Europa League is the level the English clubs are at. No way is any English club Semi Final material, I'd argue not even Quarter Final either. I'd much rather be in a competition we can win than be in one we have no chance of winning like United and Arsenal were.
Let's NOT panic. The tradition of high scoring between the two clubs was maintained last night(19 goals in four matches) so everything is on course. So three English clubs left in Europe and only in the Europa. If we all get kicked out then where does the interest lie for everybody in Europe? I don't fully understand why people want our country's clubs to be kicked out of European competitions because if that happens we have less to interest us. Who here would tune in for a Lazio v Basel final for instance? I wouldn't because there's no interest and it just tells us that we are not good enough for Europe. But if there's an English team in the final there's far more for us to watch and sink our teeth into. Do we want to be laughed at by European clubs in return for laughing at our rivals' supporters? You might not like the Europa but winning it is a passage into Europe next season and that's where I prefer to be.
I'd like to get Benfica,and avenge 1962,when we were cheated out of the European cup final,With 3!! disallowed goals by Greavsie
Lazio for me. They were poor when we played them and we put 3 or 4 passed them. After what happened to our fans, revenge would be sweet.
Just a thought. Is the winner of the EL guaranteed a place in the EL next season? Do they bounce out a team that has otherwise qualified? Just thinking that this season the EL places *may* not be league based - Swansea from the league cup, the FA cup might just go to Wigan or the runner up of the FA cup might get the place... the 5th placed team might be the only EL league place. So what if say Newcastle won the EL? Presumably that following the CL precedent they would get the 5th place EL spot... wouldn't they?
Draw permitting no they aren't. If they got a favourable draw they'd get to the semi at best but sooner or later you have to play the better teams. There will be nowhere for Malaga and Galatasaray to hide in the QF and I duly expect them to get found out at this level, like Man U and Arsenal would have Uncalled for.
Utd were in charge and Real Madrid were chasing the game until the ref intervened. Real were favourites until Barcelona's recovery from a dodgy performance away to Milan- the same Barca who were tamed by Chelsea in the semis last year and even lost to Celtic this! And Bayern Munich didn't look world beaters on Wednesday night either! So which teams should the English teams consider themselves inferior to, DL?
Hugely disappointing DL, you said you'd argue they weren't QF standard...now you've gone and rolled over! No surprise you jumping on the weak standard argument, there's talk about it today, and most are quick to dismiss the hyperbole view that we're all ****. A culmination of things have led to no English in the CL draw. Evil group for City, United we know about, are you really saying you lot are **** with the names you have??, your managerial mayhem has caused it this season, nothing else. This season is a blip, its happened to other countries teams, the Spanish all got bombed out in other years but no-one said La Liga was ****e all of a sudden.
Read a Chelsea fan respond to Rio being recalled to the England squad by calling him "racist" - talk about an irony deficiency...
Looks a good draw in the quarters of the CL: Malaga v Borussia Dortmund Real Madrid v Galatasaray Paris Saint Germain v Barcelona Bayern Munich v Juventus Bayern-Juve could be a real classic in my opinion.
You mean when he disallowed Higuain's goal for no legit reason and failed to give a penalty/red card for the Rafael handball? Or what about the first leg when you scored from what should have been a goal kick but the ref inexplicably gave a corner? A 50/50 decision went against you (for a change) but few could argue over the 2 legs Real shaded it. United played very well in the 1st leg up until the red card which completely changed it though.
