It's weird, I'd love to see West Ham relegated (again) but then I do actually miss the times we can't play them...
I wouldn't mind them staying up if they got shot of Allardyce, Nolan and that clique. We need the quality of football in this league to improve drastically. For that reason I'm hoping QPR, Watford and Leicester/Forest/Leeds come up. Teams that play good football but also teams that can compete at this level and improve what we have.
What all the recently relegated teams who weren't good enough to stay up? West Ham won't stay up because they play slick football (the same can be said for many others too) but because they will be organised, resilient and determined enough to do so. Like it or not the key to picking up results for most teams is doing the ugly things - closing opposition players down, playing to a formation, concentrating for 90 minutes, putting bodies on the line etc. It's what makes our league stronger, not weaker and means wins are hard earned.
I'd like to see Watford come up, been really impressed with the job Zola's done and the way they play.
It can't have been easy integrating all those players but he did very well. Shame they bottled the playoff final last season. Palace offer nothing to this league.
To my thinking Holloway's a prat. It would be interesting if Watford came up and West Ham went down, that would really make Zola laugh but again he wouldn't survive in the PL.
Zola kept West Ham up, but was then sacked anyway. Stupid decision and they went down the next season, as per usual.
We should do them 3-0 with Bobby scoring. I know I know he might not be playing but if he is..................!
They "signed" a lot of the loanees in the summer. Obviously the owners own both clubs so I don't know if they bothered negotiating transfer fees but I suppose they probably loaned some players too.
Really - so Watford are owned by the same people that own Udinese, isn't there a rule against that, or is it only in the same country? http://www.watfordfc.com/news/article/130601-transfers-signings-201314-877020.aspx
Granada's owned by the same guy too. It would only have to change if 2 of his teams were playing in the same competition(so Europa League or Champions League). To me it just seems like cheating because those players they signed(and loaned before) were available to them and only them.
Some of us used to collect footballer cards, this guy seems to have taken it a little further. One from Italy, one from Spain and one from England is he going for the complete Europe set? There is no reason why these teams can't meet in competition and that could lead to all sorts of problems and potential corruption. If it's not against the rules it ought to be.
Remember when ENIC took over they also had stakes in Rangers, Basel, Slavia Prague, AEK Athens and Vicenza.
ENIC sold their interests in other football clubs back in 2007 to fund the takeover of Alan Sugar's shares in Tottenham Hotspur.
Pretty sure it is against the rules. I remember Abramovich had to sell his stake in a Russian club when they were drawn in the same group as Chelsea, although I'm sure he had a few connections there which is a bit dodgy. For the businessman it makes a lot of sense as Udinese and Granada clearly have a good amount of reserves doing nothing that are good enough for the Championship(a couple looked well above that level) so he's bought a club on the cheap and with little outlay has made them good enough to compete for the PL jackpot. Football ownership's a big mess though and whilst I think the Watford owner is cheating, if the PL/FA/FL can't work out that the Venky's were not suitable owners then there's little chance of Watford ever getting into any trouble.
