OT: soccer thread

[fatlever]

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/s ... itter_feed

congrats det

[Det the Threat]

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/soccer/05/25/bundesliga.wed.ap/index.html?eref=twitter_feed

congrats det

Thanks.

I'm now feeling at least 20 years older then before.

BTW:

Before


After

[SWedd523]

The President of FIFA is now being investigated on charges of corruption.





NOW we see how Qatar won!

[fatlever]

no doubt that selection committee was getting bribes. the evidence is mounting. fifa's rep as corrupt seems well deserved.

[Det the Threat]

The President of FIFA is now being investigated on charges of corruption.





NOW we see how Qatar won!

Once Russia and Quatar won those world cup bids for 2018 and 2022 everyone assumed that money had a big say so in it.

Especially Quatar, who'll just build those stadiums, host the world cup and tear them down afterwards, which is the plan, as far as I know.

BTW: Some news on Michael Bradley.
Every report over here in Germany says that Aston Villa wants him(despite hardly playing him at all) and that they only want to negotiate a lower figure(something over 4 mil euros currently) as a transfer fee with Moenchengladbach.

[fatlever]

hopefully if bradley can get back with villa and go through preseason he can start to get more minutes. thats a deep experience midfield so its not surprising they didnt give him many minutes that late in the season.

prediction for today's match? i have a hunch man u is going to give barca a good game. i am going to predict 2-1 man u for the win.

[fatlever]

prediction for today's match? i have a hunch man u is going to give barca a good game. i am going to predict 2-1 man u for the win.

um.... forget what i said.

that was a total beatdown.

[SWedd523]

Good day too be a Barca fan

[Marvel]

The game of soccer living up to it's rep @12:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=svqBvLrOkSU[/youtube]

[fatlever]

thats a great find marvel. i just have to shake my head at some of the stuff that the floppers will try.

[Det the Threat]

Some more news from Germany.

Manuel Neuer will be leaving Schalke for Bayern Munich and sign a five year contract with the bavarian side.
http://www.kicker.de/news/fussball/bund ... neuer.html

Bayern will pay more then 20 mil euros(depends on how they'll do) to Schalke for the keeper who had one year remaining on his deal.

Neuer's replacement at Schalke will be Ralf Faehrmann, who had been relegated with Eintracht Frankfurt, but played for Schalke between 2003 - 2009.

Ruud van Nistelrooy still keeps playing and he'll join FC Malaga of Spain, after not signing a new contract in Hamburg.
http://www.kicker.de/news/fussball/intl ... l-sol.html

[doc.end]

If you stumble on any info where Morávek will paly next season, post it here please. i surely hope it won't be Schalke, I don't like how they managed him.

[Det the Threat]

If you stumble on any info where Morávek will paly next season, post it here please. i surely hope it won't be Schalke, I don't like how they managed him.

I searched for it and that's what I can tell you right now.

It's still up in the air, but it looks almost certain that he won't play for Schalke this upcoming season.

He had been in talks with Hannover, but turned them down in the last minute, because he somehow wasn't convinced to go there.

So currently it looks like he'll be playing another season for Kaiserslautern, either on loan from Schalke or, if they're able to make a deal, on a permanent move.

[doc.end]

I thought Lautern doesn't have them money, so most probably loan. Thanks, Det. Good news , I guess.

[fatlever]

i saw some of my chelsea boys are heading to hamburg next year.

now just watching the newswires everyday waiting for the news of neymar signing with chelsea. we so desperately need a winger with pace and dribbling skills. someone to compliment torres and provide him some service since none of our midfielders seem capable of making those passes any longer.

[Thaliontil]

Good luck on this night´s match against us guys ^^!I´ll try to watch it,hence it would be difficult because of exams :s

It has been a long time since i visited this topic.Fat,I see you are a Chelsea supporter,what do you think about Torres?For me the biggest lie of Spanish soccer.I wish him the best in Chelsea (I´m a fan of Liverpool but I always enjoy the Spanish players to make great performances,case of Raúl).But he has been horrible since he arrived to London,do you think he would be better with Cesc or a good creator behind him? I heared that Abramovich would sell Lampard,Terry,Drogba and Anelka to hire Cesc,Neymar and Lukaku...

