No soccer fans here, eh.

I think Barca will be too strong for City ....... my prediction would be 2-0 with obviously Messi scoring and possibly someone like Dani Alves.
City will be lucky if they finish the game with all 11 players

:)))

Tiki-taka is not soccer. As usual, I couldn't stand watching it for more than 15 minutes. That it was 4 am is irrelevant. Today it will be the same but at least I will be watching football so I will stay awake.

Park the bus isn't soccer either, though.

I think you'll that parking the bus and tiki-taka are both soccer.

Park the bus is an evolution of everyone's favorite most exciting soccer tactic, catenaccio. As such, it should be admired and worshipped as Godly.

Man U v. Olympiakos. I don't like the Kokkinoi but I dislike Man U more.

Wait until Swindon Town are in the Champions league then you'll see some quality football being played. We won't have bought our way there either, on no, just good honest hard graft and a reliance on home grown talent as will be born out by us supplying at least 20 players in each England squad from the under 11's right up to the seniors. Oh yes i can see it now, first we storm the Premier league then it'll be Europe we lay to waste, no one will be safe, NO ONE I SAY. MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAH...

Nice goal from Maniatis.

Excuse me, Dominguez.

Man U were dreadful. I feel sorry for Vidic. He's the only one who came to play. Glad he'll leave that outfit by the summer.

Also, how hilarious is it that Campbell is on loan from Arsenal? Ha.

I don't know what's more surprising... The extent of Man-U's fall from grace or that webdip is home to half the members of Swindon Town's supporters club. I wonder what pass time the other one enjoys?

I don't know. For whatever reason Swindon Town is exactly the type of club that I'd expect diplomacy hobbyists to support.

You may mock Octavious, but Swindon actually has the 8th highest average attendance in League one this season, that's right I said EIGHTH, not 10th or even 9th, but a big fat number 8. Hell yeah, so stick that in your pipe and smoke it...

Real Madrid looking to romp the Germans. Gareth Bale looks dominant. Torres has Chelsea up.

First leg over, EPL really put in a bad showing, aside from Chelsea who should have gotten another goal vs Galatasaray in the the opening half with that strange formation. Only one goal from all four sides. Real Madrid look completely dominant. They need to shore up the defense but it doesn't really matter when you're scoring at will. That game could have been 10-1.

The Premier League should forget about Europe, our football is too different now along with the refereeing. We should reform the league into American style conferences, call it the World Premier league with the winners crowned world champions. Withdraw from European football completely and play some games all over the world like the NFL.

EPL was not great in ECL games. Granted, Arsenal and City had huge teams to overcome but Chelsea wasn't that good and United was frightful. Bayern, Barca and Real Madrid look scary strong.

The English game is just too physical for Europe, we can't play our natural way as a tackle which wouldn't get a second glance in the Premier league gets you sent off in Europe, we have to play in a straightjacket all the time.

Plus as our league is so competitive compared to all the others, our teams are always knackered by the time the knockout stages start. There are no easy games here, the top team can lose to the bottom one, every game is intense, unlike in say Spain.

You're being serious, aren't you Baldy? I genuinely thought you were talking bollocks for the fun of it.

The English teams have done badly because they're not good enough. Chelsea haven't got enough up front, Man-U are poor everywhere but up front, and City and the Arses had the misfortune to be up against extremely strong teams without luck on their side. The difference in refereeing is far smaller than made out.

The 'competitive' nature of the EPL is more due to its mediocrity. The top teams are just not that good. Despite the fact that everybody says La Liga is just Barca and Real Madrid, all three of their teams won in the UCL legs, and they got 3 more teams in the Round of 16 in the Europa League.

And if the EPL was too physical for European teams, then you wouldn't see Arsenal at the top of the table.

Arsenal are only near the top by regaining some of their physical nature they last won trophies with, and let's be honest foreign referees will always be biased against the English, always have been, not to mention the corruption going back to the 70's.

