The Redcafe Champions League Draft

The Game: 1. Zidane 2. Seedorf 3. Shevchenko 4. Frank De Boer 5. Pires 6. Cocu 7. Ze Roberto 8. Lopez 9. Simic 10. Reuter 11. Baia
JakeC: 1. Messi 2. Cantona 3. Buffon 4. Roberto Carlos 5. Xabi Alonso 6. Puyol 7. Mascherano 8. Sagnol 9. Ljungberg 10. Chivu 11. Robinho
kps88: 1. Cristiano Ronaldo 2. Kohler 3. Davids 4. Vieri 5. Riquelme 6. Costacurta 7. Cambiasso 8. Salgado 9. Gonzalez 10. Heinze 11. Peruzzi
Thisistheone: 1. Ronaldo 2. Desailly 3. Rui Costa 4. Blanc 5. Essien 6. Dani Alves 7. Rooney 8. Paulo Sousa 9. Grosso 10. Barthez 11. Di Maria
Ralaks: 1. Keane 2. Del Piero 3. Effenberg 4. Beckham 5. Overmars 6. Ramos 7. Trezeguet 8. Piqué 9. Rafael 10. van der Sar 11. Capdevila
nahealai: 1. Xavi 2. Raúl 3. van Nistelrooy 4. Ballack 5. Busquets 6. Lizarazu 7. Irwin 8. Abidal 9. Kahn 10. Couto 11. Marchena
Stobzilla: 1. Henry 2. Stam 3. Totti 4. Gerrard 5. Veron 6. Mata 7. G. Neville 8. Mijatovic 9. Mihajlovic 10. Hyypia 11. Toldo
Feeky: 1. Maldini 2. Scholes 3. Bergkamp 4. Deschamps 5. Ibrahimovic 6. Y. Touré 7. David Silva 8. Lúcio 9. Marcelo 10. Casillas 11. Srna
akash02: 1. Romario 2. Cannavaro 3. Hagi 4. Guardiola 5. Lahm 6. McManaman 7. Petit 8. Chiellini 9. Baraja 10. Van Bronckhorst 11. Canizares
Gio: 1. Rivaldo 2. Nedved 3. Ferdinand 4. Zanetti 5. Fabregas 6. Zambrotta 7. Montero 8. Joaquin 9. Owen 10. Mauro Silva
Snow: 1. Ronaldinho 2. Kaka 3. Mendieta 4. Terry 5. Carvalho 6. A. Cole 7. Ozil 8. Gallas 9. Cech 10. Albelda
Isotope: 1. Redondo 2. Ribery 3. Eto'o 4. Albertini 5. Campbell 6. Boban 7. Forlan 8. Angloma 9. Kompany 10. Coentrao
EDogen: 1. Nesta 2. Giggs 3. Hierro 4. Van Persie 5. Enrique 6. Robben 7.Evra 8. Ferrara 9. Deco 10. Simeone
Theon: 1. Iniesta 2. Pirlo 3. Cafu 4. Gattuso 5. De Rossi 6. Crespo 7. Aguero 8. Silva 9. Candela 10. Nadal
Fergus'son: 1. Batistuta 2. Thuram 3. Ayala 4. Makelele 5. Schweinsteiger 6. Moller. 7. Villa 8. Muller 9. Aimar 10. Samuel
BD/NM: 1. Vieira 2. Figo 3. Vidic 4. Drogba 5.Lampard 6. Popescu 7. Maicon 8. Gilberto 9. Giuly 10. Sergi
 
Snow said:
Özil on the right is a common thing at Real. Not unusual at all. They have him or Callejon play there all the time. Madrid often doesn't play with a winger. Same with Barcal (I don't think you count Iniesta or Villa as wingers). Where does the width come from? A little thing called movement off the ball. You see, none of these players are rooted to their position. They don't hang there like Valencia (who doesn't know any better) but move around freely. Much like the current Chelsea side and many other teams as well.

Too many cooks to spoil the broth? Well shit. Someone ring Scolari, Tito or del Bosque and let them know.
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I don't remember any of those managers shoehorning three advanced playmakers into the same side, so I think they already know. Also, Barcelona have Jordi Alba and Dani Alves rampaging forward to stretch the pitch and create space, you have William Gallas.
 
