The Association Football Thread

[Ben.Daly]

Originally Posted by Fall

I really love this new jersey design. We've had some boring jerseys the last couple of years. The last cool jersey was the one we had in 2014-2015. Coincidentally we won the Champions League that year. The best jersey before that was our 2010-2011 jersey. We won the Champions League that year too

If this means what I think it means, I can't wait until next season

Definitely won of your best Jerseys of the past few seasons

I really hope Barca can figure things out. The management of the club has been quite poor recently, mostly in regards to transfers.
It's sad to see Messi having to carry the team in La Liga, the guy's got over 20 goals and 20 assists in the league alone and has been excellent the couple of times I've seen him play this season. He's recently said quite a few damning things in interviews about the direction of the club and in all honesty he's right, if they're struggling now who knows how things will go when Messi leaves possibly as early as next summer, not to mention other players such as Busquets, Alba and Suarez who are all still good players but getting quite old and will need replacing soon.
You guys are still in the Champions League this year, but the likes of Bayern Munich, Manchester City, PSG and a few others I think are in better positions to win it this season.
Especially Bayern Munich, when the Bundesliga was the first big league to return after Covid I watched a few Bayern games and they look like the best team in Europe at the moment. World-class players in nearly every position, many of which can fill in else where on the pitch. You could make a team of their players 25 years old or younger and it would still probably win the Bundesliga, that's taking out the likes of Lewandowski, Muller, Thiago, Neuer, Boateng, their quality is incredible to watch!
Maybe I'm the only one here particularly interested in all this at the moment but those are just some of my thoughts. Thanks for taking the time to read it if so!

[Fall]

Originally Posted by Ben.Daly

Definitely won of your best Jerseys of the past few seasons

I really hope Barca can figure things out. The management of the club has been quite poor recently, mostly in regards to transfers.
It's sad to see Messi having to carry the team in La Liga, the guy's got over 20 goals and 20 assists in the league alone and has been excellent the couple of times I've seen him play this season. He's recently said quite a few damning things in interviews about the direction of the club and in all honesty he's right, if they're struggling now who knows how things will go when Messi leaves possibly as early as next summer, not to mention other players such as Busquets, Alba and Suarez who are all still good players but getting quite old and will need replacing soon.
You guys are still in the Champions League this year, but the likes of Bayern Munich, Manchester City, PSG and a few others I think are in better positions to win it this season.
Especially Bayern Munich, when the Bundesliga was the first big league to return after Covid I watched a few Bayern games and they look like the best team in Europe at the moment. World-class players in nearly every position, many of which can fill in else where on the pitch. You could make a team of their players 25 years old or younger and it would still probably win the Bundesliga, that's taking out the likes of Lewandowski, Muller, Thiago, Neuer, Boateng, their quality is incredible to watch!
Maybe I'm the only one here particularly interested in all this at the moment but those are just some of my thoughts. Thanks for taking the time to read it if so!

You're not wrong about the club. The last time I felt excited about football was during the World Cup in 2018. I watched a Youtuber's analysis of Barcelona and he said pretty much the same thing. It's an aging team and Messi is being asked to carry it far too often. I will admit I was wrong about the signing of Ter Stegen back in 2014. He was a great addition and his development has paid off. There have been talks about Neymar coming back and I don't know how to feel about that. He's still a great player, but he left us when the club began to need him most. If he does want to return, I hope he's ready to put the work in and earn his spot. Having Griezmann, Dembélé, and Neymar up front sounds like an exciting combo.

[Ben.Daly]

Originally Posted by Fall

You're not wrong about the club. The last time I felt excited about football was during the World Cup in 2018. I watched a Youtuber's analysis of Barcelona and he said pretty much the same thing. It's an aging team and Messi is being asked to carry it far too often. I will admit I was wrong about the signing of Ter Stegen back in 2014. He was a great addition and his development has paid off. There have been talks about Neymar coming back and I don't know how to feel about that. He's still a great player, but he left us when the club began to need him most. If he does want to return, I hope he's ready to put the work in and earn his spot. Having Griezmann, Dembélé, and Neymar up front sounds like an exciting combo.