I'm of course being deadly serious about pulling out of European football altogether, it's our game after all, The FA should charge FIFA a yearly license fee of say £500m for allowing other countries to play.

Foreigners don't like it up 'em, well tough, we'll play OUR sport how we like it, stuff the lot of them.

There are two nationalities on this earth, the English and everyone else.

That's fine. If the FA does that the international players who comprise the bulk of the talent in the EPL will simply leave, and then what are you left with? The fact is the EPL isn't even really an English league to begin with, itself being a victim of the corporatization of soccer which the EPL introduced to the world. England has completely gutted its domestic talent pool.

I'd say FIFA should call your bluff.

As for referee bias, you might want to ask the Germans about '66. The only glory England has ever gotten in the sport is due to sketchy refereeing.

Czech club football finally back in the top 15 in Europe! I missed those 2 precious spots in Champions League qualification. Of course the addition of one more team that will lose all the matches on the European stage and therefore tank the coefficient back is the unavoidable result in few years. The system of dividing country performance by number of its teams is really quite ingenuine in this regard, there is little room for stagnation around the important thresholds.

Arsenal - 5 English players
Liverpool - 11 English players
Man City - 6 English players
Chelsea - 5 English players
Man U - 10 English players

Good luck.

Why would foreign players leave? We are among the best wage payers in the world, footballers only think with their wallets, and going it alone would make us even richer.

8 English teams in the last 9 Champions League finals. Not every team can be great every year -- such is the nature of building and rebuilding teams. The English national pastime is bashing their national football, but the fact remains that the EPL is massively richer than any other league in the world, and as such will continue to be at the top of the European game. People get worked up with patriotism, but this is almost always overblown. Don't be surprised to see an all-English final/semi-final again in a few years.
This year, Chelsea will go through, Arsenal and City will go out to the two best teams in the world (two of the few who can compete financially), and Utd. may still go through, though this year is very much flukish for them and shouldn't be weighed too heavily.

Absolutely jmeyersd, if the Premier league went on it's own we could reserect the 39th game proposal by playing some games all other the world to the highest bidder.Other federations wouldn't like it of course but the courts would back us in any legal fight.

"Why would foreign players leave?"

Because they want to play against the best in the world, not Stoke City and Birmingham.

"We are among the best wage payers in the world, footballers only think with their wallets"

They also want to win championships, and Spain and Germany and even France can pay generously also.

"8 English teams in the last 9 Champions League finals"

4 champions since the EPL was formed. A number which is inferior to both Spain and Italy.

"This year, Chelsea will go through"

You're that confident? Galatasaray outclassed them the bulk of the game, as soon as they changed their formation.

By making the Premier league the World Premier league, it would be the only championship worth having, our wages would rise even higher than they are now.

All the best basketball players in the world play in the NBA because of it's prestige and wages, we would attract only the best for the same reasons.

The reorganization into conferences would mean only our best supported teams being admitted, so no Stoke or Birmingham. It would be on a regional basis, so keeping interest always high.

""8 English teams in the last 9 Champions League finals"

4 champions since the EPL was formed. A number which is inferior to both Spain and Italy."

The trend is definitely upward. Finance dictates who can compete at that level. (England has gotten progressively richer compared to the other leagues since the EPL began -- witness Italy.) For argument's sake, lets say there are 10-12 clubs in Europe with the resources to challenge for CL, barring flukes like Porto, etc. I'd say 6 or so are English. (City, Arsenal, Chelsea, Utd., Liverpool, Spurs). Who actually wins is determined by who finds the most anomalous players, i.e. freaks of nature, e.g. Messi, Ronaldo. Nobody can perpetually sustain a team at its absolute peak (to wit, the current Barca crop will be done within the next 3-4 years). Ergo, since the German/French/Spanish leagues all rely on 1-2 teams to represent, when those teams need to rebuild, those leagues have next to no chance of competing in Europe. Meanwhile, when one of the English teams is in transition, chances are that another one or two will be in a position of strength. I'm not saying an English team will win it every year. I'm just saying one or two will be around the final most years, which is not the case in any other league.