And if we have any Frecnh in the forum I´d like to have their opinion of Gameiro and Rami,acquistions of Valencia for next season.

Good luck today then

[fatlever]

hey thali, good to hear from you again. its been a while.

try not to beat us too bad today. i know your boys would much rather be on vacation somewhere in europe rather than playing a friendly in the US, so maybe if you only play 50% inspired we will actually have a chance to touch the ball once every 5 minutes.

as for torres... i was not really in favor of him coming to chelsea, at least not at the price we paid for him. i thought we had much greater needs, such as a true winger and a creative attacking midfielder. however, abramovich has apparently been trying like crazy to get torres for many years and was obsessed with getting him. as the season went on i was really rooting for him to play well. it was kinda sad to see him have such a scoring drought. he handled himself with class even when he was not starting and not scoring. i respect him for that. in the long term i think it could be a good move, but we will have to change our formation and style to build around him.

for so long we have been a team built around drogba as the lone striker in the middle and a strong fast defensive minded midfield with lampard and essien. we havent had a true winger or a true playmaker in the middle for many years. and last year our lack of both is what killed us, imo. essien and lampard were terrible all year and were routinely outplayed by mikel and ramires. yet, being who they were, both lampard and essien pretty much started and played whenever they were fit. neither were able to provide any service to our forwards all season. malouda and anelka were just terrible. both played too slow and slowed down the attack. neither is a true winger and it showed.

torres is one of those strikers that needs service and needs space to run and get behind the defense. he needs more creative players around and needs faster players around him, wouldnt you agree?

it will be interesting to see what happens this summer. neymar is #1 on my wish list. we desperately need a fast, creative, attacking winger like that, who can also play as a second striker in a 4-4-2. cesc or modric or someone like that would also be a fantastic addition. someone to play in the hole behind the strikers, even if that means, lampard or essien don't play every week. lukaku is someone we have been rumored with for 2 years now. he seems to really want to come to chelsea and become the next drogba. but im not sure how he fits with torres.

i dont think drogba, terry or lampard will be sold this summer. there is talk of drogba getting an extension to retire with chelsea and frank and terry and definitely going to retire with the club. as for anelka, i will be shocked if he isnt sold this summer. he needs to go. i would also probably look to sell malouda, bosingwa (i think he is out of contract) and maybe essien of someone came with a monster offer.

i guess first we have to find a manager... hopefully guus is on his way soon.

[SWedd523]

Why do you guys think we haven't seen the US rise to a level of dominantion, or at least consistent contention, on the world soccer level? What is it that's holding us back and keeping us behind nations like Norway, Japan, Slovenia, and those dirty Australians?

Not sure if it's as simple as "American's don't care about soccer." because the Women's team is currently ranked first in the world. I watched their game against Mexico the other day, and (aside from Heather Mitts and Alex Morgan being extremely hot) their technicality is on a higher level than the men's team. The only bad thing I saw was that they flock to the ball to much, but when they get the ball they move it around with crispness and the majority of the offensive players have a fantastic first touch and vision when passing around to each other while the men seem to go out and expect athleticism to overcome their lack of skill/finesse.

The Men's team will never be able to make that next step until they get a couple of guys that are able to handle the ball with precision and move it around with skill.

[fatlever]

thats the million dollar question swedd

1. is it simply that our best male athletes are usually playing basketball, baseball and football? i guess this could be part of the reason. imagine d.wade growing up in brazil or l.tomlinson growing up in spain. would they have been pushed into soccer rather than bball or football? maybe with women there is no football to take away from the soccer talent pool.

2. does it have more to do with the youth programs? in europe if you are viewed as a talented soccer player at a youngster you are most likely sent to a soccer academy for one of the many club teams. you get top level coaching and most likely are playing at some professional/semi professional level by the time you are 16. i am not sure how youth soccer has changed since i played in the mid/late 80s but back then the good youth players were put on select team, usually be birth, so i played in the select '73 team (i guess now they do u-17, u-15 etc...) but we had to pay to play and some of that can get expensive if your team is traveling to several out of area tournaments each year. i cant imagine messi's parents had to pay for him to play.