Did someone actually pick Gabriel Heinze, or was that a joke? The guy was shit. Even when he won the player of the year at Man Utd, I still thought he was crap. Prone to errors and a bit of a thug as well. Absolute disaster of a pick, IMO.

Barthez isn't that bad of a pick, I don't know why people are going on about it, he was a quality keeper. I'd have him over Angelo Peruzzi.
 
Jayvin said:
I don't remember any of those managers shoehorning three advanced playmakers into the same side, so I think they already know. Also, Barcelona have Jordi Alba and Dani Alves rampaging forward to stretch the pitch and create space, you have William Gallas.
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They didn't have three advanced playmakers (how Football manager of you to word it like that). Don't know what you'll call Iniesta, Messi and Neymar with Fabregas and Xavi behind them. Name me a team that had that quality available to them and didn't decide to use it.

Need I remind you the team that won the Euros last time. No winger, 3 "advanced playmakers" and Arbeloa at right back.
 
Snow said:
They didn't have three advanced playmakers (how Football manager of you to word it like that).
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I worded it like that because Kaka and Ozil are playmakers who operate in advanced positions, no need to be so condescending.

Snow said:
Don't know what you'll call Iniesta, Messi and Neymar with Fabregas and Xavi behind them. Name me a team that had that quality available to them and didn't decide to use it.
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I'd call Messi and Neymar strikers or wingers, definitely not playmakers. Brazil in 2006 had that quality available to them and tried to use it, they failed miserably.

Snow said:
Need I remind you the team that won the Euros last time. No winger, 3 "advanced playmakers" and Arbeloa at right back.
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I'd argue David Silva is more capable of playing wide than Mesut Ozil. Also, Fabregas was effectively a striker and you only have two in central midfield, whereas Spain had three. Not to mention Arbeloa is a natural right-back, unlike Gallas. Looks like a very different system to me.
 
Surprised at how many lament Cañizares and not Toldo. Toldo is quite comfortably the best non-CL-tied keeper after Buffon.
 
Jayvin said:
I worded it like that because Kaka and Ozil are playmakers who operate in advanced positions, no need to be so condescending.



I'd call Messi and Neymar strikers or wingers, definitely not playmakers. Brazil in 2006 had that quality available to them and tried to use it, they failed miserably.



I'd argue David Silva is more capable of playing wide than Mesut Ozil. Also, Fabregas was effectively a striker and you only have two in central midfield, whereas Spain had three. Not to mention Arbeloa is a natural right-back, unlike Gallas. Looks like a very different system to me.
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Messi and Neymar aren't playmakers? I didn't mean to sound condescending before but I certainly am not shying away from it now. Do you know what a playmaker is? Messi is one of the best playmakers in the world. Neymar is one of Brazils key playmakers and was the main playmaker at Santos. Of course they are playmakers. Their position is completely irrelevant. Messi is neither a striker or a winger. To categorize him as either is oversimplifying it.

True, Spain had three midfielders. That wasn't what was being argued and you haven't made a point as to why that matters. Also, why does it matters what you think is someone's natural position. What matters is that the player is better at it than someone else. Not that it's his best position. Gallas still was operating as a right back at his time at Chelsea when they were the best defensive team in the league and the best that we've seen in the PL. He didn't like it but he delivered his job well. Then went on with career again as a center back and never was as good.

Brazil didn't fail miserably. They won their group on 9 points. Comfortably went through the first knockout round and then lost out to France. Same team that knocked out Spain and Portugal and lost to Italy on penalties. Only Germany had scored more goals at that stage in the competition. Arguably their poorest performer up front in that tournament was Ronaldinho but that's irrelevant to his abilities in this game as we judge him by his peak. Same with Gallas.
 
Snow said:
Messi and Neymar aren't playmakers? I didn't mean to sound condescending before but I certainly am not shying away from it now. Do you know what a playmaker is? Messi is one of the best playmakers in the world. Neymar is one of Brazils key playmakers and was the main playmaker at Santos. Of course they are playmakers. Their position is completely irrelevant. Messi is neither a striker or a winger. To categorize him as either is oversimplifying it.
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I don't view Messi or Neymar as playmakers. They're finishers more than creators.

