The Football(Soccer) Thread

[Katphood]

I am back at watching football after this WC and I am going to cheer for Juventus, the Azzuris and our beloved Iranian national football team once again, haven't been watching football since 2010 and I sort of rediscovered how fun it is to watch a game of football.

 

Juventus has Ronaldo now and it will be interesting to see how they will perform at Serie A and Champions League.

 

The Azzuris have to redeem themselves for Euro 2020.

 

The Iranian national football team has to ready itself for the AFC Cup qualifying and I hope we get to become the champions of Asia this time around but Japan, South Korea and Austraila are strong opponents.

 

How is it looking with you fellas?

 

Edit: I discovered that I still have my France 98 vhs tapes. On them I have all of the Italy and Iran matches. Gotta find myself a good vhs player/converter and watch them again someday. That Italy vs Chile match was epic!

 

Good times...

Edited July 15, 2018 by Katphood

[Malcador]

Wondering where Wenger is going, myself. Seems odd to not have him heading Arsenal after all these years

[Humanoid]

It's great that the transfer window will close before the season starts proper. No more heel-dragging, gotta get business done in the next 3.5 weeks.

[Tigranes]

Wondering where Wenger is going, myself. Seems odd to not have him heading Arsenal after all these years

 

Some rumours of the Japanese team, that wouldn't be a bad place to go. One of the best teams to watch this WC.

 

As for me, it is as usual the Eternal Despair of Arsenal.

[HoonDing]

Wenger should replace that chicken**** Dechamps

[Malcador]

Wenger should replace that chicken**** Dechamps

He should have gone for the French NT after Blanc left. Heh, Deschamps should find Cantona and show him the trophy

 

 

Wondering where Wenger is going, myself. Seems odd to not have him heading Arsenal after all these years

 

Some rumours of the Japanese team, that wouldn't be a bad place to go. One of the best teams to watch this WC.

 

As for me, it is as usual the Eternal Despair of Arsenal.

 

Yep, that would be a good fit for him, I imagine some people may still view him favourably there and they played attractively (and the way they lost is Arsenal-esque )

Edited July 16, 2018 by Malcador

[Katphood]

The matches starting for Euro 2020 already in september? Consider me a happy man. Also, why the hell is the Euro Cup so confusing this time around?! League phase? Qualifying? Knockout stage?

 

Teh confusion!

 

Wenger should replace that chicken**** Dechamps

Nah, they should bring back Reymond Dominic.

[Tigranes]

Qualifiers, who watches the qualifiers?

 

With the International League business, soon we are going to have a million meaningless international games a year - and star players pushed until they get injured all the time, or more likely, turn to more drugs to help them out. Then after that they can qualify for a World Cup with a gazillion teams and a gazillion terrible games.

 

I don't know. Maybe the good outcome will be that NTs spend so much time with each other, the level of NT football goes up too?

[Katphood]

Yeah, something tells me that after the Qatar WC, football will die as we know it.

 

Why change things when they don't need changing?

[Guard Dog]

Which league is the best? https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/columnist/martin-rogers/2018/07/17/international-champions-cup-soccer-best-european-league/793933002/

 

Actually for my money it's the 2nd tier USL here in the US. Why? When the Tampa Bay Rowdies won the championship back in the '90s they had a keg party on the pitch. (OK it wasn't really the same kind of league back then) You gotta love that. Plus starting next season we are getting a team.

 

In all seriousness though hard to argue against the EPL. They get as much air time here as out own MLS. It is kind of cool seeing that in NBC on Saturday mornings. Plus it comes one before all our sports so it's kind of like a pre-game warm up.

[Malcador]

Find it funny to watch a salary cap in effect in US leagues as opposed to the near naked capitalism of the European leagues. Wonder if Americans will ever go for relegation as a concept.

[rjshae]

Still cheering for the Sounders, although they've been pathetic this year scoring-wise after Morris went down. (Dempsey just isn't the player he used to be.) Hopefully Raúl Ruidíaz, their new striker acquisition from Liga MX, will perk them up.

[rjshae]

Find it funny to watch a salary cap in effect in US leagues as opposed to the near naked capitalism of the European leagues. Wonder if Americans will ever go for relegation as a concept.

 

Salary Cap makes the MLS much more internally competitive, and teams that were down one year can be on top the next. That means you can't take any team (or game) for granted. This is unlike European football leagues where the big powers generally stay on top year after year. I doubt we'll see anything like relegation in the US until the MLS has finished expanding.

[Malcador]

Salary Cap makes the MLS much more internally competitive, and teams that were down one year can be on top the next. That means you can't take any team (or game) for granted. This is unlike European football leagues where the big powers generally stay on top year after year. I doubt we'll see anything like relegation in the US until the MLS has finished expanding.

Yes, but the humour comes when you see how people in those countries view such 'fairness' outside of sport. Maybe MLS can absorb NASL and the Canadian Premier ( ) League to help make lower divisions.

[Guard Dog]

Find it funny to watch a salary cap in effect in US leagues as opposed to the near naked capitalism of the European leagues. Wonder if Americans will ever go for relegation as a concept.

Ain't happening! Sorry New York Red Bulls in your new stadium and league leading attendance but you finished last so down to the USL you go. Congrats on winning the USL Cup Dayton Dutch Lions. You and your 3000 seat stadium that you share with a high school are going to the MLS! That would fly like a lead zeppelin.

