Semi final draw for Champions League

Bayern Munich v Barcelona
Borussia Dortmund v Real Madrid

Come on Dortmund

I can see Barca v Real Madrid for the final. Getting the 2nd leg at home is crucial for both.

Barca-Dortmund hopefully.

Can't back the group of chokejobs that is Bayern

GSC wrote:Barca-Dortmund hopefully.

Can't back the group of chokejobs that is Bayern

I was thinking this yesterday. Are the German national team and club sides becoming the nearly men of football.

Bayern probably had their best shot at the gold last year via Chelsea and as you say they chocked.

El classico final for me.

Bayern Vs Real.
Think Dortmund will dominate Madrid for long periods but be wasteful.
Bayern look stronger then Barca this season.

Aye. Difference between Barca and Bayern for me, is when the chips are down, Barca bring their A game. Bayern tend to shy away.

GSC wrote:Aye. Difference between Barca and Bayern for me, is when the chips are down, Barca bring their A game. Bayern tend to shy away.

Agree.

And the similarity is neither can break down a well organised unit when under pressure. Although Barca have the advantage as in the UCL final Cahill and David Luiz had one good hamstring between them!

Yeah Barca werent really at the races last season by their usual standards. partly why Pep left I think, knew he'd have to make some hard decisions on guys he loved to get barca back to that level.

Where do you guys rate this Barca side alongside the greatest of all time?

They are - by a country mile - the best team since the great Milan side of the late 80's and early 90's.

I dunno, really hard to place as they stand. Says a lot about them though that we can look back at winning just 2 CLs in 4 years as a disappointment.

You also have to factor in their influence on Spains dominance, in terms of both players and style.

One to place after they return to the pack.

I think this Barcelona team is the greatest side. Although I can't stand them. People never throw them into the buying trophies argument, they're never compared or mentioned in the same breath as Chelsea, City and Real.

MockingJay33 wrote:I think this Barcelona team is the greatest side. Although I can't stand them. People never throw them into the buying trophies argument, they're never compared or mentioned in the same breath as Chelsea, City and Real.

And rightly so.

Barcelona's defence is quite bad, difficult to class them as one of the greatest when their defence is that weak. I remember last year, any ball lumped in the general direction of Drogba caused havoc in their defence, likewise with Ibrahimovic on Tuesday.

I think criticising a defense for not coping with Drogba or Ibrahimovic is a tad harsh

Not to mention 2 of their top 3 CBs missed that game

Duty281 wrote:Barcelona's defence is quite bad, difficult to class them as one of the greatest when their defence is that weak. I remember last year, any ball lumped in the general direction of Drogba caused havoc in their defence, likewise with Ibrahimovic on Tuesday.

Name me 3 better club sides since the birth of the European Cup. You have the Real Madrid side of the 50's, the Ajax and Bayern sides of the 70's, the Liverpool side of the late 70's and early 80's and the Milan team of the late 80's and early 90's. These are the benchmarks surely?

I'd put them alongside the Ajax and Bayern sides of the 70's myself.

Arguably the greatest team ever assembled was the Brazil side of 1970. They weren't the best defensively. I remember the great AC Milan team getting criticism for being defence minded and too methodical.

Damned if you do and damned if you don't I suppose.

GSC wrote:I think criticising a defense for not coping with Drogba or Ibrahimovic is a tad harsh

Not to mention 2 of their top 3 CBs missed that game

It's fashionable to pick holes in Barca it seems. Even the Harlem Globetrotters struggled at times.

I think the Barca team were better a few years ago when they won the treble as every single player was arguably at their peak. Nowadays, they're still wonderful, but Puyol's nearing the end of his career, Xavi's not had a great season and they're looking rather beatable just now. If you rewind that to 2009, I don't think a single team could get anywhere near them when they played well.

For me, the 2009 team was the greatest ever.

The Special Juan wrote:I think the Barca team were better a few years ago when they won the treble as every single player was arguably at their peak. Nowadays, they're still wonderful, but Puyol's nearing the end of his career, Xavi's not had a great season and they're looking rather beatable just now. If you rewind that to 2009, I don't think a single team could get anywhere near them when they played well.

For me, the 2009 team was the greatest ever.

Yeah, I'd agree with this, if not the 2009 side then the 2011 one. Xavi is definitely waning towards the end of his career and can't control games like he used to. They've become overly reliant on Messi, but to be fair, if you are going to be reliant on one player then Messi is the best one to be reliant on.

Yeah the 2009 - 2011 side was a beast, agreed.