The Neymar situation is so tricky. I honestly think it's not worth it for Barca to bring him back, apart from the massive fee they'll also have to pay his wages. You'd possibly be paying wages for 2 of the 3 most paid players in Europe! Before anything Barca need to increase the size of their team, I believe in their last game they only had 16 players in the whole first team squad, that's shockingly low. The amount of Money that's been spent trying to replace Neymar with Dembele, Griezmann, Coutinho etc is far too much when there simply aren't enough players to choose from in the future.
It's a very unique situation for a club to be in. My gut feeling is that Barcelona will find a way to get through it all somehow, but worst case scenario the club could become the next AC Milan, which is probably unlikely but things can change quite quickly in this sport.
But for now, good luck on the rest of the Champions League campaign and hopefully next season will see some big improvements at the club!

[Alex Rien]

Leo Messi wins the 2019-20 Pichichi Trophy, the seventh of his career, a new, all-time
La Liga record!

[Ben.Daly]

Originally Posted by Alex Rien

Leo Messi wins the 2019-20 Pichichi Trophy, the seventh of his career, a new, all-time
La Liga record!

Incredible. Statistically wise this has been a poor season for Messi by his own standards, yet he's still top scorer in La Liga with 25 goals, and top of Assists for La Liga by a mile with 21

A mediocre league season for this man is about on par stats wise with Thierry Henry's best ever season at Arsenal (2002/03) with 24 goals and 25 assists in the Premier League
That's something no other PL player has done, get 20+ goals and assists, and Henry is regarded by most to be our best ever player. Yet Messi essentially equals Henry's best campaign when having a 'poor' season at Barcelona.

Unreal.

[Scruffydog777]

You guys do know Alizée at one time ran a school on how to become a football referee, but it was for American style football.

[Alex Rien]

The Ballon d’Or will not be awarded in 2020.

P.S.

We understand.
Besides, everyone knows who the best is.

[Ben.Daly]

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

You guys do know Alizée at one time ran a school on how to become a football referee, but it was for American style football.

This video is quite creative, can't say I know much at all about the sport but still a fun watch

Originally Posted by Alex Rien

The Ballon d’Or will not be awarded in 2020.

P.S.

We understand.
Besides, everyone knows who the best is.

The news about the Ballon d'Or is upsetting

https://www.goal.com/en/news/messi-r...2130ya96i7sh08

“lack of sufficient fair conditions”
Most leagues have returned to complete their seasons, sure it's all unfortunate but it's unfortunate for everyone. Because it's France Football's award I have a suspicion they might not want to see votes for Mbappe and Neymar at PSG go down and look bad on Ligue One considering they were the biggest league to cancel their season outright.
I guess there aren't any international fixtures but that only makes up for a small percentage of a Footballer's games even if there was an international tournament on.
Lewandowski is getting robbed, he's the front-runner for me, especially if Bayern win the treble which they have a better shot at than anyone. There's also Van Dijk, De Bruyne, Sancho, and a couple of others who could've posed a threat to the normal Messi/Ronaldo dominance.
France Football can do this if they want, they're not a governing body like UEFA or the FA, but it will be very upsetting for a lot of fans and players.

And yeah, I agree Messi is the best player in the world, though as I suggested he probably wouldn't be my favourite to win this year but it's still a close one, a lot of worthy candidates.

[Bamagirl]

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

You guys do know Alizée at one time ran a school on how to become a football referee, but it was for American style football.

This is great! Thank you, Scruffydog!

[Scruffydog777]

Originally Posted by Bamagirl

This is great! Thank you, Scruffydog!

It's kind of corny but I get a laugh out of it every once in a while.