I'm not 100% sure about that: I would put Messi, Iniesta, Xavi, Fabregas, David Villa, Alexis Sanchez, etc. or Gomez, Muller, Robben, Ribery, Mandzukic, Kroos, etc. up against Rooney, Van Persie, Kagawa, Hernandez, Nani, etc. fairly reasonably. You could probably also make an argument for Real Madrid, just based off of Ronaldo, Higuain, Benzema, Ozil, and Di Maria, as well.


That's fair. I think those players are arguably better, and they are creative/attacking players so in that respect I think there's some merit.

I think that RVP and Rooney are the best forwards in the world though. Hernandez and Nani are really good goal scorers, too. That's more what is so impressive about them - they just seem to be able to create huge chances without dominating the game, and they seem to always convert them. Munich is pretty crazy though - Mario Gomez on the bench for them is insane. I don't know if he just hasn't been fit, but I think very highly of him.

Who's got the League Cup final? Is it BeIn? Fox nor ESPN are showing it.

I was watching Juve/Siena..what happened in that Cagliari/Torino game?

I don't know. I don't want to know. Boo!

Bein for the League Cup.

It's BeIn.

LET'S GO BRADFORD!

Man, those are some ugly uni's for Bradford.

That's a total -1, right there ...

Really disappointed that I can't see the League Cup. The last couple of finals have been a lot of fun.

Jose, it's not the highest quality, but here's a pretty good link.

I'm totally for Swansea. They're the ones who really deserve the silverware, given the quality football they've played everywhere for several years running, as opposed to Bradford who've beaten Arsenal, some relegation fodder, and some lower league clubs while also being pretty blah in League Two.

Looking it up, Swansea would be the first Welsh club to win an English cup competition since 1927.

Balls.

(not that I'm against Swansea, even if their lineup and performance against Liverpool in advance of this match left a #### taste in my mouth ...)

Not that anybody here cares about rugby, but this is the most wins for Scotland in the Six nations, since 2006. 'This' being two.

Love the Bradford kits myself, I'm a sucker for hoops and stripes. Celtic is perhaps my single favorite kit, too bad it's worn by such a crappy team to root for (imh, Irish-American, opinion).

If Swansea was making better choices in the final third, this could be 3 or 4 nil right now.

No miracles for Bradford City today. They are completely outclassed here.

Meh.

After working so hard to win this thing and get into Europe, I hope Swansea don't make those tired complaints next year about what a distraction Europe is.

Dyer really wants that hat trick.

Well, that's that ... well, that that before that that was that ... but you know what I mean ...

Wow ... what a bizarre display by Dyer.

A hat trick in a Cup final would be a rare thing indeed...never done in the League Cup, not done in the FA Cup since 1953.

I thought they should have let Dyer take it, myself, so I'm sympathetic to the little guy.

I suppose.

It's the Capitol One League Cup against Bradford; I'm having trouble spotting the special nature of the moment ...

[edit] I get why Dyer would want to take the penalty, what I don't get it why he was so pissy and unconsoleable about it ... I mean, DeGuzman did *win* the penalty, and, after all, it is only a ####### League Cup Final against lesser opposition ...

I'm wondering if Capitol One might be considering letting Carling have the Cup back at this point.

Probably the only chance at a hat trick he'll have in his career. He's not exactly a goal scoring machine.

I'm having trouble spotting the special nature of the moment ...

Shut up and go eat your prawn sandwich then.

Yes, 40 odd thousand Swansea fans think it's pretty special I'm sure.

Anyone know at what stage Swansea will have to start in the Europa? Will they be like Fulham a couple of years ago and start in July against the Faroe Islands champs or some such team?

If a guy is sitting on a hattrick, you let him take the penalty. Especially if the game isn't really in doubt. It's pretty common football etiquette.

Anyone know at what stage Swansea will have to start in the Europa? Will they be like Fulham a couple of years ago and start in July against the Faroe Islands champs or some such team?

