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*Official* English Football Season 2010-11
- Thread starter GIMH
- Start date
duffer
Cricket Web: All-Time Legend
Chamakh and Nasri are carrying this team right now. We'd be screwed without them. Jack is a big addition though.
edit: Not sure how it was only two at half time. Counted at least 6 or 7 good chances. Really big chance to get our gd up like United did.
edit: Not sure how it was only two at half time. Counted at least 6 or 7 good chances. Really big chance to get our gd up like United did.
Last edited:
sledger
Spanish_Vicente
Gave enough of a rat's ass to post about it, however.
Uppercut
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vcs
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at Mourinho, Ronaldo and Real Madrid.Sadly, only serves to illustrate further what a joke La Liga is in terms of competitiveness. It's a travesty that a collection of talented individuals (Real Madrid) can flat-track bully their way to 90+ points in a top league purely because the disparity in resources is too much for the lesser sides to make up.
Ausage
Cricketer Of The Year
It's hardly a problem confined to La Liga though. Does anyone think the EPL will be won by anyone other than Man U, Chelski or possibly the Arse this year? There have been only 3 winners of the EPL in 16 years. Happens in Italy and Germany to a lesser degree too.
Sadly, only serves to illustrate further what a joke La Liga is in terms of competitiveness. It's a travesty that a collection of talented individuals (Real Madrid) can flat-track bully their way to 90+ points in a top league purely because the disparity in resources is too much for the lesser sides to make up.
vcs
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It's not about how many teams are in with a realistic chance of winning it. In every league, the top 2-3 richest teams are always going to be the only ones in contention to win. It's about whether the rest of the teams have a remote chance of toppling the big boys on their off-days, or if they suffer a couple of injuries. It doesn't seem to be the case in La Liga. Watch Real Madrid string together 10-15 more wins starting next week.
It's a shame, because, they will be shown up by the first decent team they face in the Champions League knockouts, and they could lose home and away to Barcelona in the league, and still end up winning the league, because they have fewer injuries, or Barcelona have a couple more off-days, loaded schedule etc. They came close to winning the league last year purely by flat-track bullying. They were in contention up to the last day.
Only a few years back Villarreal, Atletico, Valencia, Sevilla etc. used to be capable of causing upsets against Real Madrid and Barcelona but now it's pretty much a case of the top 2 and 18 minnows. It's caused by the terrible imbalance in resources. Barcelona atleast, are a genuine all-time great team and mostly composed of their own youth products, and have a well-defined style of play. Real have none of the above, they are merely a collection of very talented and expensive individuals.
sledger
Spanish_Vicente
Money makes the world go around unfortunately. The financial imbalance is not specific to the Spanish league, neither is it specific to football. In any business anywhere in the world, industries and markets are dominated by those companies with the largest resources. Companies that rise to the top inevitably earn their position there. Real Madrid for example are as much of a global brand as addidas or nike or whatever, Sevilla and so on are not. I'm not saying that this is either right or wrong, but this is the way it is. I'm not entirely disagreeing with you, but I'm not sure what the fascination with smaller teams being able to topple the big teams on their off days is, if you want to watch a league when every team beats each other than watch the Championship, not something I would particularly enjoy myself. Unless you're suggesting that Barcelona and Real ought to be penalised somehow for having the two best squads in Spain by quite some distance, I'm not really sure what your gripe is. Though the imbalance in the quality of teams in La Liga is stark, and I would argue a unique case, I would rather watch a league with a few sides which possess really quality rather than one were the supposed dominant force in the division goes and plays away at a load of dross sides and routinely get rolled over.
vcs
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Well, that's your preference, and I cannot argue with that really. I just find it a farce that a team that is markedly inferior to Barcelona could win that league if only a few chips fall their way. Wouldn't happen in a league where the resources were slightly more evenly distributed, like the English League.
Take this hypothetical situation : Barcelona make the Champions League final overcoming a set of tough opponents in Chelsea, Inter Milan and Man. Utd. Real Madrid get knocked out in the last 16, take advantage of a nice free schedule, put together a great late-season run against teams that have already given up the ghost before they go out to face them, and overhaul the 6-point or so advantage that Barcelona have created over them in head-to-head fixtures. Nearly happened last season. You might call that fair enough, I call it nearly flat-track bullying your way to a league title, and a terrible state of affairs.
Take this hypothetical situation : Barcelona make the Champions League final overcoming a set of tough opponents in Chelsea, Inter Milan and Man. Utd. Real Madrid get knocked out in the last 16, take advantage of a nice free schedule, put together a great late-season run against teams that have already given up the ghost before they go out to face them, and overhaul the 6-point or so advantage that Barcelona have created over them in head-to-head fixtures. Nearly happened last season. You might call that fair enough, I call it nearly flat-track bullying your way to a league title, and a terrible state of affairs.
Ausage
Cricketer Of The Year
Madrid is just the natural extension of the process that exists in all the European leagues though. How is it worse than a select few teams to dominating in the EPL just because there's the odd chance of one of them getting knocked off by a minnow once in a while, or because there is a more competetive second tier of teams in EPL. It's still the same process affecting a league in a different context.
I don't like it either, but all major football leagues in Europe suffer from a similar problem, it's just more pronounced in Spain.