Yes, I think Chelsea will go through, though obviously it's not a sure thing. Mourinho's teams are the ultimate pragmatists and I think if you'd offered them 1-1 before the first leg they'd have taken it and fancied their chances at the Bridge.

Nobody is going to play in your sandbox. Players currently playing and dominating in La Liga just as easily played and dominated the EPL. The notion that these players couldn't compete because the EPL is 'too physical' is fantasy. If the EPL withdrew from FIFA it would shrivel and die. The NBA was the only game in town for decades before international club basketball picked up. That's why it's still the most prestigious league, although honestly it's losing its luster. People have noticed how the drafts are becoming bereft of talent, and the NBA in general has been lacking in talent in recent years. I wouldn't be surprised if European basketball starts to compete with the NBA for the biggest names soon.

"Ergo, since the German/French/Spanish leagues all rely on 1-2 teams to represent, when those teams need to rebuild, those leagues have next to no chance of competing in Europe"

Except Germany has four teams in the UCL final 16, Spain has three, and all of Spain's teams won their first leg while two out of Germany's four did. Meanwhile Spain also has three teams in the Europa league final 16, England has one. England has won exactly one Europa league title in the past decade, that being last year. Sevilla, Valencia, and Atletico Madrid have each won at least one Europa league title in the past year. And this is from a league that supposedly has no depth compared to the EPL.

The EPL's wealth will keep it relevant, but Spain and Germany are currently racing past them in talent and prestige.

*past decade, not past year

Also, another reason why Spain will dominate the EPL for the foreseeable future is that their clubs invest in domestic talent and youth programs. England does not. I mean you have one La Liga outfit, Bilbao, which is comprised entirely of Basque players and is currently fourth on the table. The Spanish league is played by Spanish players, while England has to rely on foreign talent.

English teams have never taken the Europa league seriously, it just gets in the way and can seriously bugger up their league campaign with the extra matches and timing, staying in the Premier league is just far more valuable financially than winning that tin pot trophy.

And that's what it all boils down to, cash...We have odles of it fairly evenly spread out, finishing bottom still makes getting promoted from the championship worthwhile, which makes the leagues below tough and competitive as well as everyone wants to get there. Having no promotion and relegation in the Premier league would still leave a very strong tier of football below it.

Well for starters Shalke and Leverkusen aren't exactly lighting it up :). But yes, Munich/Barca/Madrid/PSG(?) happen to be better than the English clubs this year. No one is disputing that. My point is that these things are cyclical; on average, the English teams will be more competitive simply because they have a better chance of having at least one at the peak of their cycle in any given year.
The Europa League is great for smaller clubs to have a chance at European glory, but it is a hindrance for bigger clubs. We are at the point where teams like Liverpool or Spurs actively don't want to be in it because it decreases their chances of qualifying for the Champions League. I think the fact that England sent Swansea tells you all you need to know about how indicative it is of a league's competitiveness. In no world is Swansea the 6th best team in England (yet still they outplayed Napoli...)
In 2008 nobody thought the EPL was doomed to be surpassed by La Liga. Just as that generation is being phased out now, so will Barca's dream team come to an end in the near future. When that happens, do you still think they will be substantially better than Man City?

Also, article I saw this morning as point of interest:
http://www.evanvanness.com/post/77824294753/social-inequality-as-seen-through-soccer

@Putin
Also, your point about home-grown talent is valid, but why do you conclude that this will make the Spanish league stronger? Often these players up and out from domestic Spanish clubs to chase higher wages in England (see: Swansea). I believe "Soccernomics" had a chapter on this, in which it compared promoting domestic players to ISI (fairly, imho). The conclusion was that it actually had an adverse effect on league quality.

