Pass and Move Porto Are Poo: The Midweek Football Thread

Simple economics at the root of it, isn’t it? Raiola was into United for about £900k a week last season, now Mkhitaryan’s gone and Zlatan’s had a paycut so he’s probably only into them for about half that. The lad’s got bills to pay, so they force a new deal or get him to Real/PSG.

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Enjoyed the Real v PSG game last night. Neither side particularly struck me as champions in waiting, and thought 3-1 flattered Real a little.

Enjoyed Dani Alves a lot, and thought Asensio had a pretty big impact when he came on in the final 10-12 minutes or so.

First time I’ve seen anything of Mbappe, he reminded me a bit of Chris Armstrong.

Thinking Dortmund v Atalanta and then Leipzig v Napoli will be the way forward tonight.

I’m going to a bar showing those two AND Arsenal/Celtic games this evening :heart_eyes:

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Michael Owen’s said De Bruyne’s better than Scholes was and United fans aren’t taking it very well at all.

how many yellow/red cards has de bruyne got?

Of all the things to get upset about, I find stuff like this utterly laughable. Any grown-up that loses their wig over this kind of thing need to take a seriously long hard look at themselves and probably avoid life for a bit.

Comparing two players who played at different times is a silly pursuit.

Scholes was brilliant. deBruyne is brilliant. That’s all there is to it.

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Never seen De Bruyne’s chopper so can’t possibly comment.

I for one am livid

but but but the strangers I attach myself to arbitrarily say a great deal about me and my worth as a human

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De Gea’s a thief

Celtic vs Zenit tonight. We’re too prone to a defensive calamity (and have too many injuries at the back) for me to hold out too much hope, but if everyone pulls out a big performance we could get a result.

Nice to see yer Bobby Mancini in the vicinity though, I’ll always have a bit of love for that man.

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Ronaldo has now scored more Champions League goals than 117 of the 137 teams to have played in it

That is ridiculous.

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116 goals in 147 UCL games is pretty good but Messi has a better hit-rate with 97 goals in 121 UCL games

sorry Ronaldo, you’re still 2nd best

shout out to Gerd Müller;
34 goals in 35 European Cup games

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(yes I am slowly reading F365’s Winners and Losers)

On April 4, 2009, Yuri was playing for Cheltenham Town in a home defeat to Leyton Orient in League One. On Wednesday, he started for Paris Saint-Germain in the Bernabeu against Real Madrid.

Also ridiculous.

Thought this was a good piece.

This, perhaps, was a glimpse into a future in which elite clubs, focused more on marketing and the generation of revenue than the pursuit of a coherent footballing philosophy, gather together elite players and throw them out onto the pitch to perform without any thought as to whether they can play together.

Thought that bit was particularly pertinent. Applies to Man Utd’s skyrocketing revenues in the face of their most barren spell in decades. “Success” doesn’t really matter anymore and isn’t particularly relevant to the people that run football clubs - having a marketable asset that you can build your brand around like Paul Pogba is far more important to how he actually fits within a three man midfield.

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How does getting rid of a player on a free & then buying him back for a world record transfer fee fit into this plan? I guess it generates headlines & narrative much more than if he’d just slowly worked his way into the first team ?

Harry Kane - 9 goals in 9 games :shushing_face:

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the richest clubs putting lots of effort into branding/marketing/profit instead of into building a better team does offer a glimmer of hope to club with less financial power so i’m not against it

also, had forgotten about the failed rabona last night, that was funny

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on Ronaldo having 30 touches and 10 shots:

An actual cannon might have been more involved in general play.

:rofl:

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Heard a pundit say yesterday that if Real win the Champions League then Ronaldo would be a shoo-in for the Ballon d’Or. Could barely believe what i was hearing. Not been one of the fifty top players in Europe this season. That sort of short-termist obsession with pigs’ trough football’s proof the game broke, if we didn’t already now.

Maybe a player will go on to have a big effect on the latter stages and/or World Cup, but Kane should be well ahead of Ronaldo, same for Mertens and De Bruyne and various others.