Snow said:
True, Spain had three midfielders. That wasn't what was being argued and you haven't made a point as to why that matters. Also, why does it matters what you think is someone's natural position. What matters is that the player is better at it than someone else. Not that it's his best position. Gallas still was operating as a right back at his time at Chelsea when they were the best defensive team in the league.
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You pointed to Spain's Euro 2012 win as proof that your trio of attackers could work, my point is Spain had three midfielders backing them up and you don't. I'm not disputing Gallas' defensive prowess in that Chelsea side, just questioning his ability to get forward and compensate for your lack of a wide player on the right hand side, in the same way Dani Alves does for Barca.

Snow said:
Brazil didn't fail miserably. They won their group on 9 points. Comfortably went through the first knockout round and then lost out to France.
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Brazil beat Croatia, Australia, Japan and Ghana before being knocked out by the first decent team they faced. I'd call that failing miserably.


Anyway, I'm obviously not going to change your mind, and you're not going to change mine, so I'll leave it at that. That's the beauty of these drafts though, where I see a weakness in your team, others might see a strength.
 
I haven't watched Neymar a lot at Santos but it is not at all wrong to call Messi a proper playmaker. He racked up what 25 assist in his record breaking season? Mata has 30 odd this season which has made people call him one of the best playmakers in the world, which he is, but Messi is also. That is what makes him so much more dangerous, even if he doesn't score which is so much rare in itself, he'd be easily setting up chances and not just with a simple final third pass but with extremely creative thinking that involves as much vision as it does for any other top playmaker in the world.
 
I don't understand how Messi at Barca works as an example for the three playmakers behind the striker in Snow's team? Messi after all is arguably the greatest goal scorer of all time as well and plays with different tactics in a different formation with a total different style of football. Of course I need more playmakers in a team with so much focus on possession, but why do I need them in a team sitting deep and trying to score on the counter (at least that's how Cutch explained it earlier)?

And even without the 3 playmaker argument, Özil out wide is most of the time a disaster for club and country. Germany at the Euros against Italy is a great example why he's an average choice for that role, Dortmund's 4-1 against Real is another one. And both times the team at least tried to play through him as the main creative attacking player anyway (don't think that's going to happen a lot with Ronaldinho and Kaka in the team), but he's always less influential out there and he's definitely no goal threat and most of the time a defensive liability. I can't think of a big game at Real where Özil starting out wide really worked in the last 2 years and in the successful games against Barca, Özil usually started in the middle as far as I remember.
 
Claudio Taffarel

1994_taufel_630.jpg
 
Sorry if it's been asked, but can non-participating members comment as to choices/ line-ups etc or do we have to wait unti the squads are chosen? Didn't understand what the OP meant at the last bit, didn't want to tred on anyone's toes..
 
Jaybezia said:
Sorry if it's been asked, but can non-participating members comment as to choices/ line-ups etc or do we have to wait unti the squads are chosen? Didn't understand what the OP meant at the last bit, didn't want to tred on anyone's toes..
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You can, as long as you don't mention any unpicked names.
 
Jayvin said:
Did someone actually pick Gabriel Heinze, or was that a joke? The guy was shit. Even when he won the player of the year at Man Utd, I still thought he was crap. Prone to errors and a bit of a thug as well. Absolute disaster of a pick, IMO.

Barthez isn't that bad of a pick, I don't know why people are going on about it, he was a quality keeper. I'd have him over Angelo Peruzzi.
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Short memories, or never seen him in his prime, or just have a more romantic image of other keepers we've only seen a handful of times as they never played in the PL.

It's the Veron syndrome. I'm not going to think Veron is shit just because he flopped at Utd. When I see him I'll be thinking of one of the best midfielder's I've ever seen live (he played Wales once in Cardiff) and more importantly the player who was brilliant for Lazio. I know he was brilliant, so whatever happened at Utd doesn't change that.