You might have a point about how English clubs view the Europa league, but then what do you have to base the claim that the EPL is a more competitive league? We just have to take their word for it?

"My point is that these things are cyclical; on average, the English teams will be more competitive simply because they have a better chance of having at least one at the peak of their cycle in any given year."

My point is simply that the other leagues have more clubs capable of beating the top teams in Europe than the EPLers claim, which is evident by the number of Spanish and German teams that keep advancing into the later stages of the UCL.

"Just as that generation is being phased out now, so will Barca's dream team come to an end in the near future. When that happens, do you still think they will be substantially better than Man City?"

Well Barca's current run of dominance has resulted in 3 UCL titles and they've been able to keep legends like Messi and Xavi on their roster for a decade now. The top Spanish clubs are able to get the best players in the world and keep them, whereas the top EPL players all seem to roam from one club to another. Furthermore the other advantage of the cantera systems is that you can have teams like Bilbao which are successful while being debt free. Whereas fine EPL clubs can do well for a while but they're going to have to eventually sell off their players. It's not a recipe for long-term success.

Also news like this leads me to believe that the EPL is going to have a harder time poaching off La Liga.

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/la-liga-stop-arsenal-liverpool-repeating-cesc-fabregas-cases-report-1438359

But the fact remains that a team like Atletico Madrid will never get a sniff of an ECL trophy because to do so they would have to get past Barca and Real, which they will never have the resources to do consistently. There is too much disparity there. The only way a team of that caliber -- an Atletico, Dortmund, or Sevilla, say -- can compete is when they manage to assemble some hidden gems under the radar and get a great manager in. That was Dortmund last year, and maybe Atletico this year. The problem is that they simply do not have the resources to sustain that team; once they reach a certain height, the players and managers get poached (Lewandoski, Goetze --> Munich), which puts them back to square one. These teams should be applauded for what they achieve, but there is a limit to the number of hidden gems you can bring in on the cheap, so decline is inevitable (look at what's happened to Sevilla or Villarreal since the mid-2000s).
This is why the EPL should be stronger than La Liga. The 6th or 7th placed teams can typically poach the best players from any Spanish team except Barca or Real (Soldado, someone like Costa may well end up at Spurs this summer). You are right that "other leagues have more clubs capable of beating the top teams in Europe" this year, but those teams come and go very quickly.
"which is evident by the number of Spanish and German teams that keep advancing into the later stages of the UCL."
The fact that in the last 9 seasons, there have been 14 English semifinalists compared to 11 Spanish, 5 German, and 4 Italian suggests to me that the EPL actually has a better record in that regard. Moreover, there have been 4 different English finalists over that period, compared to two Germans, two Italians and ONE Spanish. This goes to what I'm trying to say about how the chances of an English team being around the top, given the vicissitudes of footballing fortune, are substantially better than those of any other country. Talent accumulates in England, and this is borne out by the results in Europe.

I could not agree more that what Barcelona has achieved is unparalleled in the history of soccer. But in some ways I think this supports my argument. Barca is one of the few teams who can compete financially with English clubs, and they have amassed some of the best talent ever in the last decade. However, the fact that they are the only team Spain has managed to send to the ECL final in well over a decade means that the rest of the league (bar Madrid) simply cannot compete at that level. This Barca side cannot go on forever. Xavi is on his last legs; one day Iniesta and Messi will have to retire. There will be no one to step up until they can rebuild, which will take a few years. The Barca of 2008-2014 was unique and won't be replicated. They have carried La Liga but cannot do so indefinitely.

