Europa League 15/16

dreamlord

Couldn't find a thread. Some tasty draws in the Round of 16.

Shakhtar Donetsk v Anderlecht
Basel v Sevilla
Villarreal v Bayer Leverkusen
Athletic Bilbao v Valencia
Liverpool v Manchester United
Sparta Prague v Lazio
Borussia Dortmund v Tottenham Hotspur
Fenerbahce v Braga

Clrnc

Probably one of the best draws in Europa League history. Pretty sure Dortmund will do Spurs, and Liverpool might knick it against United.

Since Italy only have Lazio left in Europe this season I am not worried by the coefficients. Would want all the english clubs to get knocked out.

Qwiss

That Liverpool United tie might mean I actually watch a Europa league game this season, maybe.

Mirth

Clrnc wrote:
Probably one of the best draws in Europa League history.

Agreed!

y va marquer

That's pretty damn good,in a way more interesting than the almost inevitable line-ups heading for the CL quarter final stages

Meatwad

i'm actually going to watch a few of those ties.

Biggus

y va marquer wrote:
That's pretty damn good,in a way more interesting than the almost inevitable line-ups heading for the CL quarter final stages

Would you say we should re-align our expectation's?

I remember back in the good old days (last week) when people scoffed at the Europa league.
Wenger couldn't win it anyway its still to difficult for his standard.

y va marquer

I said nothing about us and wasn't thinking about us when I posted that.
The Europa League is still a Micky Mouse affair but Liverpool v United and Spurs v Dortmund look like good fun ties for the neutral given the potential for drama and heartbreak for old enemies.

Mirth

Biggus wrote:
y va marquer wrote:
That's pretty damn good,in a way more interesting than the almost inevitable line-ups heading for the CL quarter final stages

Would you say we should re-align our expectation's?

I remember back in the good old days (last week) when people scoffed at the Europa league.
Wenger couldn't win it anyway its still to difficult for his standard.

I don't fucking want to play Midtjylland if I can help it thanks.

MistaT

Haven't watched a minute of Europe League this year (highlights aside) but oddly this ties interest me more than CL ones right now. CL has got a little stale in my opinion.

Biggus

No, I'm just being the little boy who's pointing at the naked Emperor again.

A few years ago my hatred of Tottenham diminished- We have bigger fish to fry (Man Utd & Barcelona)I said, these are our biggest rivals not that little team.
But now things have changed we have regressed, and are not CL class anymore and are very much rivals with Sp#%s again.
I would be delighted if we won the Europa league.

Burnwinter

Funny way of looking at it, since that constellation of clubs, United, Barcelona, Spurs, has hardly remained relatively fixed.

Barcelona have gone to another level since The Invincibles, beating United in the league is now a minimum requirement, whereas if we put daylight between ourselves and Pochettino's Spurs this year we'll win the whole league.

Biggus

These are strange days Burnsy.......

jones

Not sure why people scoff at Europa League, there was some very good football on show in the last round. If we were in place of one of the weaker teams this round I wouldn't be confident of us winning the whole thing at all.

Mirth

jones wrote:
Not sure why people scoff at Europa League, there was some very good football on show in the last round. If we were in place of one of the weaker teams this round I wouldn't be confident of us winning the whole thing at all.

Because it's not the Champions League, obviously. No doubt there's some good teams in there and the quality is decent but the fundamental fact is that the best teams in there aspire to be in the Champions league, the games are on Thursdays which impact on form in the league and the recognition for winning the Europa league (which, like you said, isn't a given) is minimal at best.

So that's why people scoff at is, no matter how exciting Dortmund v Tottenham is.

jones

That's all well and true but I'm obviously not talking about the reputation of the competition but the quality of football. Of course as a supporter I wouldn't want us to be in it but I found it funny that people here don't even watch any of the games as if it were beneath them.

Biggus

I think the CL should be enlarged to include many of the Europa league teams, maybe groups of 6 teams instead of 4, it would share the wealth around a bit more.

Mirth

jones wrote:
That's all well and true but I'm obviously not talking about the reputation of the competition but the quality of football. Of course as a supporter I wouldn't want us to be in it but I found it funny that people here don't even watch any of the games as if it were beneath them.

Not really, people moan about how boring the CL is as well these days

Biggus

Its only boring because its an exclusive restricted club.

Tony Montana

The group stages are crap although I like that they've mixed up the seedings.