-4 draw with United last season).

WHY U NO DO DIS LAST WEEK!

Yeah, great win for Everton but, as you say, hardly means much now. Difficult to see them getting a Champions League place now. All that's left is the chance of finishing above Liverpool.

QPR currently losing to Villa. Massive game for both sides. Hope Villa stay up and QPR go down.

:cool:

Watching Bayer v Bayern on a stream. Bayern seem to be coping with the loss of Ribery far better than they did against Arsenal. Quite brilliant goal from Gomez.