I totally agree that debt-free youth development would be ideal, but I'm not sure that Spanish clubs are better off financially. For starters, raw debt statistics are probably misleading because they are massively skewed by the likes of Chelsea and Man City, who show loads of debt, but whose debt is really owned by their sugar-daddy's. In general, the EPL generates more than one billion euros more in revenue than the Bundesliga (in second), and those two league's are the only two whose clubs operate with a net profit. Revenue streams in the EPL make debt relatively sustainable. Meanwhile, wages alone absorb 77% of revenue for La Liga teams other than Madrid/Barca. http://www.deloitte.com/assets/Dcom-UnitedKingdom/Local%20Assets/Documents/Industries/Sports%20Business%20Group/deloitte-uk-sbg-arff-2013-highlights-download.pdf

Revenue sharing probably helps.

Anyway, changing the topic slightly, predictions for this year? I fancy Madrid myself.
Guardiola was wrong to choose Bayern -- this can only end in failure for him after their successes last year.

I wouldn't count out the Atleti this year. They're perfectly capable of winning the UCL and even La Liga. And Dortmund seems to be doing perfectly well after their incredible run last year. Second on the table and well positioned to advance to the final 8 in the UCL. We'll see how they do in the quarterfinals.

"The fact that in the last 9 seasons,"

That seems an arbitrary number. Last year the semifinals were two German and two Spanish clubs. No English club even made the quarterfinals. The year before it was two Spanish, one German, and one English. Only one English made the quarterfinals. The year before that no English teams made it to the semifinals. While the EPL may have dominated the semis before it doesn't seem to be the case the last few years.

"(look at what's happened to Sevilla or Villarreal since the mid-2000s"

What happened to Villareal? Villareal look like a very good young talented team. 5th on the table. They made it to the UCL quarterfinals a few years ago.

Anyway I agree Real Madrid look unstoppable, however their defense can be a bit shaky sometimes and I wonder if they play a more balanced opponent like Bayern what would happen. I still think Bayern is the team to beat just due to Real's inconsistency.

You're right that Bayern are the best on paper, but there's so much good fortune that goes into winning the ECL, and somehow I don't think they'll get it twice in a row. Real have their flaws, to be sure, but with that much firepower they'll always have a chance of steeling through. It will be fun to see. Hard to see past the Spanish giants and Munich, though maybe PSG could be a dark horse? I haven't seen them play this year, but reportedly they're quite good (though one wonders about the standard of opposition).

Weren't Villarreal relegated a couple years ago? I also seem to remember them being on the edge of insolvency a few times, though maybe I am confusing them with another club. Anyway, the moderate success of the current vintage is a far cry from the Riquelme-era team that made the ECL semis. That's my point: a team of limited resources can do well for a few seasons (when they do, no one loves to see them do well more than me -- the Dortmund-Real tie last year may well be the best games I've ever seen), but before too long it is dismantled, and when it is the fall can be huge.

9 seasons is arbitrary, you're right. But if you just look at the last two or three years the sample is too small to mean anything. If you go back much further you're talking about a different era. 10 years or so includes the high and low points of the major leagues.
In any case, I've been arguing that EPL clubs will tend to do better because even at the low points in their cycles they are more likely to have at least one club at the top due to their general financial advantage. Other leagues have to be at their peak to compete.
Utd., Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal were all peaking around 2008 -- that year none of them came close to losing to foreign opposition; German/Spanish teams were not remotely competitive. The last few years that generation has been on the way out: the era of Cole-Terry-Lampard-Essien-Drogba or Vidic-Ferdinand-Carrick-Evra-Rooney is over. Barca and Real have been at the peak of their cycles (now Munich). But even so, there has been an English team in 2 of the last 3 finals. Even at a low point, the EPL can still muster one challenger.
Before much longer, Barca will be at the point English teams are now. The era of Xavi-Iniesta-Puyol-Alves will end, just as the era of Ronaldinho-Deco-et al ended around '06. When that happens, the ECL will revert back to a 2008-type landscape, as the likes of Chelsea reach a new peak with players like Hazard, Ramires, Cahill, etc. I doubt La Liga will be able to mount a challenge while Barca is rebuilding in the same way Chelsea did in 2012.