UEFA Champions League (2 Viewers)

Previous Next
zorro37 said:
The draw was rigged, apparantly. Look at this thread from a Liverpool forum posted 1hr and a half before the draw began.
Posted: Fri Mar 14, 2008 10:28 am Post subject: Possible leak of draw
Rumour going around draw has been leaked..... this is no doubt rubbish but if Rumour is true it's LFC - arsenal and Chelsea - fenerbache and manure v roma
No bookies will take bets on the draw either.......
Let the draw commence. Comeeee on!

A very good guess, or a UEFA scandal?
Click to expand...

wow, that's certainly curious!
 
geauxboy said:
Where's Juventus?
Click to expand...

They were not elgibile for UEFA competitions due to being demoted to Serie B in the point fixing scandal a couple of years ago.

They're back in Serie A now and will probably be in the Champions League next year.
 
superchuck500 said:
I don't know of a site that explains all the interplay, but I just kept looking up the various cups and leagues on wiki.

Here's what I understand about it:
Each nation has their own leagues. There are usually different levels or divisions- with a top level league and then lower leauges. England for instance has the Premier League- which is the top 20 teams and they play each other once (home and away) for a total of 38 games. Three points to win, one point to draw - and the league champion is the team with the most points at the end; no playoffs. Then there are the "under" leagues or divisions. (In England the next league down is the CocaCola Championship not to be confused with the UEFA Champions League - which is what people refer to when they say "Champions League" as explained below). But in all there are more than 400 football clubs in the English Football Association (FA), throughout the various leagues and divisions. Unlike in the U.S., a club can win and play up to a higher league, and likewise, a nonperforming team can be "relegated" to a lower league. That's pretty cool and happens every year. I think the bottom 3 teams in the Premier League are relegated each year. Also, within the clubs in English football, there are tournaments each year for different cups that each have their own history. One is the "league cup" (Carling Cup) and another is the FA Cup. These are tournament style competitions that intersperse with the club's regular league schedule (a match doesn't count for both though- so for instance, Man U. might play Tottenham in Round 4 of the FA Cup tournament and then play the same team again the next week in its Premier League schedule). One cool thing about the cup tourneys is that a lower rated club can put together some wins and theoretically could end up in the Cup final, with all the prestige and money that comes with it. (Sort of like George Mason going to the Final Four).

It is my understanding that most of the countries are set up this way. There's the Bundesliga in Germany but also lower division leagues, La Liga in Spain, and in Italy there's Serie A (top leauge, but also Serie B is the next league down). So that's how it goes.

Then there's the inter-league play. The UEFA is the Union of European Football Associations, which has tournament style play every year to award cups/championships to the winners of its two major tournaments that are drawn from qualifiers across the member leagues (which include the leagues from the nations of Europe).

The Champions League is the top UEFA class. It is made up of the top teams from the leagues in Europe, but the leagues have different rankings, which correspond to how many entries they get into the Champions League. Sometimes there are "play-in" style matches to set the field- and it gets relatively complicated. But in general, it allows for the top teams in various leagues to compete against each other for what is basically crowned as the champion of Europe. But again, these fixtures are apart from the club's regular league schedule and schedule with other cup tournaments going on. For instance, as of this Saturday, Chelsea would have played the Carling Cup Final versus Tottenham, a Premiere League match versus West Ham, a Champion's League match versus Olympiacos and an FA Cup match versus Barnsley all within a 14 or 15 day stretch (I think). So conditioning and depth of the squad is a big factor during these runs (for the top clubs).

The UEFA also holds the UEFA Cup tournament, which is sort of a next class down from the Champions League, but a tournament for qualifying clubs across the member leagues of Europe. Champions League clubs don't participate, and the various leagues have methods to set their entries. But for instance, the 6th place Premier League club will likely play due to the top 4 clubs being in the Champions League. The UEFA tournaments also run throughout the season and result in a final match, crowning the victor.