UEFA Europa League Third Qualifying Round

Anyone know at what stage Swansea will have to start in the Europa? Will they be like Fulham a couple of years ago and start in July against the Faroe Islands champs or some such team?

The League Cup place is the worst of the English EL places, so they will most likely have to travel somewhere odd.

The League Cup place is the worst of the English EL places, so they will most likely have to travel somewhere odd.

Maybe they'll face the New Saints! Which would be a Welsh team representing England facing a Welsh team that plays in England!

Shut up and go eat your prawn sandwich then.

Sod off, tosser.

The Leo Messi-Gerd Mueller goal record situation had me thinking some sort of .X multiplier for penalties should be in place. So a Hat Trick might be 2.70 goals instead of 3.0. The same could be applied to game scores themselves, with penalties only counting for, say, .7. Definitely one of those things you'd want to try out in Football Manager or FIFA first for a few hundred seasons, not to mention the deliberate giving away of penalties when up 2-1 and such. Not that it wouldn't be fun.

So, any .X multiplier would probably only apply to total goal situations like Messi/Mueller. Btw, the final score in today's Cagliari-Torino game would be 3.4 - 2.7 under such a system. An open goal for Torino wins it...hmmm....I kinda like it.

So far English teams have a goal differential of 16-0 in the Europa League third qualifying round.

2012 Liverpool 3-0, 1-0 FC Gomel aka FK Homel
2011 Stoke City 1-0, 1-0 Hajduk Split
2010 Liverpool 2-0, 2-0 FK Rabotnicki
2009 Fulham 3-0, 3-0 FK Vetra

The ideal scenario would be
2013 Swansea City 1-1, 2-2 Airbus UK Broughton

Airbus UK Broughton are currently second in the Welsh League. First place is TNS, the team literally on the English border, and second place is Broughton, which is about four miles from England and basically in Merseyside.

The Leo Messi-Gerd Mueller goal record situation had me thinking some sort of .X multiplier for penalties should be in place. So a Hat Trick might be 2.70 goals instead of 3.0.

If you're bothered by penalties why not just count goals from play? Most of the credit for a penalty goal should go to the victim/diver after all.

EDIT: I see, you want it to count it like that in games. No thanks.

I'm not saying I necessarily want to count them in games that way...although it's a fun way of playing Games Rule God (which is always fun). I'm okay with only counting open play goals for year/career stats and such, but I'm guessing that's a minority position.

I think in player evaluation counting PK goals differently makes sense. I'm just not sure how to do it. If I'm looking for a pure sniper then the guy with 15 goals but 0 PK goals is more appealing than the guy who has 15 goals but 5 on PKs. However, the ability to put the ball in the net reliably on a PK has value (hello Jonathan Walters) and should not be dismissed. It's a skill but not necessarily the same skill as being a scorer.

For record keeping purposes I feel the same about goals and PKs that I do about homers and steroids. If you put the ball in the net it counts as a goal.

I think counting the PK as a goal is extremely analogous to counting an intentional walk as a walk. They have no relation to what the player would do when actually being challenged to accomplish something. Better / more respected players get more of them, through no fault of their own.

What happened to the cold-blooded assassin Aguero from last year?

I think he was drunk. Or high. Yeah, maybe high. He was absolutely awful.

RE: Gus Johnson

I've heard him three times now and today was easily his worst performance. It seemed as though he took the criticism to heart and responded by trying to "learn" the game. So, instead of simply calling the action, he was now offering tidbits on players and situations, at least once or twice being blatantly wrong (err...I meant Belgian. Yeah Hazard is Belgian even though he played in France.). Further, he called EVERY single pass receipt by a full back in the opposition half an overlapping run, often times when the fullback was simply pushing forward. He also failed to see obvious actions, such as Mata not moving on a ball because he was in an offside's position, not because he wasn't ready. Another example was his claiming that Rodwell's (I think it was Rodwell) shot had too much power when it was clear to anyone watching the broadcast that the shot was actually on target but had been saved by Cech. Just an awful performance.