It's staggering that United were favourites going into that 09 final but hindsight is a wonderful thing I suppose.

Absolutely. It made a bit of sense at the time (defending champions, on a roll etc) but they were well and truly humped. If only we knew how good that Nessi (as I mistakenly called him back then) bloke was going to be...

United actually played better in that 09 final as memory serves. In 2011 they just got battered.

I'd go 2011 because it featured Messi as the main man.

Nessi Reminds me of my niece calling me Pilchard (my name is Richard) for the first 10 years of her life! Now I'm just an ATM...

GSC wrote:United actually played better in that 09 final as memory serves. In 2011 they just got battered.

I'd go 2011 because it featured Messi as the main man.

I don't think Utd were at the races in either game.

In 2009 they were certainly in the game and certainly giving Barca problems. 2011 was just one way traffic with Rooney popping up.

GSC wrote:In 2009 they were certainly in the game and certainly giving Barca problems. 2011 was just one way traffic with Rooney popping up.

Yeah you're right. A quick look at the stats suggests that United were definitely better in the 09 game. I always remembered it being more one sided than it actually was for some reason.

Yeah I thought it was before reading Peps biography haha.

I think thats a key point of Barca's defending. They aren't a backs to the wall side, but they do a fantastic job of keeping you at arms length and making you feed off scraps.

FreekShow wrote:

MockingJay33 wrote:I think this Barcelona team is the greatest side. Although I can't stand them. People never throw them into the buying trophies argument, they're never compared or mentioned in the same breath as Chelsea, City and Real.

And rightly so.

It's not rightly so. Their current squad cost €211m (11 players, all could be considered first team worthy).

GSC wrote:I think criticising a defense for not coping with Drogba or Ibrahimovic is a tad harsh

Not to mention 2 of their top 3 CBs missed that game

When Marc Bartra has to come on for Adriano at CB you know there is an injury crisis

Yeah, dunno why they didnt play Song at CB

MockingJay33 wrote:

FreekShow wrote:

MockingJay33 wrote:I think this Barcelona team is the greatest side. Although I can't stand them. People never throw them into the buying trophies argument, they're never compared or mentioned in the same breath as Chelsea, City and Real.

And rightly so.

It's not rightly so. Their current squad cost €211m (11 players, all could be considered first team worthy).

Valdes, Puyol, Xavi, Iniesta, Busquets, and Pedro came through the ranks. Messi cost what? 500k or something stupid. So that's their spine sorted.

Had Fabregas and Pique not have been snatched from their youth set up then you can add another two players there.

Comparing Chelsea and City to Barcelona is comparing apples and oranges. Barca are a whole lot more self sufficient than Chelsea and City will ever be, it's not even an argument.

The sugar daddies leave Stamford Bridge and Eastlands and it's as you were: Chelsea fighting for a european spot at best and City languishing in mid table at best.

Chelsea and Man City are manufactured football teams/clubs. Barca are certainly not.

But they aren't self sufficient. They're in a lot of debt, €578m to be exact. That's €44m more than Arsenal, the other "self sufficient" club. To put it next to what Chelsea's debt, £96m or €112m, was before Ambramovich cleared it is silly because if the owner clears the clubs debts surely that's a way of self sufficiency wouldn't you say. As owner of the club he took over all responsibility, as did Ken Bates when bought Chelsea in the early 80s. The difference between the two men is only the clubs status under ownership. Chelsea were a yo-yo club in the 80s and might have stayed that way if it wasn't for Bates and Harding but nobody claimed we bought the cups we won in the 90s did they. God forbid someone other than Man United or Arsenal have a legitimate shot at winning the Premier League. People are just bitter because Chelsea and now City have upset the status quo.

Thank you for acknowledging the level Chelsea were before Roman came along as most people pretend we were a bottom half team.

MockingJay33 wrote:But they aren't self sufficient. They're in a lot of debt, €578m to be exact. That's €44m more than Arsenal, the other "self sufficient" club. To put it next to what Chelsea's debt, £96m or €112m, was before Ambramovich cleared it is silly because if the owner clears the clubs debts surely that's a way of self sufficiency wouldn't you say. As owner of the club he took over all responsibility, as did Ken Bates when bought Chelsea in the early 80s. The difference between the two men is only the clubs status under ownership. Chelsea were a yo-yo club in the 80s and might have stayed that way if it wasn't for Bates and Harding but nobody claimed we bought the cups we won in the 90s did they. God forbid someone other than Man United or Arsenal have a legitimate shot at winning the Premier League. People are just bitter because Chelsea and now City have upset the status quo.

