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Norway28695 Posts
On August 06 2007 04:34 Sadir wrote:Show nested quote +On August 06 2007 01:25 Liquid`Drone wrote:
i shouldn't really comment on anything other than the premier league
and in the premier league I picture chelsea winning this year. united is too vulnerable to injuries in several positions and is bound to end up in trouble during the phases of the season where most games are played. chelsea on the other hand was ridiculously unlucky with injuries last season (come on; both 2 first goalkeepers, among those the best goalie in PL (if not the world), end up injured for a long period of time in the same match.. it's just sick. ) terry and joe cole also out for long periods of time, and to top it off some early experimenting with fitting big stars in the team. mourinho is going to go back to the basics and play predominantly with wings this season which will be better. malouda is probably the best signing in the entire premier league as well, and they got several other class players almost for free.
i almost think tottenham can topple arsenal this season, I do think liverpool will get third but they just bought so many players.. might take a while before they're all ingrained in the system and it might make liverpool lose some important points early.
aston villa, newcastle and manchester city take 6 7 8. iirc United had a time in march where 5 defenders were injured Richardson was forced to play defender on one side
it's true that united lacked a lot of players at some points last season.. but having terry joe cole and cech out for long periods of time is still just.. more extreme. ronaldo pretty much wasn't injured at all. if he had been out for 3 months, united wouldn't have won the pl.
they were incredible last season and definitely worthy winners and all, not trying to take anything away from them. but chelsea really were extremely unfortunate.. it's not so much that I necessarily think united won't be able to follow up their season (although it's unlikely that they're able to win as many clutch points at the end of matches this season as well), it's more that I think chelsea will be quite a bit stronger.
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United
Chelsea
Liverpool
Tottenham
Arsenal
Man U for me take it again this year. Acquiring Hargreaves is big for them, and with Ronaldo and Rooney up front you've got a lot of goals. Chelsea will be strong as always, but I think they lack the attacking flair that Man U has which could cost them.
Newcastle, Everton or West Ham could be a darkhorse this year. Bolton will slide dramatically without big Sam, Sunderland will be relegated and come back in 2 years as per usual, Birmingham will survive.
Derby, Sunderland, Wigan to go down.
I'm looking foward to seeing how Torres goes in the EPL. Morientes came across with a lot of hype and was pretty horrible. Nani and Anderson look exciting.
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On August 06 2007 22:58 Liquid`Drone wrote:Show nested quote +On August 06 2007 04:34 Sadir wrote:On August 06 2007 01:25 Liquid`Drone wrote:
i shouldn't really comment on anything other than the premier league
and in the premier league I picture chelsea winning this year. united is too vulnerable to injuries in several positions and is bound to end up in trouble during the phases of the season where most games are played. chelsea on the other hand was ridiculously unlucky with injuries last season (come on; both 2 first goalkeepers, among those the best goalie in PL (if not the world), end up injured for a long period of time in the same match.. it's just sick. ) terry and joe cole also out for long periods of time, and to top it off some early experimenting with fitting big stars in the team. mourinho is going to go back to the basics and play predominantly with wings this season which will be better. malouda is probably the best signing in the entire premier league as well, and they got several other class players almost for free.
i almost think tottenham can topple arsenal this season, I do think liverpool will get third but they just bought so many players.. might take a while before they're all ingrained in the system and it might make liverpool lose some important points early.
aston villa, newcastle and manchester city take 6 7 8. iirc United had a time in march where 5 defenders were injured Richardson was forced to play defender on one side it's true that united lacked a lot of players at some points last season.. but having terry joe cole and cech out for long periods of time is still just.. more extreme. ronaldo pretty much wasn't injured at all. if he had been out for 3 months, united wouldn't have won the pl. they were incredible last season and definitely worthy winners and all, not trying to take anything away from them. but chelsea really were extremely unfortunate.. it's not so much that I necessarily think united won't be able to follow up their season (although it's unlikely that they're able to win as many clutch points at the end of matches this season as well), it's more that I think chelsea will be quite a bit stronger.
Chelsea fell behind pretty early but everyone thought their strength in depth would show near the end when it mattered but it never did. I think in the end Kalou, Shevchenko, Wright-Philips, etc, just didn't have the necessary quality to create goals when they needed to. Cech and Terry were largely present for the second half and they were behind but I think they had a stronger squad then and could've made the title race much closer if they seized their opportunities better. United did get lucky on several occasions and extremely extremely lucky vs Liverpool away at Anfield. But being forced to start Kieran Richardson who's bad to begin with, out of position at defense, O'Shea, Wes Brown, all at the same time, was like playing with a reserve defense and it did cost United quite a few points near the end. It was absolutely amazing for Evra to play as well as he did when he was needed the most. I think if he and either Ferdinand or Vidic were available vs Milan for both legs, United could've advanced to the final. But back to the league, both Chelsea and United dropped points near the end when they shouldn't have, and it was a combination of Chelsea's incompetence, a large lead, and United's amazing morale that gave them the title. The comeback vs Everton summed up United's season pretty well, they pulled through when it mattered the most on pure spirit. If they have are half as motivated this year and the injuries don't focus only on defense, they can take the title again.
