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Lampard being this generations Neil Warnock would be a surprise

Just wait until he puts a fullback as striker because Christine had a dream that he would score that day
You've gotta fucking die to get relegated as soon as you reach the prem off a decent championship run

I'd love to see Rooney on Barton's podcast, probably won't happen but a conversation between those two would be class
 
Lampard being this generations Neil Warnock would be a surprise

Just wait until he puts a fullback as striker because Christine had a dream that he would score that day
He really should just slowly work his way up to the premier league and not force it like he did with Chelsea and Gerrard did with Aston Villa. He won't be 48 until next summer so he easily has 15-20 more years to coach if he wants. Just don't jump the gun too early because you can't work off a stain like that
 
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It's not looking good celtic sisters...

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some trouble in paradise lol, who would have guessed signing big names with massive egos would lead to internal struggles

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this might definitively end the goat debate if he does shit in turkey
 
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It's not looking good celtic sisters...
This might be the year a new team from Scotland wins the league. I am oh so hopeful it happens too
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some trouble in paradise lol, who would have guessed signing big names with massive egos would lead to internal struggles
Catalan newspaper. I would trust the Huffington Post sports section before I trust them to report on accurate Real madrid news
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this might definitively end the goat debate if he does shit in turkey
Not a chance. Messi isn't leaving to join Galatasaray. This is clearly a plant
 
ye this is probably true but sports journalism is such a shit show I just take what I see at face value most of the time
You can boil sports journalism down to 2 different things right now. 1 is a journalist trying to break a story 30 minutes before a club announces something and the other one is a journalist publishing a rumor to please one of their connects that help get them the story that breaks 30 minutes before the club announces it.
 
Sunderland with one of the most deserved points you'll see this season. I'm not going to pretend to have followed their recruitment and progress since they last went down and come back up, but that's the sort of quality, fight, support, and stadium atmosphere I personally want to see from newly promoted teams. Genuinely hope they stay up this year and work towards cementing their status as a PL mainstay. Early days but if they continue down this path I see no reason they can't become the next Bournemouth.
 
Sunderland with one of the most deserved points you'll see this season. I'm not going to pretend to have followed their recruitment and progress since they last went down and come back up, but that's the sort of quality, fight, support, and stadium atmosphere I personally want to see from newly promoted teams. Genuinely hope they stay up this year and work towards cementing their status as a PL mainstay. Early days but if they continue down this path I see no reason they can't become the next Bournemouth.
I don't think Sunderland will have a problem staying up this year. I think Wolves, Forest, West Ham, Burnley, Leeds, and Fulham will all be battling relegation
 
August 30th, 2nd matchday, Bremen vs Leverkusen, 3:3, Leverkusen sacks coach Ten Hag.

September 14th, 3rd matchday, Mönchengladbach vs Bremen, Bremen wins 4:0, Mönchengladbach sacks their coach Seoane.

This weekend, 10th matchday, Bremen vs Wolfsburg, Bremen scores a last minute 2:1 win, Wolfsburg sacks their coach Simonis.

I'm noticing a pattern here.
 
August 30th, 2nd matchday, Bremen vs Leverkusen, 3:3, Leverkusen sacks coach Ten Hag.

September 14th, 3rd matchday, Mönchengladbach vs Bremen, Bremen wins 4:0, Mönchengladbach sacks their coach Seoane.

This weekend, 10th matchday, Bremen vs Wolfsburg, Bremen scores a last minute 2:1 win, Wolfsburg sacks their coach Simonis.

I'm noticing a pattern here.
Everyone must think Bremen is a 3rd division squad
 
Flick must be looking for a fat payout from a sacking because there's no reason to be playing the suicidal football he has Barca playing lol
 
I'm working on a MLS write-up (the first round of the playoffs finish tonight in San Diego), but I thought a shout-out to Bayern would be appropriate.

After 16 consecutive wins in all competitions, they finally settled for a draw yesterday at ... Union Berlin. Union has been sitting in the middle of the table but has caused Bayern a lot of problems over the last few years. That said, they're still winless against Bayern. They struck first (after a questionable offside disallowed goal by VAR), then Luis Diaz scored a nigh impossible goal to draw level. Union struck back in the second half, after a careless loss of possession by Kane on their own side of the pitch. (Kane's been all over the field this year.) However, Kane made up for it and leveled at 90'+5.