Anyway! Done with this Barthez debate. (Until the match day thread)
 
Fernando Torres
Very happy to secure a player of the quality of Torres at this stage to complete our lineup. At his peak, there were very few strikers in this draft as devastating. More suited to the role of lone striker than some of those picked before him. 65 goals in 102 league games for Liverpool is almost a goal every 1.5 games.

[URL='http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/9/98sy.jpg/'][/URL]

The Game: 1. Zidane 2. Seedorf 3. Shevchenko 4. Frank De Boer 5. Pires 6. Cocu 7. Ze Roberto 8. Lopez 9. Simic 10. Reuter 11. Baia
JakeC: 1. Messi 2. Cantona 3. Buffon 4. Roberto Carlos 5. Xabi Alonso 6. Puyol 7. Mascherano 8. Sagnol 9. Ljungberg 10. Chivu 11. Robinho
kps88: 1. Cristiano Ronaldo 2. Kohler 3. Davids 4. Vieri 5. Riquelme 6. Costacurta 7. Cambiasso 8. Salgado 9. Gonzalez 10. Heinze 11. Peruzzi
Thisistheone: 1. Ronaldo 2. Desailly 3. Rui Costa 4. Blanc 5. Essien 6. Dani Alves 7. Rooney 8. Paulo Sousa 9. Grosso 10. Barthez 11. Di Maria
Ralaks: 1. Keane 2. Del Piero 3. Effenberg 4. Beckham 5. Overmars 6. Ramos 7. Trezeguet 8. Piqué 9. Rafael 10. van der Sar 11. Capdevila
nahealai: 1. Xavi 2. Raúl 3. van Nistelrooy 4. Ballack 5. Busquets 6. Lizarazu 7. Irwin 8. Abidal 9. Kahn 10. Couto 11. Marchena
Stobzilla: 1. Henry 2. Stam 3. Totti 4. Gerrard 5. Veron 6. Mata 7. G. Neville 8. Mijatovic 9. Mihajlovic 10. Hyypia 11. Toldo
Feeky: 1. Maldini 2. Scholes 3. Bergkamp 4. Deschamps 5. Ibrahimovic 6. Y. Touré 7. David Silva 8. Lúcio 9. Marcelo 10. Casillas 11. Srna
akash02: 1. Romario 2. Cannavaro 3. Hagi 4. Guardiola 5. Lahm 6. McManaman 7. Petit 8. Chiellini 9. Baraja 10. Van Bronckhorst 11. Canizares
Gio: 1. Rivaldo 2. Nedved 3. Ferdinand 4. Zanetti 5. Fabregas 6. Zambrotta 7. Montero 8. Joaquin 9. Owen 10. Mauro Silva 11. Taffarel
Snow: 1. Ronaldinho 2. Kaka 3. Mendieta 4. Terry 5. Carvalho 6. A. Cole 7. Ozil 8. Gallas 9. Cech 10. Albelda 11. Torres
Isotope: 1. Redondo 2. Ribery 3. Eto'o 4. Albertini 5. Campbell 6. Boban 7. Forlan 8. Angloma 9. Kompany 10. Coentrao
EDogen: 1. Nesta 2. Giggs 3. Hierro 4. Van Persie 5. Enrique 6. Robben 7.Evra 8. Ferrara 9. Deco 10. Simeone
Theon: 1. Iniesta 2. Pirlo 3. Cafu 4. Gattuso 5. De Rossi 6. Crespo 7. Aguero 8. Silva 9. Candela 10. Nadal
Fergus'son: 1. Batistuta 2. Thuram 3. Ayala 4. Makelele 5. Schweinsteiger 6. Moller. 7. Villa 8. Muller 9. Aimar 10. Samuel
BD/NM: 1. Vieira 2. Figo 3. Vidic 4. Drogba 5.Lampard 6. Popescu 7. Maicon 8. Gilberto 9. Giuly 10. Sergi

-----------------Cech------------

Gallas----Carvalho----Terry----Cole

---------Mendieta----Albelda------

Ozil-------------Kaka--------Ronaldinho

----------------Torres--------------
 
Thisistheone said:
Short memories, or never seen him in his prime, or just have a more romantic image of other keepers we've only seen a handful of times as they never played in the PL.