[rjshae]

 

Salary Cap makes the MLS much more internally competitive, and teams that were down one year can be on top the next. That means you can't take any team (or game) for granted. This is unlike European football leagues where the big powers generally stay on top year after year. I doubt we'll see anything like relegation in the US until the MLS has finished expanding.

Yes, but the humour comes when you see how people in those countries view such 'fairness' outside of sport. Maybe MLS can absorb NASL and the Canadian Premier ( ) League to help make lower divisions.

 

Well the MLS is essentially a monopoly business and the salary cap is maintained in the US because it reduces overall costs to the franchise owners. It would never work in Europe because of the fractured nature of the sport.

[Malcador]

 

Find it funny to watch a salary cap in effect in US leagues as opposed to the near naked capitalism of the European leagues. Wonder if Americans will ever go for relegation as a concept.

Ain't happening! Sorry New York Red Bulls in your new stadium and league leading attendance but you finished last so down to the USL you go. Congrats on winning the USL Cup Dayton Dutch Lions. You and your 3000 seat stadium that you share with a high school are going to the MLS! That would fly like a lead zeppelin.

 

Why ? The big team screwed up and is punished and the plucky underdog managed to work their way to the top!

[rjshae]

^ TV ratings are all important in the US because of the geography. NY and LA have more people to view the games.

Edited July 18, 2018 by rjshae

[Zoraptor]

Find it funny to watch a salary cap in effect in US leagues as opposed to the near naked capitalism of the European leagues. Wonder if Americans will ever go for relegation as a concept.

 

The top Euro clubs in the top leagues could do with at least a bit more regulation. In theory they're meant to live within their means and not overspend via being owned by [billionaire] but in practice that's not enforced and most of the top clubs are unsustainable without cash injections or leveraged up to the eyeballs. Won't take much misfortune to make them insolvent.

 

 

 

Ain't happening! Sorry New York Red Bulls in your new stadium and league leading attendance but you finished last so down to the USL you go. Congrats on winning the USL Cup Dayton Dutch Lions. You and your 3000 seat stadium that you share with a high school are going to the MLS! That would fly like a lead zeppelin.

 

Why ? The big team screwed up and is punished and the plucky underdog managed to work their way to the top!

 

 

It's a different situation where football isn't so popular, and you also have to consider sponsorship and the like. You don't want to kill support somewhere like New York and you don't want sponsors not having access to that market; somewhere like the EPL though there's both committed fanatical fans of teams and almost always multiple teams for any large population centre as well. I'd use Australia as an example, if Perth got relegated a city of 2 million+ would have no team and the closest one would be thousands of km away in Adelaide, there are multiple other codes competing for attention (AFL and cricket especially) and it practically wouldn't be a national league any more. It's not like the EPL/ Championship where you could have a former European Cup winner like Notts Forest get promotion.

 

(yes, the whole thing runs counter to how 'free market competition' is meant to work, but that's hardly a surprise since that's pretty much never how it does work)

[Tigranes]

There's essentially zero meaningful oversight, yeah. A salary cap is years overdue and honestly the sport would be far, far better off with it.

[Malcador]

Wasn't being wholly serious, you need a loyal set of idiots, sorry, reliable market to exploit if you want to implement relegation.

 

But from talking to some football fans over the years I get the sense many just don't like the idea.

 

 

I'd imagine they need to do something about agent fees before wages.

Edited July 18, 2018 by Malcador

[rjshae]

Interesting factoids: FC Cincinnati in the USL (the US equivalent of the Championship League in the UK), has an average attendance this year of 25,000. That would put them 15th in Premier League attendance. The top team Atlanta is averaging 52,400, for 7th in the Premier League, and Seattle is 40,500 for 9th place. Total attendance for 23 US MLS teams is at 4.7 million, less than half way through the season. The Premier League attendance last season was 14.5 million for 20 teams. I'd say thus far Football is doing decently well in the US, and the academies are just getting started cranking out talent.

 

Ed.: Atlanta just set a new MLS attendance record vs. Seattle: 72,243. If that becomes normal, they'll be just shy of Man U.

Edited July 19, 2018 by rjshae

[Tigranes]

Agent fees is a cancer, but it has only grown instead of being controlled. If anything, we will see a future where clubs don't even own players, they just 'rent' them from their respective agencies, and every star player regularly changes clubs every 12 months - because hey, more transfers, more money, and more stupid media speculation and tabloid pages and terribly edited 'unveiling videos' and all the other useless crap to make money off.

 

That Atlanta stat is great - the US has the population to have a truly robust football league going, and a lot of work seems to be going on the last 10 years to make it happen. The national team's success will follow, for sure.

Edited July 19, 2018 by Tigranes

[Malcador]

Second greatest fear is the US winning the WC

[Guard Dog]

Second greatest fear is the US winning the WC

Why? Few here would even know it happened! 

 

Actually in all seriousness I'm glad we can finally kill this angst among fans of the sport here about why it is not popular in the US. It is. It's just not #1. Or #2. Or even #3. And it does not have to be. The MLS has done a great job becoming what all the other "big" pro soccer leagues here should have been: a league that recognized where it was when it started and grew from that. The others tried to be the NFL right off the bat and did not survive. 

 

Besides, European stars who were past their prime and forced out by younger and better players had to go somewhere. Why not here. 

 

 

Hmmmm I haven't played Football Manager in years. Might need to give the new version a look. 

Edited July 19, 2018 by Guard Dog