Like most people I don't really want the oil clubs to win, even though they will eventually anyway. On the other hand I don't want Real Madrid to win it either, mainly because I don't really like the idea of them going down as this extremely dominant team in this era of European football when for the most part they weren't that dominant. Don't get me wrong, they've had a fantastic team more often than not, their midfield is great, Ronaldo, Benzema, Ramos, Marcelo etc... but them winning three in a row with another one shortly before that makes them sound a lot more impressive than they were.
Champions League Quarter Finals 2020/21 - Apr 6/7 & 13/14
- Thread starter Pagh Wraith
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik @Rood and Imran @Annihilate Now! start with the good news by celebrating Manchester United Women's emphatic FA Cup win over Spurs at Wembley and the future of manager Marc Skinner.
Then it's the bad news and the ever worsening form of our Men with losses to Arsenal and Palace.
Finally the main debate - ETH Out now or keep him until the end of the season - if not longer. Are you Team Nik or Team Imran?
Not to mention their success is kinda based on state/goverment backing way back when. They really are the original money club.
They are an extremely dominant team in Europe this is factual though. They won it three times in a row while no one else has ever managed to do it twice since the new format was introduced in 1993.
If they win it this year all it will do is give more credit to Zidane and Benzema/Modric/Kroos/Casemiro as players since there is no Ronaldo to win ties on his own this time around
IF, and it's a big IF, we go through tonight, we will win the champions league
It's not a big if, you have 80% chance of going to semis.
Beating Chelsea is a bigger if.
Winning the final against whoever gets there is an even bigger one.
preach
You can be sure that Ronaldo and his fans must be secretly hoping that Real Madrid will never win it because this will just downplay Ronaldo's achievement for them and it will just reinforce the narrative that Real Madrid's CL triumphs were more of a collective team effort rather than Ronaldo's single-handedly firing them to it which Ronaldo and his fans ego won't be able to take it.
No. I agree with Giorno on this one. If Real Madrid manage to get past Liverpool and Chelsea, which would be no small feat considering how decimated their squad is by injuries and covid, they would be easily favorites to win the final.
One game, no away goals rule, Zidane in charge. And with Madrid's finals in Europe record.
It's getting tough to decide who you want to see lose the most. In order, probably PSG, City, Chelsea, Liverpool. Madrid or Dortmund would be the ideal result.
As much as we all hate Liverpool, it will be another nail in the coffin of football if one of the plastic clubs win it.
As much as we all hate Liverpool, it will be another nail in the coffin of football if one of the plastic clubs win it.
Surprised by that, I'd have thought that most Utd fans would rather see PSG, Chelsea or even City win it instead of us getting to number 7.
In the 4 of 5 CL I had the clear feeling that Madrid were better than the finalist, but this year with City and PSG...
And Chelsea first! I think they will be comfortable with our style of play, and perhaps we'll both propose the same type of game
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Much as i hate you lot as a rival, you are a proper football club like us and everybody else. Those three are different, especially City and PSG. Letting them win it would mark a big change for the worse in football.
One of them is gonna be in the final unless City fecks it up tonight, depressing thought. Never thought there would come a scenario where Real would be the only team left in the semis I'd want to win the CL, if they go through tonight. I don't want Chelsea on 2 and don't want PSG or City to win either. Guess it's Real > Chelsea > PSG > City for me if we don't go through ourselves.
It was always down to collective effort, that doesn't take anything from Ronaldo but we've seen in 2019 that even if he scores a hat trick to get past Atletico and score in both legs against Ajax, he can't win the CL without a strong team around him and no one can.
I'd favor Madrid against PSG/Dortmund but not sure about City.
However with Zidane saying they've reached their physical limit, who knows in what shape the players will be by May
For me it's anyone but City. Call me romantic but I'd like to keep the mystic aura around our 99' side being the only english team winning the treble. Sharing that honour with a plastic City side would be unpleasant, and winning the quad it could reach unbearable levels with the press and their "best team ever" narratives. Probably they have those articles written already and kept in a drawer for years now.
I wouldn't like Liverpool either but I don't give them half a chance anyway. They gifted the first leg naively and looked half-arsed, probably don't have the spirit to fight in both fronts and I can understand it. With their current holes and coming from a difficult year I think they'll prioritize a top 4 finish to try to save the season.
The rest I can take it, but zero sympathies though. PSG the oil club, diving cnuts. Bored of Real and the bald being always there. Chelsea, plastic. Dortmund winning -> CL qualification -> Sancho transfer cost +20m. Just cancel the competition or something.
I wouldn't like Liverpool either but I don't give them half a chance anyway. They gifted the first leg naively and looked half-arsed, probably don't have the spirit to fight in both fronts and I can understand it. With their current holes and coming from a difficult year I think they'll prioritize a top 4 finish to try to save the season.
The rest I can take it, but zero sympathies though. PSG the oil club, diving cnuts. Bored of Real and the bald being always there. Chelsea, plastic. Dortmund winning -> CL qualification -> Sancho transfer cost +20m. Just cancel the competition or something.
I don't really get the 'proper club' thing. City got an investor, yes, but that's a weak point of criticism in a hyper commercialized market like football. For me, the only legit criticism is of moral nature since the sheikh family seem to be downright horrible people but if you start with that, you really shouldn't watch CL, the WC or anything else. Almost every big club has ties to oligarchies these days. And let's not even begin to discuss stuff outside of football. The Saudis are invested in so many consumer companies and a great bunch of corporations produce under horrendous conditions. Apple/Foxconn or Asian textile factories for example. It's practically impossible to avoid supporting those people without dedicating your whole lifestyle to it. You sure as hell couldn't support any big football club without being a hypocrite then.