He needs to stop trying to add insight to the game. He doesn't know it and sounds silly when he does. Simply call the action as you see it. He doesn't have to say Clichy's on an overlapping run; you don't even know what one is. Simply say "to Clichy" and be done with it. Once that's done you can turn it down about 6 notches and you might have a shot of being an acceptable PBP man.

I completely agree with 1288. Johnson was really irritating today.

Yeah, I don't get why Johnson is so bad. I've only been watching soccer religiously a few years but I feel I have a better read on the game than he does. Also, he says the names funny which is a small thing, but it makes me question how much soccer he's actually watched. The British color guys can butcher names, but the PBP guys are good about trying to get it right. I don't know, I'll be patient with him, but he hasn't been promising so far. He really needs to stop the John Sterling habit of getting overly excited about the wrong things and completely missing the important things. Also, he doesn't seem to have enough of a well of knowledge to draw analysis or just stories from the color guy. Honestly, I hope he gets there, but if he doesn't, just get me a non-descript English guy because those guys are just fine, really. I don't HAVE to have an American voice telling me what I'm seeing.

Yeah, I don't get why Johnson is so bad.

Because he doesn't know enough about what he's watching?

There is no way that someone with as little knowledge of soccer or as little experience of broadcasting it would get a regular gig as a TV play by play man in, say, England. The TV guys usually do years on Radio first.

Yeah, I don't get why Johnson is so bad.

Based on the rest of the paragraph that followed, I can only think that this first sentence was either a typo or complete sarcasm ...

Based on the rest of the paragraph that followed, I can only think that this first sentence was either a typo or complete sarcasm ...

It was an honest question. He's been calling MLS games on the radio and, unless he's a liar, he's been making an intense study of the sport the last couple of years, yet he sounds like he just started following the sport last week. It's just strange to me. He's an experienced broadcaster so I just don't get why he can't do a better job.

At this point we're stuck with him so I just hope he gets better. Any game he's going to be doing we're all going to want to watch. Hopefully he improves to the point where he doesn't take too much away. Just like every other televised sporting event we may get pissed at crappy announcers but we're going to watch it anyway. Johnson actually has a fanbase so I can see why Fox wanted to try this.

I wouldn't be surprised if nerves are part of the issue. It doesn't take a lot to be noticeably off when you are talking pretty continuously for 90 minutes. Also, his style is going to make the misreads of situations more obvious. The over excitement is his style, that's not going away so when he reads a play wrong, as all announcers do, it's more obvious than with others.

Lastly, he probably hasn't bad much time at all with his color men so part of the problem with his bringing out the best of them is likely a simple function of familiarity or lack thereof. Of course Johnson is also about as far from stuff upper lip English as you are going to get. I can easily picture Barton spending 90 minutes giving him the "what the #### are you all worked up about" smirk he gives Wynalda on occasion.

I think criticizing him for being loud and boisterous is not really a fair criticism of performance, more one of style. Fox hired him for that style so they obviously think its the way to go.

I agree we shouldn't criticize Gus Johnson for being Gus Johnson. I'm fine with loud and boisterous. I enjoy it, plus loud and boisterous is absolutely how you sell soccer in America - get people into the excitement of the big chance and the half chance. But you have to actually help teach people to identify those chances and distinguish them from a ball in the box. Johnson so far has been really bad at that, and that's the problem.

I don't think the problem is that his style makes the misreads more obvious, it's that he's making more misreads.

AVB says get out of your mother's basement already, nerds

"I don't use it because I don't believe in it," Villas-Boas said. "Sometimes certain tasks might not achieve specific physical data that rewards premium efficiency in terms of a physical performance.

That last one is probably the platonic ideal of a Villas-Boas sentence. That is some kind of jibberish.

And what was Palermo up to yesterday?

Just one guess...

Not that anybody here cares about rugby, but this is the most wins for Scotland in the Six nations, since 2006. 'This' being two.

Speak for yourself, peat muncher.

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