Bayern have now secured the best start to a season in the top 5 in Europe (the old record was 13 wins across all competitions). Along the way they beat every top 5 team in the Bundesliga (Stuttgart though was in the Supercup), they knocked out Chelsea and most recently PSG in the Champions League. Oh, and they quietly extended Coach Vincent Kompany, their 8th or 9th pick for manager a year ago.

Some might wonder, what happened then, and where's FC Hollywood (in Bavaria)? Kompany's rotation tactics have been... odd, and maybe too reliant on player feedback. He put the B team in last weekend against Bayer Leverkusen, a team who had been streaking since they fired Ten Hag after week two. That came to a halt against Bayern's B team, who easily walked away with a win. So Bayern had fresh legs going into Paris against PSG. (Oh, and they beat PSG 2-1, down to 10 men for the whole second half.) But... then company didn't rotate almost at all against Union Berlin, and when he sub'd, it was well after 60 minutes. (Maybe there was a half-time sub for Lennart Karl, their 17 year old wunderkind- if not it was earlier.) But honestly, it the team just looked spent, and to many, it looked like Kompany hadn't adjusted properly.

That said, they secured one point, and thanks to draws and losses at the top of the table, Bayern's lead on the table moved up to 6 points over Leipzig (from 5).

As for FC Hollywood, I wonder how much of that mentality remains under Kompany. He has a very no-nonsense approach to the press, and the team seems to love him. There have been several videos floating around about what Kompany-ball is, at least in the Bayern context, and a lot of it seems to be aggressive man-marking and positioning- actually, almost positionless football. Kane's heat map this year is all over the place, and there are times you wish he was lingering around in the box just a bit more (for that rebound or missed cross). That said, the defensive showcase in the second half against PSG was a wonder, and while they let one goal slip, it was still a wonder to behold. Even the first half was great (less a tough Diaz red card).

But to the FC Hollywood? Most of the leaks in the press, seem to be coming from the supervisory board (or their agents). A lot of shade has been thrown at Max Eberl, the director of sport for the club; secondarily against various other parts of the club. My baseless speculation is this is coming from the old guard, who came in around COVID time because they thought the club was acting recklessly. Money was being spent unwisely, especially securing lengthy, costly contracts after the team won the treble in the covid season. But the more and more Uli Hoeneß speaks, the more clear it becomes he doesn't understand the game today. The classic examples from the off-season were Bayern's misses on two big German nationals in the transfer market - Florian Wirtz and Nick Woltemade. Now Wirtz has not exactly panned out as planned at Liverpool, but Woltemade is looking great at Newcastle. Wirtz was signed for an astronomical figure. While Woltemade's cost proved high (60 mil?), the upside of signing a 6'7" (1.9m) forward.... seems obvious. Instead, Bayern ended up settling for a one year loan for Nicholas Jackson at 16 mil, which has looked like money poorly spent. (The loan was at Uli Hoeneß's direction.)

How does that tie back to Hoeneß? Well he said they'd couldn't overspend for Woltemade, and the costs Stuttgart wanted for him were ridiculous. Clearly not for the Premier League. He also was personally involved in trying to sign Wirtz. That failed. Uli recently whined to the press about, if he was not needed, he'd just go away. Yet... he remains. (The other vocal member of the advisory board is another Bayern legend, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, still at times seems to enjoy the sound of his own voice in the press, but his public takes are not as self-aggrandizing.)

But this also ties to my MLS coverage (later this week). Last season, during the premier of Thomas Müller's documentary, Eberl said something to the effect of Thomas being welcomed at the club so long as he wanted to play / work. But before the new year rang, Uli was talking about moving on from Müller. There was speculation that Eberl saw the utility of having a Thomas on the team, even if he was not up to his previous standard, the leadership qualities would make him worthwhile as a super sub. The questions arose again after Jamal Musiala had a serious injury (against PSG) in the Club World Cup. The press speculated if Uli was worried Müller would eventually displace him. For his part, Müller took the move with grace (at least publicly), tamped down any talk of a late extension, and would eventually sign with the Vancouver Whitecaps of MLS. A team that has gone 9-4-1 since he joined the team.
 