That's my understanding of it from a basic viewpoint. Someone else might have better info, or a website. FoxSoccer.com is pretty good.
Click to expand...

That's a pretty good assessment. :9:

The MLS is trying to get some of this started with other nations. We just played Japan and some other Pacific nations in one and I know that they have a Cup where four MLS teams play four Mexican league teams. Its nowhere even in the same stratosphere as the UEFA Cups but its a good start. The bad thing is that they always seem to do it during the MLS offseason so our teams **** it up due to bad conditioning and preseason-esque teamwork.

I really wish we could get a team or two in the Champions League. I know they would have little chance of winning but I think they would put up more of a good fight than analysts will admit. Last year, the then last place Galaxy (without Beckham still) only lost 1-0 to Chelsea and it was actually a well played game between the two.
 
I guess the problem might be that UEFA is Europe. But that would definitely be cool.
 
Yep, and that's why it will always be a 'wish' thing. It would be cool if they could take one team (the champion) from every league but that would take away from the Champions League so they'd never do that. It would also fall in with a lot of leagues offseason, ruining any chance at a true measuring stick.

Ah well, in a perfect world......
 
AndyG said:
It would be interesting to get some MLS teams involved in the FA Cup - it would present similar 'giant-killing' opportunities.
Click to expand...
No, no way. Could never and would never happen, the FA Cup has way too much history.
 
Barnsley has been amazing. I've actually heard them being mentioned in Louisiana. Crazy.

I agree the FA Cup will stay the way it is for a very LONG time. I would believe UEFA will crush any dreams of starting a World Cup of club teams in the same way people imagine oil companies squash more efficient fuels. They have the supreme product (other than the WC but that's every four years) of sports and I doubt they let some new thing surpass it. I'll predict we'll have a World Government before we have a World Cup of club teams.

But it sure would be cool.
 
It would definitely be cool for a club cup to be developed that included North American (or also South Am.) clubs. But it just couldn't be FA (the longstanding English Football Association), or doubtfully UEFA. It could be something that UEFA was involved with, perhaps, but it would have to involve other organizations.

It would be cool though.

And I agree Andy, it's a bit short sided to see European football as truly local. I don't think the World Cup would suffer from a global club championship - the "national team" component gives it a completely different dynamic.

The only thing I could see being a problem would be fitting another large tournament into the club schedule. It would have to be every four years or so- something like that.
 
AndyG said:
Just to clarify - I wasn't proposing including overseas teams in the FA Cup - merely stating that it would be interesting, particularly for MLS teams - as the format offers greater opportunities for an upset.

There is already a fairly low key world club championship - AFAIK a one-of game between the South American and European champions.
Click to expand...

They have a bit more of that now with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FIFA_Club_World_Cup. With more money being poured into it, it should carry more prestige, but with payouts along the lines of 5 million wont attract much.
 
We're down to the Elite 8!

USA TV Schedule:
Tues. April 1:
Roma v. Man U., 1:30pm EDT, ESPN2 (live)
Schalke v. Barcelona, 1:30 pm EDT , ESPN D (live); 4:00pm EDT, ESPN Classic

Wed. April 2:
Arsenal v. Liverpool, 1:30pm EDT, ESPN2 (live)
Fenerbahce v. Chelsea, 1:30pm EDT, ESPN D (live); 4:00pm EDT, ESPN Classic
 
Cristiano Ronaldo and Park Ji Sung ran the show for United tonight. They were shaky at times but Ronaldo was sheer class as usual. 36 goals in all competitions so far.
Looking highly like a Man Utd - Barca semi final which should be a cracker.
 

Create an account or login to comment

You must be a member in order to leave a comment

Create account

Create an account on our community. It's easy!

Register

Log in

Already have an account? Log in here.

Previous Next

Users who are viewing this thread

    Total: 3 (members: 0, guests: 3)

    Share this page

     

    Twitter

    Back
    Top Bottom