Is it necessary to talk about Ole in every thread. It's like if someone says X the manager has flaws, but Ole is worse.
Champions League Round of 16 (16th Feb - 17th Mar)
- Thread starter Samid
- Start date
Pedri the worst of the lot unless he's playing world champions Alaves.
Barcelona been conceding loads of goals recently, 3 to Granada, 2 v Seville, 2 v Betis etc. Not to mention last year in CL...
They're a poor team defensively and no real surprise PSG put 4 past them.
They're a poor team defensively and no real surprise PSG put 4 past them.
Pedri has been brilliant, Puig has not been given the minutes he deserves (Koeman has a weird dislike of of him) and Trincao has only recently started showing promise. Araujo has been pretty decent in defense but he was out injured.
Linekar sounds so depressed there talking about his precious Barca and Messi being smashed. Could barely hear him. Shit night for him, can't go tweeting tonight trying to stir up shit speculation about Klopp either. Dickhead.
Gosh how poor are Barca?! Totally dominated. Messi anonymous. Sergino Dest is a laugh and a half.
Dest has been fairly decent this season. But there will be lots of knee jerk reactions around today
His man-crush on Messi is really quite vomit inducing.
I agree. I’m actually more convinced by Nagelsmann now than before the game, that he should be our next manager. Not just tonight, save for PSG in the CL semi, they never look like they are inferior to another team despite not having a single player anyone would consider top class bar the CBs. Under Nagelsmann, when they play Bayern, they are never outclassed despite Bayern being an amazing team. They got beat 1-3 by Dortmund and 5-0 by us, but I still didn’t think they anywhere near deserved those results, although I was delighted we hammered them.
Also, Nagelsmann is a front foot, quick-passing, counter-pressing manager. That is his primary tactic, not the counter attack. Bring him over here and let him implement his style with better players, and we’ll rip up the PL. Bruno will become a top 5 player in the world under him, and I don’t even know how to put into words how much I think Marcus will improve.
Messi has won 2 CL's in the last decade. While not bad (20%), you could argue it's too little for him. Ronaldo won 4!
Vidic career was over as soon as he had injury while Rio was still regular for us in 34, 35 won the PL. Either way, the point is not about discredit Pique anyway.
He's still good, but not top 2-3 anymore.
Not for me atleast.
What a performance from Mbappé, his first goal is a copy of the one he scored in the WC. Such quick movement and power with his left foot.
Curious to see if he'll go straight to Real, wait it out or come to Arsenal
Curious to see if he'll go straight to Real, wait it out or come to Arsenal
Fair enough, my comment relates to just this game. I haven't really watched him much. Horrible display.Dest has been fairly decent this season. But there will be lots of knee jerk reactions around today
Never mind me! Just your comment reminded me of Darren Fletcher on commentary for BT Sports. He’s always saying that during games: “What a goal that is!” Messi clueless performance. He's become a liability almost for Barcelona at times.
An expected win for PSG. Barcelona are rubbish. Surprised they actually managed to go a goal up.
Barca without Messi would be only slightly above the relegation zone. You think I'm kidding but Ansu Fati is the top 3 scorer of the squad and he got injured in November after playing 6 games total.
Barca were slightly above the relegation zone before Messi picked up form again recently. Without his influence they will be back there with the current players and coach no doubt. Likes of Pique, Busquets, Alba, Griezmann are completely done and Pedri, Dest etc. don't even get into Sevilla's squad.
Barca were slightly above the relegation zone before Messi picked up form again recently. Without his influence they will be back there with the current players and coach no doubt. Likes of Pique, Busquets, Alba, Griezmann are completely done and Pedri, Dest etc. don't even get into Sevilla's squad.
True, but Messi isn't blameless for their impotence in big UCL games the past few years.
Should have kept Valverde after all. Will admit he's a much better manager than I gave him credit for.
Fair enough. How about top 5?
Should we instead compare Martial favorably to Mbappe, so that we don’t hurt his feelings?
Top 10
Two clear wins away from home have surely not many people predicted........i only can see that Leipzig can turn around this tie.
I bet even in Barca they aren't really shocked by yesterday's humilation because it will happen again, it's simply where they are at the moment. I actually predicted Barca win, some kind of last hurrah for them, but around 40th minute it was already obvious what's going to happen, when Pique and Griezmann were telling each other to feck off. their current first 11 literally can't play against any decent team because they lack fundamentals. there's no physicality, desire, drive, nothing. they're disfunctional as they can be and there's simply nothing left in them to offer resistance when they face any decent team. they already lost to Sevilla, Madrid, Atletico in la liga/copa and Juve and PSG in CL. their only focus in current state should be future & finances, and ending the season in top 4 while beating minnows. it's not like they have any choice.
while it may be true, it's easy to say that now. Chelsea fans could also say the same for Morata given how poor Werner is, or Juve fans for Allegri if they knew they would end up with Pirlo.
the thing is, when their fans criticized Valverde, they did it while believing things will get better with their next manager. they certainly weren't expecting disaster that happened under Setien. it was the same when they criticized Suarez. obviously they wouldn't have wanted him out it if that only meant Suarez going to their league rival without Barca buying anyone. in both cases their board fecked up big time.
Something like that maybe yes, I also find it very hard ranking him now. The current situation at Barcelona seems to me a mess.
Do people really think if we would have rocked up against Barcelona, we would have won? We could be playing Messi plus 10 randoms from La Masia and I wouldn't be confident against these Spanish cnuts! They are our bogey team.
You can’t really say they’re our bogey team because we lost 2 finals against their best, and possibly the best team of all time. We had a great record against them before. 1984, 1991, 2008...
We could definitely have beaten them they’re shite.
We lost to them twice recently when they were still pretty shit. We drew against them twice in 1998 despite being the better team. In 2008, we were very lucky to get away with a 1-0 aggregate win.
I’ll take that. Messi has a mediocre squad around him now so it’s a bit easier to defend him but he’s still a deadly threat.
we beat you in 2019. We aren’t good but united have been losing to Sheffield and dropping points against west brom. PSG would’ve beaten united as well.
We generally have a terrible record against Spanish teams and our record against RM is worse than against Barca. At least we won a few relevant games against Barca, whereas against RM we only knocked them out once in 1967/68.
Given our current state, PSG would have destroyed us. No debate whatsoever.
Na, we beat them when we were a lower ebb than now. We literally got outplayed by Brighton a game week earlier.
We have the pace to handle PSG, Barca don't.
Common knowledge. PSG in this form would smash Pool and Mbappe in that mood would even tear through this excellent City defence. My concern is that I genuinely feel Barca would have romped us yesterday. AWB and Lindelof have made Messi look like the Messi who played us in 2009 and 2011.
"Whataboutoleism" is real on this site.
Liverpool will get the winners from this tie. You just know it.
Horrible starting midfield from Dortmund, too passive and bereft of technical quality. They'll be dominated there and lack and control of the match.
I predict 3-0 to Sevilla.