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How did Pique do at Zaragoza last year?
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He wasent Great, but he did a pretty good job
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On August 06 2007 23:42 RowdierBob wrote:
Newcastle, Everton or West Ham could be a darkhorse this year. Bolton will slide dramatically without big Sam.
Where did Sammy go?
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newcastle. theyve been bringing in a lot of classy players, definitely watch out for them next season.
AHHH cant wait only 5 more days :D
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EPL is already starting????????????
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im suprised so many people see Sunderland being relegated. I guess im the only one under the ''roy keane'' effect.
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Norway28695 Posts
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Vatican City State1176 Posts
On August 06 2007 10:57 Musli wrote:La Liga: 1.FCB 2.Sevilla 3.Real Madrid 4.Atletico Madrid 5.Valencia EPL: 1. ManU 2. Chelsea 3. Liverpool 4. Hammers 5. Arsenal SerieA: 1. Inter 2. AC Milan 3. Roma 4. Juve  Ligue1: 1. Lyon Bundesliga: 1. Bayern M imo ;-)
u'll see Real Madrid will kick ass =)
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Danish League
Randers is owning atm, which is good, cause it's the town I'm from. FC Copenhagen and Brøndby, which are usually regarded as the best danish team, are struggling to get their game going, neither of them lying where they should (5 and 7 respectively). Odense and FC Horsens take up the 2nd and 3rd spot on the list, which is actually quite surprising since these are the teams you would expect to see struggling at the bottom.
Danish league is actually in reverse atm, with all the good teams at the bottom and all the "bad" teams at the top. 
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You guys are totally underestimating Arsenal, they were dominant in most of the pre-season tournaments winning both. I personally saw the game vs Inter Milan, Arsenal totally dominated the game. Van Persie is back and Hleb is brilliant, Arsenal will surely be competeing for top 3, just because Henry left doesn't mean the team will do worse, yeah its true, hes an amazing player, able to score a goal from nothing but Arsenal will cope.
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Henry... best clutch player? can't remember him doing anything special in CL,WC final
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Norway28695 Posts
still the best arsenal had haha
henry scored many many matchwinning goals in league games.
never that awesome in cl or wc finals, agreed. guess lehmann would be on the top but.. henry had matchwinning qualities. I don't see arsenal having that now.
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how about the dutch league?^_^ Don't watch it, it blows compared to the other big leagues. But if you are interested PSV, Ajax, Az or Feyenoord will win. (just like the last 70 years) Have fun
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with the bundesliga starting this weekend here are my opinions on the top teams this year.
bayern münchen - without a doubt THE favorite to win everything this season. after the disappointment of missing the championsleague they now try to buy back the success. it seems to have worked out well, and resulted in winning the preseason "ligapokal" with ease. And even though they struggled in the first round of the more important "dfp-pokal" against a team from the 3rd league they managed winning in the end (penaltys) which is all that counts.
their (most important) signings:
ribery seems to be worth the hype, played very good in all his games till now. the question is how long he can keep up his intense style of playing.
klose also does not have any problems adjusting and already scored a pretty important goal i have no doubts he will at least play an OK season.
toni hasn't done anything yet since he is injured. has barely any international experience and no one knows how he will play in a new leauge.
vfb stuttgart - last season the surprise champion, now is the time to prove this was not a fluke. they only lost 1 key player, their goalkeeper so keeping last times winning team together will be a plus. the big question is the champions league. they may have many overplayed or injured players, which will hurt them in the long run. they tried to compensate that by signing a couple good but not really great players to have a wider player pool. although they are the defending champions they are not really a favorite to win the league due to their young team and playing cl (didn't play international last season). i still think they will at least get 5th place but wouldn't be surprised if they did better. in cl they need luck to survive the groupstage.
schalke 04 - 2nd last season, i don't see them doing too much this time. they profited of weak bremen and bayern and still didn't manage to win the league. now with (inconsistent) lincoln sold and not getting appiah i don't see enough quality in their midfield. their advantages are that most of the team kept together and their defense. It will be enough to place somewhere at the top, but again they will win nothing.
werder bremen - they took a huge blow by having to let klose go to bayern. but they are know to replace keyplayers like it's nothing. the team has a lot of potential to be great or to fail. will diego play a great second season, or was the last one exceptional? is carlos albertos ego really as big as people say and if so will it make him suck? (bremen was also always pretty good at handling "difficult" players) will sanogo continue to score (4 games 4 goals) or like last season in hamburg start to suck? these are the questions to be answered on the field. the rest of the team looks pretty solid so i think they make top3
hamburger sv - (my hometeam so i am more informed about them, also biased  ) last year was the absolute horror. after qualifying for cl we lost 5 out of 6 games there and placed last in the league at halftime of the season. we got incredibly unlucky/stupid with injuries, red cards, and the last couple minutes of games it wasn't even funny. after thomas doll the coach was fired, luck and concentration came back with the new coach huub stevens. with van der vaarts return from injuries the second half of the season was the second best of all teams, placing us in the ui-cup and now due to our successful qualification the uefa-cup. so if all stays well we might be headed for cl this season. so the big question is, will van der vaart stay healthy? or better, how will we replace him when he gets injured? (which is likely ) he is our most important offensive player, the teamcaptain and -leader. he scores important goals and many of them, he is impossible for us to replace. but even without him the team could be strong enough for the top 5. we have 3 new key players, who seem very promising.