Thank you for acknowledging the level Chelsea were before Roman came along as most people pretend we were a bottom half team.

I wrote this a couple of years ago Jay. Have a read.

https://www.606v2.com/t10065-are-we-right-to-put-man-city-and-chelsea-in-the-same-bracket

The whole meaning of self sufficiency in football is not relying on the owner to fund acquisitions you wouldn't otherwise be able to afford.

And no, I have nothing against Chelsea as a club. Though I'll freely admit the spoilt brat attitude from their fans has soured my opinion of the fans.

GSC wrote:The whole meaning of self sufficiency in football is not relying on the owner to fund acquisitions you wouldn't otherwise be able to afford.

Exactly. Fancy paying my gas bill G? It was a big one this quarter..

Obviously paying someone's gas bill is totally different. I see it like credit. Roman bought a club paying an up front fee of £30m with the intentions of the buyer and seller that the buyer will take on the debts left by the buyer, it's the reason Bates managed to buy the club for a measley £1, like when you take out a mobile phone contract, you (sometimes) pay an up front fee and you then agree to pay off the owed money as long as you own the phone.

It's a crap analogy but it's all I could think of right now. It's late. But, the point I'm trying to get across is that when the club became Roman's so did the debts. He paid off the debts and that's it. If he was paying it off as a favour the club would owe him still but they don't.

You missed the point. In football terms, self sufficiency is paying the phone contract yourself, instead of your parents paying for a contract you can't afford.

Yeah but in this situation Roman isn't the parent. He's the club. When he became owner he took the responsibility that if the club gets into trouble financially he is the person the creditors first call.

No, in football terms Roman isn't the club. That the entire point

Gotze to Bayern?

24 hours before a CL semi final?

I'd be surprised

Confirmed this morning

Bayern could be scary good next year. Wonder if that will have any effect on Dortmund heading into their semi final or whether it will spur them on more

Are Bayern putting together the greatest side in Europe?

Bayern vs Real final methinks

It must be so frustrating for German teams when Bayern seem to be able to basically just take a pick out of the teams lower down the table and take whichever players they want, even if one of those teams has got to a Champions League semi-final and last couple of years has beaten Bayern to the title.

I wonder if this will affect the possible Lewandowski move to Bayern, it could either make it more likely to get the link up with Goetze, or less because Dortmund won't want to sell two of their best players to their main competition.

You'd have thought that Dortmund would have wanted to sell Goetze to anybody but Bayern, at least waited until the summer to get a transfer war on.

I think they've triggered a release clause in his contract with the 32 million offer so they couldn't hold out for a transfer tussle. Maybe we'll see that now be the case with Lewandowski in the summer

It's certainly not good for the competition in that league and it's potential to become one of the best leagues in Europe. Bayern have so much power it's ridiculous and Guardiola is just walking into a trophy winning side without doing anything. That's the thing which annoys me really, Guardiola will walk in there and win everything and be proclaimed the world's best, when in fact anybody could win with that side. Goetze is not even needed in that side, Shaqiri has been absolutely wasted at Bayern and is a major talent. Can see Klopp wanting to move on presumably to the EPL if he's losing another star player. Kagawa, Goetze and possibly Lewandowski.......who's next?

Gundogan would be welcome at Man Utd

It'll be interesting to see if Guardiola tries to use Goetze as his Messi at Bayern.

Can't see it. Goetze is not a natural finisher, technically he is superb with great balance and vision but when it comes to scoring goals that is his downfall. A great example was the Malaga tie where Goetze should of scored a hat-trick in the first leg but missed every chance. I think he's got about 20 odd goals in about 100 apps for Dortmund, you'd have to check, but I can't see him turning into a Messi type on that level.

One thing's for sure is that Guardiola is walking into a job with a squad which has no limits to it's potential and will not only dominate domestically but could dominate Europe. The best managers always walk into jobs at the right time and leave jobs at the right time and this is another example, just like Mourinho.

John wrote:Can't see it. Goetze is not a natural finisher, technically he is superb with great balance and vision but when it comes to scoring goals that is his downfall. A great example was the Malaga tie where Goetze should of scored a hat-trick in the first leg but missed every chance. I think he's got about 20 odd goals in about 100 apps for Dortmund, you'd have to check, but I can't see him turning into a Messi type on that level.

Goetze has been used in that role before for Germany though I believe, and before Messi moved into the false 9 position he didn't score that many goals either. He's not going to score 50 goals, but I can't imagine Guardiola using Mandzukic or Gomez as they are two very natural forwards.