I think I want PSG to win it. I’ve tried to put their oil money aside. I’m enjoying Mbappe and Neymar.
Yes, but the original funding comes from the state. For all their trusts/foundations/holding companies construction, at the end of the day it's sovereign states that have pumped money into previously underperforming clubs as PR projects for their countries. It dilutes the competition. While Abramovich is a detestable asshat, his fortune is not limitless and he can lose it in a way that the Abu Dhabi government can't unless someone invents something that makes oil/natural gas irrelevant.
I don't care what happens tonight once the bin dippers get knocked out. Couldn't care less about City and their gazillions.
For sure, that in a nutshell is why international football should be cut back. Far too many games that no one carrs about.
Dippers are currently built on American Venture Capitalist $$$. Hardly the most organic model going.
If people want to talk about wanting a club who is 'run properly' winning it, the Dortmund is their only option.
Yeah, the Real dominance between 14-18 is one of the stranger things to have happened. Don't get me wrong they were a good team, but they weren't a dominating one. I think they only won, one league title in that period for instance.
The credit you can give them though this that they knew how to win cups ties efficiently.
Kind of have to agree. Another thing that needs to be remembered is that if you actually look back to the origins of football then most clubs where financed by the local big businessman. So, the move to oil money is kind of just globalisation in play.
Yeah, the Dippers need to go, both figuratively and literally.
I'd easily let you have both number 7 and 8 before City or even Chelsea.
Wouldnt mind PSG because of their otherwise irrelevance.
This.
Yup, I'm in the same boat.
Everytime so far that us and Real have been in a position where we will both face eachother if we win our ties one of us have buggered it up (Real in 2004 and 2012 and us in 2014).
Will tonight finally be the time?
Will tonight finally be the time?
Is there a chance Hazard could be back to play Chelsea or is he out for a while?
This in a nutshell shows why The Glazers have managed to exploit your club so easily.
Probably, he started training again
It wasn't right really, the second leg was excellent game management and I never at any point was worried (and I'm usually someone who can't even start to relax until 4 goals up).
I might have to send him some donuts and burgers to keep him out of form.
Fair enough, I'll be honest I didn't watch the 2nd game, but in the first leg it seemed they had plenty of chances themselves.
I guess I just expected you to cruise passed them by 3/4 goals.
Madrid have consistently qualified at least to CL semifinals from 2011 until 2018, that's 8 seasons in a row. I don't know if that's impressive or not to you, as that's entirely subjective, but I think you will struggle to find any other club with that level of consistency ever in modern football. Also, to put things into context, the other two competitors in the league reached the Champions League final 3 times during that 2014-18 period, so it's not like they were competing against mediocre sides in domestic competitions.
You should send them to Vini
I don't know, in the end it's just an investor who's spending the money with a purpose and if said purpose wouldn't get fulfilled, they would stop spending. TAbu Dhabi isn't paying City so much out of vanity or because they love the sport so much, they expect something in return and it seems as if it is paying off.
That being said, many football clubs also have close ties with governmental bodies. Real Madrid for example. One could also argue that taxation is a factor, too. As far as I know, professional footballers pay less taxes in France and Spain than in Germany, for instance. This is of course not to the same extent but it's messing with the competitiveness anyway. And as I said, you'll have a hard time finding a top club who doesn't have ties in one way or another with oligarchies.
Very good point, yes. One could definitely argue that the current "proper" elite clubs are where they are because they were the first to commercialize.
It's the concept of using football as a way to whitewash abhorrent regimes that i disagree with. We've gone well beyond investment to aid marketing, we've now got states and oligarchs buying into clubs to exert influence and gloss over the atrocious things they've done and continue to do. If the clubs win the CL, it's a win for the regime that sponsors them. Abramovich is a lesser evil but his Chelsea ownership was still originally a way to raise his profile and make it less likely for him to end up dead or in jail for his past activities.
People use clubs like Blackburn or Madrid as examples of how this has already happened in the past, but a local businessman or a local council investing in the local club is very different.
Is this the old 'Franco built Real Madrid' thing or what
Let's go Madrid? Or psg?
I mean as a United fan I don't want Liverpool getting number 7
Them getting 5 was annoying but 6 more so to double what we have
Don't like any English clubs winning, city winning it with the league would be annoying even though many don't take them seriously
Chelsea 1 behind us would be annoying too
So that leaves Madrid and psg right? Unless Dortmund manage to somehow go through tonight
I mean as a United fan I don't want Liverpool getting number 7
Them getting 5 was annoying but 6 more so to double what we have
Don't like any English clubs winning, city winning it with the league would be annoying even though many don't take them seriously
Chelsea 1 behind us would be annoying too
So that leaves Madrid and psg right? Unless Dortmund manage to somehow go through tonight
Also I'm still laughing that the PSG keeper ran into his own defender, went down and the referee gave PSG a free kick
Madrid > PSG > Chelsea > City
Obviously if Dortmund knock out City I will be rooting for them all the way.
If Madrid get knocked out today it will be a disaster from a United point of view.
Obviously if Dortmund knock out City I will be rooting for them all the way.
If Madrid get knocked out today it will be a disaster from a United point of view.
Just imagine if we got a Liverpool, City final. The horror as a United fan