General Football : Page 20 - The Arsenal discussion forum and community: One More in the Tolly

General Football

Claudius

Clrnc the ESPN simulation had AC Milan finishing 8th on 4 wins, 3 draws and 1 loss. In that simulation, the top 5 teams were all safe after week 7.

QuincyAbeyie

Claudius one thing is knowing after 8 games that you were safe after 7 games, but to be able to "throw the game" you'd have to already know you were safe before the 8th game. ESPN explicitly stated in that simulation that after round 7, only Real Madrid and City were guaranteed to go through, while only three teams were guaranteed to go out.

Claudius

Good good. Confirms the point that this is an unnecessarily brutal format.
UEFA will love it because there are 2 extra match days and people will be glued to their TVs for those last two rounds.

flobaba

Claudius all about that Heineken TV money.

USArsenal

This will be a certifiable nightmare for the players and the clubs, with extra matchdays in the middle of an already crowded fixture list and international crap. They thought players were burned out at the Euros and the Copa... so lets make them play even more in the season directly following.

Sicario2

USArsenal

It will be fine - the carabo cup will just be sacrificed by literally youth players imo

Clrnc

Sicario2 Watch Odegaard and Saka strut their stuffs there

goon

To be fair the format does seem like it’s a lot more interesting than the current group stages.

Mirth

goon yep, I'm reserving judgement. The Champions League is suppose to be the pinnacle of football, any attempts to improve it or drive engagement are fine by me. It's the pointless international friendlies that need scrapping.

Meatwad

it needs to be as hard as possible. it's really the only good thing about football these days.

awooga83

I think it'll be very boring basically 24/36 progress through to the next phase so the league aspect becomes a bit of a non event. It's designed to ensure the bigger teams progress. You'll play enough games in the lower seeded teams to probably nearly qualify without caring goo much about the game against the top tier teams. I think it'll make the group phase pretty boring and about conserving your reserves and pick and choose what games to target to hit the points you'll need.

Claudius

awooga83 i think there is some value in finishing top 8 because you keep those seedings. So if you want to avoid Real Madrid for a few rounds, it’s a great incentive. If we finished 9th, went into two extra games and then had to play the 8th place team, there would be some recriminations.

awooga83

Yeah that would be nice but ultimately you won't want to exit the champions League and it seems that's incredibly unlikely based on the way the group stage is structured your still going to be in it most likely when it hits a knock out format even if you ended up in the play off. The jeopardy is removed which tends to make the first phase pretty dull.

goon

awooga83

Thats more jeopardy than the current group stage. Essentially ‘second’ no longer guarantees you progress and results in extra games, while giving teams a bigger incentive to finish ‘third’.

It basically increases the importance of each position in a traditional group and gives smaller sides a better chance of making it into the knockout phase against teams who would have traditionally gone through to the last 16 with ease.

invisibleman18

The new "random" electronic draw means it can be more easily rigged too.

awooga83

I guess we'll see I don't think it helps smaller teams. I think the whole design concept is to ensure the big boys always progress and it's an attempt to give them something in line with what the super league was after. Outside of that only 12 teams actually crash out so I think most of the top European sides should be fine staying in. It's not ideal hitting the play off outcome but if you misstep and end up there well that's another chance to still be in the champions League.

How they sort the fixture even For arsenal as 2nd pot it means we have 4 games against opponents seeded below us. If you come through them your probably almost guaranteed to progress in some way even if it ends up being the play off without counting some bonus results. I'm not sure that's great jeopardy myself but we'll see. I think these things have led to less interesting early stages in the international tournaments that expanded. Maybe this will be different

goon

awooga83

We’ve progressed past every group stage we’ve been in over the last 25 years and without having to play in any play off, and it’s rarely ever been close.

Under the new format, teams who finished second comfortably this year will now have to get past a lower ranked team in a knockout game. In theory, that could have meant that PSG would have to play Barcelona in the play offs rather than progress straight through to the last 16. I’m not sure how that can be considered easier.

It’s all relative - and the current group stages sucked.

awooga83

goon I'm not saying that the current version is great I just don't think this does anything to make it better.. The big league format with seeded fixtures I just think makes it super easy for the big teens to progress.

I think the playoffs are also seeded based on the description
"In the knockout phase, the teams that finish between 9th and 16th will be seeded in the knockout phase play-off draw, meaning they will face a team placed 17th to 24th – with, in principle, the return leg at home"

So I think you'll still avoid that PSG v Barca outcome and most crazy fixtures you could get in that phase. It basically is what it always has been knock out is when it's becomes real tournament the rest is a waste of time to get there and I think it's even more weighted for the big teams now.

Big Willie

goon We’ve progressed past every group stage we’ve been in over the last 25 years and without having to play in any play off, and it’s rarely ever been close.

Think we were knocked out a few times in the early 2000s. Fucking Deportivo and Valencia were our achilles heel those days. Shame because Bergkamp was doing magical things to Juve and Leverkusen back then and we should have had enough to go through.

Burnwinter

I think the new format might help us and hinder some of the recent European juggernauts in relative terms, seems to put a little more weight on consistency than brilliance. It's a tough ask for the players but as entertainment I think it might be quite good.

The international breaks are boring but they're a necessary part of football—I'd actually hate it if FIFA's right to call players up was undermined, it'd just be yet another example of money setting the script for the sport.

Claudius

Burnwinter the system will break at some point. A lot of young fans, particularly folks I talk to in the USA resent the concept of international football. They now at the altar of big club football. I grew up on fun tournaments like the Euros and Afcons of the 90s, USA94 etc., so have a very fond association and strong bond with international footy. A lot of younger fans just see it as nothing but a hindrance to the next superstar gathering.
At some point, players will rebel. Or the football system will break when US owners finally get their quorum and force a breakaway.

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