No one outside of Canada gives a shit about the Canadian Premier League. Except for today where they decided it would be a good idea to host the finals in during a -2° snowstorm leading to quite possibly the most insane game of football since the Snow Casico in 2013.
 
Man I am trying my hardest to get into MLS but its so fucking tough to follow. And everything is done so weird imo. They have 2 different conferences with 15 teams and the schedule stretches from like February to December? Seriously, can they not just play 28 regular season games (everyone in your conference home and away), the open cup, the league cup, and then have 4 teams from each conference make the playoffs. Do a 2 legged playoffs until the final and then have the final be a one off match. Then you can have that stupid league cup where you play Mexican and other MLS teams in the tournament be teams from the other conference. Saves on travel cost, cuts down a bunch of the fluff, and lets you space out the summer better. I really don't need to see a best of 3 series between 16 of the 30 teams in MLS for a playoff
 
Everyone must think Bremen is a 3rd division squad

They still have to play against Augsburg who are 15th (2-1-7) at the moment. Their coach is Sandro Wagner, who was part of Nagelmann's coaching team for the national team, and created a lot of media buzz when taking over in Augsburg this summer after Augsburg sacked Jess Thorup who led Augsburg to their best positioning in Augsburg's Bundesliga history. 2nd matchday Augsburg lost 2:3 to FC Bayern and after the match Wagner made a bold statement that his squad is clearly on the level of the mighty Bayerns.

I'd say: Good luck, Sandro :story:
 
I'm sure FC Porto fans won't be angry about that
They still have 0 points and Mourinho is getting railed at home games against bottom tier table teams. Porto is doing good domestically but struggling in Europa and appears to be losing steam. Sporting CP is being a bit more stable but still behind Porto but doing consistent champions league. This season will be really fun for Portuguese league it seems
 
They still have 0 points and Mourinho is getting railed at home games against bottom tier table teams. Porto is doing good domestically but struggling in Europa and appears to be losing steam. Sporting CP is being a bit more stable but still behind Porto but doing consistent champions league. This season will be really fun for Portuguese league it seems
So I took a look at the league table. Porto are nearly unplayable at the moment, 31 out of a potential 33 points is insane. But Sporting being 3 points back and Benfica being 6 points back is interesting. I also recognize a few names in the table like Braga, Vitoria, Nacional, and Rio Ave but Gil Vicente and Famalicao pushing for european spots? Come again?
 
So I took a look at the league table. Porto are nearly unplayable at the moment, 31 out of a potential 33 points is insane. But Sporting being 3 points back and Benfica being 6 points back is interesting. I also recognize a few names in the table like Braga, Vitoria, Nacional, and Rio Ave but Gil Vicente and Famalicao pushing for european spots? Come again?
Gil Vicente has been up and going since last season. Their coach is really good at implementing the correct mindset, gave an hard time to all the big 3 last season. Famalicão has been putting up consistent matches for like 3 years now they have been peaking europe for a bit but they always choke it, one of the best academies excluding the big 3. Rio Ave is owned by that Greek forest idiot and he has destroyed the soul of that club. Sporting lost to Porto at home on the 3rd match this season then drew against a 2 decker bus Mourinho benfica at home. While Sporting conceded a 97 min penalty against Braga at home. If Porto for some reason keeps the steam as well as Sporting it will probably get down to the match at Porto’s home. But looking at Porto in Europe and their last matches (like the 32% possession at home vs Braga), they don’t seem as healthy as the start of the season. Sporting is getting consistent with like a 2.5 xG per game and has a better bench. Sporting just lost one of their strikers and Pote (the LW that’s been one of the backbones for the last 5 years) due to injury 6 weeks out and will probably miss the Lisbon Derby. It looks like it will be a open league for the rest of the season. Braga will bounce back to 4th I’d guess, their new coach used to be with Pep and they are implementing that possession football. Better at big games right now.
 
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