3. is it our soccer culture here that has seemingly placed more emphasis on stamina and physicality over the technical aspects of the game like passing, ball control, first touch etc? our national team has always been in great condition and physically tough but with poor technical skills.

4. or maybe its the coaching that keeps pushing for conditioning over technical ability. kids who are pure playmakers and technically gifted, but maybe smaller seemed to get pushed aside for those who are bigger faster and stronger. example: guys like torres get passed by guys like rico clark in the national team depth pool.

5. at the national team level i just think keeping bob bradley around for a 2nd world cup was a bad idea. this team was dying for some new, fresh ideas. we need a coach who has had experience in europe to coach this team, but one who also can related to the us training and mls. does that guy exist? bradley is the epitome of a coach who shies away from smaller technical players in favor of the run-all-day types. but if we dont emphasize technical skills at a youth level how can we ever expect it to be emphasized at a national level.

it is shocking that out of a player pool as large as ours we cant find 25 players who can compete consistently on a higher level. hell, about half our team is now players who we poached from other nations or who had parents who were from soccer countries: chandler, jermaine jones, torres, feilhaber, adu, altidore, aguedelo, holden, diskerud, gooch, kljestan, yelldell, gomez etc... (i may be off a little on my research, but you get the point)

swedd, you played a lot of youth soccer growning up. what were your experiences like?

where is E4 btw?

as for the spain game, we had no business scheduling that game 3 days prior to the start of the tourny, compounded by the decision to play bradley, dempsey and dolo in the 2nd half rather than the 1st half. gooch looked awful and i think he is done. rogers and sasha dont belong on the team. and i really wish holden wasnt hurt and timmy chanlder was playing. i think those two would make a huge difference. holden was awesome in bolton this year. oh, and i am sick of jozy. he is lazy and never presses hard when we are chasing the ball. why does he keep getting starts? move dempsey up top and pair him with aguedelo. sit jozy on the bench.

[/rant]

[Det the Threat]

From the outside looking in...

I think you partially hit the nail on the head.

Of course you first need to have the awareness of kids that soccer is a sport to play and that there's a chance you can make a living out of it or become "famous".

That's pretty hard for you guys, because "american sports" are baseball, football and basketball, while soccer's pretty much still random(as far as I know) and requires guys to go overseas, if the really want to have a great career and play with the best.

That, for example, is a big reason why Basketball is still fighting for recognition in Germany, cause the German League isn't all that good and games of the best players are played overseas and during the night.

Another thing is your league. I've heard it's getting better, but it's still not all that great and simply can't compete with the big leagues, which makes it harder to follow and more difficult to attract kids.

There's also the system, which is based around schools and not clubs, as far as I know.
It sure is nice that you can play at your school etc. but being in a club is probably more competitive(as there are guys from all over the town and not just from your school) and scouts are probably more likely to see you, as there aren't that many clubs to visit.
I also don't know how the draft is handled and if there are only guys drafted into the MLS after they attended college, or even after high school.

In German clubs, as you've partly mentioned, most skilled youngsters will start playing or at least training with the first teams squad when they're 18 or even earlier, which makes it more competitive for them and challenges them even more.


Though, all things said, there's only one way to get better and that's the same way us German's choose back in 2000, when we couldn't get out of the first round of the european championships.
Back then we decided to transform our youth and scouting systems to generate way more talent and thanks to that every 1st and 2nd Bundesliga club needs to have a youth academy, to get their license for their respective league.
Because of that we're now at a point where there are many talented youngsters from Germany that most of europe would love to have on their team and that teams like Real, Barca, Arsenal, ManU, Chelsea, Milan etc. are very interested in buying.

Therefore, you guys need to spend even more on youth academies, commercials etc. to push soccer, the MLS in general etc. to show youngsters that it's worth playing this sport.