It's the Veron syndrome. I'm not going to think Veron is shit just because he flopped at Utd. When I see him I'll be thinking of one of the best midfielder's I've ever seen live (he played Wales once in Cardiff) and the player who was brilliant for Lazio. I know he was brilliant, so whatever happened at Utd doesn't change that.
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All that is fine and I doubt anyone playing this draft or with enough knowledge on thier careers would judge them on their United form (specially in case of Veron), as far as I can see it is the pick that is being criticized, not the player. The pick is a gamble and I don't think you can argue against it.
 
AldoRaine18 said:
All that is fine and I doubt anyone playing this draft or with enough knowledge on thier careers would judge them on their United form (specially in case of Veron), as far as I can see it is the pick that is being criticized, not the player. The pick is a gamble and I don't think you can argue against it.
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That's fine. I'm more than aware it's a risk and what the casual voter will think. I could have picked Toldo. As a pick though, Barthez is a good one, considering my centre backs. I hope this has been noticed.

Same with Essien. Or even Rooney. A few months ago he'd have won more votes but now there's this whole transfer request saga, he'll not be viewed as highly in typical fickle caf fashion.
 
Joining Sol Campbell on unbeaten 49 games in Premier League, twice UEFA Club Goalkeeper of the Year:

Jens Lehmann
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For me, Fernando Torres is a poor choice, people regard his time at Liverpool as a representation of his ability, I do not, I regard his time at Liverpool as very good form. His stats shows that before Liverpool, he didn't have a good conversion rate at all, and after Liverpool, his Chelsea days are now infamous for his poor finishing
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As you can see below, his best season stats at Liverpool (the time he was apparently the best in his career), his best goals per minutes season was 95.2 minutes every goal, which is a brilliant tun in, but you can see quite clearly that of 3 good seasons, were clearly outside the norm for the way his career has been to date.

For me, Fernando Torres just isn't and wasn't ever that good, Spain is his only record that disagrees with me, and there are so many superstars there (not that it's easy for him), but he wasn't doing anything IMO that 10 other Spanish strikers at the same point could have done.


Year.............Club.........Minutes...Apps..Goals...Mins p/g
2010/2011 Liverpool 1895 23 9 210.5
2009/2010 Liverpool 1713 22 18 95.2
2008/2009 Liverpool 1734 24 14 123.86
2007/2008 Liverpool 2541 33 24 105.88
 
I think you are putting a tad too much emphasis on stats there, Jay. If your point is that he went through a great purple patch but over his whole career he shouldn't be considered a top striker, in the same breath as others in this draft than I can understand that though I don't completely agree. But in those 2-3 years at Liverpool he was quite unstoppable most times. Had a great first season and finished 3rd for Ballon D'or if I am not wrong. Then his second season where Liverpool led the league for the first half of the season it was him and Gerrard who formed a devastating attack. The wingers were good but not great, it was mainly those two who kept winning games for them and in style too. That was the time when you'd think it was inevitable for Torres to score if he was playing, doesn't matter who the opposition is.

In my opinion it had a lot more to do with his mentality and confidence than anything else. We all know how that is vital for strikers specially when it comes to scoring, and he was enjoying his game more than he had or did afterwards. A great example that shows how determined he used to be then was that goal against us (probably 09-10 season if I'm not wrong) where he was half fit and playing on injections and he turned barely half a chance while being closely marked by Rio into a great goal. That Torres was something else and really feared by most defenders out there.

He has lost that confidence, that will power to keep on going till he finds the net now. I don't know the real cause for that, probably injuries, probably something happened naturally, I don't know. But he's lost that hunger. So I don't really agree that his quality should be in doubt when he spent enough time IMO at a top level and being a scary prospect against any defense.
 
Jaybezia said:
2007/2008 Liverpool 2541 33 24 105.88
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Good post but I think these drafts are about peak and 4 seasons certainly count as a peak period. It is hard to call 4 seasons "unexpectedly good form".

I think it is also quite obvious that Torres had a lot in his game. Nobody has ridiculed our defense like he did since Ronaldo and that says a lot. Every time Torres got the ball near Ferdinand or Vidic we were all shitting ourselves knowing that Torres has that little extra ability to beat the worlds best defense on his own.

