Football Banter

(27-02-2020 22:57 )snookered Wrote:  Shocked that Arsenal and Celtic lost at home to get knocked out the Europa League.
Only Man Utd, Rangers and my lot left in of the British representation.
Would have been nice to have 5 teams rather than 3. Oh well .

Unfortunately Celtic’s defence was all over the place and silly mistakes and lack of coordination, really should have tried to calm things down after the penalty but not to be.

(27-02-2020 22:57 )snookered Wrote:  Shocked that Arsenal and Celtic lost at home to get knocked out the Europa League.
Only Man Utd, Rangers and my lot left in of the British representation.
Would have been nice to have 5 teams rather than 3. Oh well .

I guess I'm rooting for Wolves out of that lot then, your team would probably do a better job if you get Olympiacos

(27-02-2020 23:03 )HLO Wrote:  

(27-02-2020 22:57 )snookered Wrote:  Shocked that Arsenal and Celtic lost at home to get knocked out the Europa League.
Only Man Utd, Rangers and my lot left in of the British representation.
Would have been nice to have 5 teams rather than 3. Oh well .

I guess I'm rooting for Wolves out of that lot then, your team would probably do a better job if you get Olympiacos

I think Wolves have an excellent chance, Inter Milan are the clear favourites for me, but I would fancy Wolves to get by everyone else over a 2 legged match.

Sevilla, Roma and Inter Milan are all very tough. Would prefer a medium strength draw that is testing but winnable if my lot play well.
I think maybe someone like Basel or Wolfsburg would be ok. Tough but not ridiculously so.

606 at the w/end will probably feature the Arsenal fans moaning about being w/out champions league football next season and wanting Arteta sacked, Man Utd fans bigging up their Europa league chances and saying how brilliant Solskjaer is, Man City fans still moaning over being banned from CL!! and Wolves fans just being Wolves fans - not being big headed but quietly fancying their chances

(27-02-2020 23:22 )snookered Wrote:  Sevilla, Roma and Inter Milan are all very tough. Would prefer a medium strength draw that is testing but winnable if my lot play well.
I think maybe someone like Basel or Wolfsburg would be ok. Tough but not ridiculously so.

Wolves v Olympiacos. Not the worst draw. Think it fits your "medium strength draw that's testing but winnable" criteria

Apparently Man United are now favourites to win the Europa League!

Nah..not for me...if I was going to put money on an English side who I thought could go all the way and win it I’d say Wolves.

Wow the player who scored the goal who knocked Celtic out has been arrested and charged with assaulting a police officer

https://twitter.com/STVSport/status/1233332275896606720

it looks more like the copper took the hoof tried to stop the player and fell into the advertising boards

Makes Celtic and the Scottish police look like a bunch of Fannys

Gianni Infantino is leaning towards Arsene Wenger's view of offside, daylight between the players. If the law is changed to this it will make football worse. For one thing it wouldn't stop the long ass calls looking for a millimetre offside as it will just change to a long ass call looking for a millimetre onside instead. The time it takes to make a call is worse than the fractional offside in my book, a change like this wouldn't solve that issue at all

Then there is the issue of defenses playing deeper as as result, so be prepared for a lot more defensive, bus-parking, Tony Pulis, Sam Allardyce style games. The article also said this offside VAR problem is only happening in the Premier League, from the European football I watch I have to agree, they don't have to reinvent the wheel just because the standard of refereeing in the PL is atrociously laughable, where the refs don't actually understand the rules of the game and go out of their way to over complicate EVERYTHING

https://www.skysports.com/football/news/...w-proposal

I would think if anything they will probably trial it next season, and if it still causes confusion scrap it and go back to square one!! And we would be nowhere NEARER to clear and definitive resolution. it is always going to be one decision that will raise the most controversy and I feel how it is handled on VAR atm, just brings down the credibility of the system able to make correct call on offside itself.

I think if they eventually scrapped VAR altogether, then i suggest managers should be given four challenges per match (2 per half) to any refereeing decision, wouldn't that be far simpler? or does anyone have any better ideas?
Also should the referees explain certain decisions in post match interviews, so that everybody knows WHY that particular decision was taken at the time? Robbie Savage has been advocating that to happen for years on 606 and I think some people have been in agreement with him with it, personally I would like to think referees should be given an opportunity to explain a decision, but I also think somehow it may be far better if a referee's match reports on certain incidents were posted online on the FA's site,and then we can see why that decision was taken. If we have the best football league in the world then why are our refereeing standards not even matching that aspect? Would it be easier to have top referees from around the world or from Europe refereeing games and in doing so, would it help to bring our refereeing up to a far better standard?