zidan - striker bought from mainz where he scored 13 goals in 15 matches last year. he is hoped to be the solution for our scoring weakness. he has great potential but has had problems in bremen before. so no one knows how he will handle his second "big club".
castelen - right winger bought from feyenoord rotterdam, i don't know much about him but he has made a great impression in his first couple games.
kompany - already signed last season but then only appeared in 6 games due to injuries. the gifted defender chose us over chelsea, lyon and a lot of money because he wanted to play and become an important part of the team. after a season of watching (drove to every league game in is car :D) football now he wants to play again and show everybody what he is capable of.
in conclusion, if vdv stays healthy most of the season we place 1-4, if not 3-6 :D
1. bayern
2. hsv
3. werder
4. stuttgart
5. schalke
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On August 05 2007 21:49 Adaptation wrote:
SerieA(Italian)
I have a lot less knowledge about the Italian Serie, but with AC Milans victory in the Champions League, it think they are favorites to take the title. But watch up for the return of Juventus...
The great favorite here is Inter Milan, buyed the strong defender Chivu from Roma and the attacker Suazo from Cagliari. They got greatest numbered/skill level of the league, so they should just win by dont give points to the small teams (as last year). Definetely favorite number one for title.
Back from Serie B is Juventus. The real mistery of this Serie A, got a new coach: the young and experienced Ranieri, and buyed a bunch of supposed talents around europe, while confirming the "storical" group -Buffon, Nedved, Camoranesi, Trezeguet, Del Piero...-. On the other side they got a totally noob management of the society that is at the opposite of the "mafia style - triade" Moggi-Giraudo-Bettega which provided several titles but also the revoke of the last 2 championships and the Serie B.
Then there is AC Milan, this is a "mentality factor" in the last 20yrs of the "Berlusconi Era", they always stayed on the "Champions League is the most important target". This kind of mentality never changed and this year they also have to play the "European Supercup" and the Tokyo game. Typical AC Milan situation is to loose manymany points during winter with small teams, this is always payed with the loose of the title, since teams like Juventus almost never leave behind points with small teams and the "Crack of the year" (sometimes roma or lazio or inter or some underdog) do the same.
This is the way you win in Italy: winning with small teams.
As potential underdogs there are Lazio and Roma: both solid, both with a great axe players-coach-society, both with a very defined and unique style of play... but on the other side, outnumbered on quality players by Inter and Milan for sure, and maybe by Juventus too... and both qualified in the Uefa CL, which will provide more stress and more effort which they are not used to know how to manage (remember 7-1 manu-roma last year...). You can be sure that if they go through the "group stage" then they will pay a lot in serie A.
Fiorentina could be the real great surprise of this year: no Champions league, an incredible supporter faction (full stadium of 40000 ppl, when declassed to italian 3rd division 4-5yrs ago, due to financial troubles), a great coach (Prandelli) known in Italy cause he works with young players like no one, a very ambitious management (Della Valle brothers, italian shoes kings...) that said "We wont really play for the title till 2010, when television rights will be equally distribuited but in that moment we will be ready", and of course a young stars fullfilled team: Pazzini could be the next sensation (Quagliarella style) and was the main reason Toni was sold to Bayern, Mutu got talent, Bojinov will have to accord to society plan or will be sold... No great known names other than these but a great team.
Underdogs with no chance for title, but maybe for a UCL position:
Udinese, got Quagliarella for something like 7mln, and got a superstar attack with DiNatale and Floro Flores. They can do good.
Palermo buying and selling here and there with appearentely no sense, but they definetely stronger than last years when they leaded Serie A for a couple of months, and finished with an enormous crisis (something like 5-6 points in last 15games) loosing champions league qualification too.
Genoa and Napoli back from Serie B with great ambition will defenitely crash on Serie A approach: they got a lot of hype from the city/press.
My personal surprise? Livorno, they sold the franchise man Lucarelli to some ucraina team, but they buyed with a lot of intelligence solid players and a great undervaluated talent, the attacker Tavano.
My hope: a young and cheap based team like Empoli, could confirm the Incredible league of last year!
Favorite for the title: Inter
Runner up: the CL teams (Milan-Lazio-Roma)
Mistery: Juventus (Anonymous year or title year? who knows)
Will play a great year for sure: Fiorentina (CL level)
Bye
edit: take a look here for rosters
http://www.gazzetta.it/Calcio/prob_form/mercato.shtml
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MURICA15980 Posts
Yo thanks for the write ups on the Serie A and Bundesliga. I only really follow the EPL and very little of La Liga so any other news is welcomed.
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EPT