Any player who on his own can make Ferdinand and Vidic look shakey deserves all the credit they are getting.
 
Very true, I do forget I suppose as it was a few years ago, and on form, no doubt he was unstoppable. I too, share a lot of memories worrying whenever he got near Vidic, but that was more to do with his pace than his ability to get past a man. The one thing he was very good at during his very good stage was finishing IMO, he was lethal and IMO on a similar to RVP now, but even RVP now has more about him as he doesn't rely on solely on pace.

Confidence in relative to form from any striker IMO, more so than any other position on the pitch, so I can't discount that, but when you lose confidence; you would be expected to try and regain this. My problem stems from his mentality more than anything else I suppose, someone who has been unable to regain confidence, yet being shown untold confidence by a club you have just moved to and have been playing quite badly for, this shows a weak mentality for me.

If you consider, as I am sure you do, confidence to be vital to a striker, it has to be an ability, or something that is able to be measured, if you pit this against other top players, for me he falls short.

(Also, FWIW, I am a stats enemy, I hate them, but they seem a very good way to get your point across over the internet, when I can't sit there and force people to watch historical youtube clips :lol:, my Mrs is sick of me :lol:)
 
Jaybezia said:
2qkm9f4.png



As you can see below, his best season stats at Liverpool (the time he was apparently the best in his career), his best goals per minutes season was 95.2 minutes every goal, which is a brilliant tun in, but you can see quite clearly that of 3 good seasons, were clearly outside the norm for the way his career has been to date.

For me, Fernando Torres just isn't and wasn't ever that good, Spain is his only record that disagrees with me, and there are so many superstars there (not that it's easy for him), but he wasn't doing anything IMO that 10 other Spanish strikers at the same point could have done.


Year.............Club.........Minutes...Apps..Goals...Mins p/g
2010/2011 Liverpool 1895 23 9 210.5
2009/2010 Liverpool 1713 22 18 95.2
2008/2009 Liverpool 1734 24 14 123.86
2007/2008 Liverpool 2541 33 24 105.88
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You know that this draft is based on the players at their peak and not over their whole career don't you?
 
Torres is a very good pick at this stage. Heinze on the other hand :p

The "at their peak" part needs to be made very clear to voters though.
 
As said, I would have amended my comments, at his peak as others have pointed out, he is the one to cause Vidic (who at his peak at the time, was one of the world's best CB's) the most problems, that speaks for himself, my problems are to do with times not concerning his peak and are therefore not valid..
 
Jaybezia said:
Very true, I do forget I suppose as it was a few years ago, and on form, no doubt he was unstoppable. I too, share a lot of memories worrying whenever he got near Vidic, but that was more to do with his pace than his ability to get past a man. The one thing he was very good at during his very good stage was finishing IMO, he was lethal and IMO on a similar to RVP now, but even RVP now has more about him as he doesn't rely on solely on pace.

Confidence in relative to form from any striker IMO, more so than any other position on the pitch, so I can't discount that, but when you lose confidence; you would be expected to try and regain this. My problem stems from his mentality more than anything else I suppose, someone who has been unable to regain confidence, yet being shown untold confidence by a club you have just moved to and have been playing quite badly for, this shows a weak mentality for me.

If you consider, as I am sure you do, confidence to be vital to a striker, it has to be an ability, or something that is able to be measured, if you pit this against other top players, for me he falls short.

(Also, FWIW, I am a stats enemy, I hate them, but they seem a very good way to get your point across over the internet, when I can't sit there and force people to watch historical youtube clips :lol:, my Mrs is sick of me :lol:)
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The difference with pace players and others is that they can go from brilliant to dogpiss in the shortest time. Owen, Torres, Valencia etc are all world-class players who within a month suddenly dropped to terrible players. One injury is enough and they hardly ever make it in to their 30's like most other type of players.

It is hard to compare Torres with RVP, I think RVP is perfect in todays 4-2-3-1 set-ups and Torres isn't but for being a lone striker who don't get a lot of support Torres in his prime was of course much better than RVP.

RVP is a great team-player and Torres is more individual quality as his link-up play is too bad.
 
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