Champions League 11/12: Page 40 - The Arsenal discussion community: One More in the Tolly

Champions League 11/12

y va marquer

Chelsea?
Yes, away for the second leg.

lorddulaarsenal

Oh then thats them out

y va marquer

Hopefully.

Over the course of the two legs how mind numbingly dull have these QF's been?
Completely lacking in any real competition or drama.
The second legs especially have been as poor as any early stage group game.

Watching Bilbao in Europa league has been more fun than watching this chronic tedium.

Tony Montana

Patters wrote:
Looks like Chelsea will be playing Barcelona days before their trip to the Emirates.

Lovely.

Stuff like this doesn't matter.

We had more than a full week to prepare and rest for QPR yet still lost.

Patters

Tony Montana wrote:
Patters wrote:
Looks like Chelsea will be playing Barcelona days before their trip to the Emirates.

Lovely.

Stuff like this doesn't matter.

We had more than a full week to prepare and rest for QPR yet still lost.

Right, nobody said it was a rule so citing a one-off example isn't particularly helpful from either end. But anyway- we had a 9 day rest before the Everton Away game whilst they played in between, and we beat them.

QPR played well and were difficult to beat on the day. Vermaelen had a nightmare and we lost. Whatcha gonna do.

Football isn't played on paper and, of course, there are no guarantees - but somehow I think it's tougher to play 2 tough fixtures in a week rather than 1.

y va marquer

Cool finish from di Maria.

lorddulaarsenal

Madrid n barca are streets ahead of anyone bar bayern

Patters

Bleugh. I think Benfica would've edged Chelsea out on away goals if the red card wasn't given. It was probably a red though so Benfica probably have themselves to blame.

y va marquer

Oooo Benfica have scored.
5 minutes or so to rid the competition of Chelsea

y va marquer

And so they get through.
What a horrible crew.

flobaba

y va marquer wrote:
Cool finish from di Maria.

That chip was just sik.

y va marquer

I enjoy watching di Maria, he's got a spark about him.

Captain

A little part of me thinks Chelsea have a chance at home to Barca. The rest thinks it's curtains and it's going to be horrible.

y va marquer

I want it to be horrible, I want them to suffer a complete drubbing at the Camp Nou.

Klaus

Here's a video of Jorge losing a couple of teeth against Real Madrid tonight: http://www.101greatgoals.com/gvideos/shocker-apoels-paulo-jorge-has-two-teeth-knocked-out-at-real-madrid/

One gets knocked out immediately. You can see it fly past the screen if you look closely. I love that he just pulls the other one out and throws it at the assistant manager. "You call yourself a tooth?!! You should be ashamed of yourself."

Captain

Could have put those back in if he was a little more careful.

Tony Montana

Patters wrote:
Tony Montana wrote:
Stuff like this doesn't matter.

We had more than a full week to prepare and rest for QPR yet still lost.

Right, nobody said it was a rule so citing a one-off example isn't particularly helpful from either end. But anyway- we had a 9 day rest before the Everton Away game whilst they played in between, and we beat them.

QPR played well and were difficult to beat on the day. Vermaelen had a nightmare and we lost. Whatcha gonna do.

Football isn't played on paper and, of course, there are no guarantees - but somehow I think it's tougher to play 2 tough fixtures in a week rather than 1.

We have a great record against Everton anyway.

If you have the quality you should be beating relegation teams. The middle bit makes sense. QPR were better on the day.

We have to make sure we rotate our squad enough when we are in more than two competitions at a time. Using fatigue is not an excuse. Sorry.

Tony Montana

Captain wrote:
A little part of me thinks Chelsea have a chance at home to Barca. The rest thinks it's curtains and it's going to be horrible.

A little part me thinks this too.

Please Barca just destroy them. Please.

Claudius

How predictable. The Final Four are Chelsea, Bayern, Madrid and Barcelona. Once again, it is important to note that these are the highest paying teams in Europe bar 2 - Manchester United and Manchester City. The latter can be excused for being rookies, while the former can afford a blip having recently attended 3 finals in 4 years. The predictability is even worse than in the league because this is supposed to be a cup competition where chance might create variety on occasion. This is not dissimilar to recent years, where the final stages are contested by the above teams and Inter who three years ago had a top 3 wage bill as well.

There are officially two types of teams that enter the Champions League. Those that hope to get as far as possible and make as much money as they can, composed of the likes of Napoli, Valencia, Arsenal, Spurs, etc. And then there are those that plan to win because their cash outlay allows them to, namely Barca, Madrid, Bayern, Chelsea and the Manchester clubs.

Financial FairPlay will probably only help entrench most of these teams bar Citeh, as they are the clubs with the highest turnover largely due to their Champions League success. To be honest, the only way to break this domination is by creating a Pan-European Super League where the members are relatively equally remunerated. The status quo will sustain these lopsided contests.

Klaus

I have a feeling that Chelsea will punish Barcelona at Stamford Bridge.

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