Official Football Thread

It's crazy how pedestrian Barcelona looks without Lionel Messi. There has always been talks of "the team carrying Messi rather than the other way around" but it's proven to be bullshit time and time again.
 
Meanwhile Sergio Agüero making up for the weeks where he went without a goal in a single game. Easily my favorite player in the game, makes it difficult to cheer against City personally.
 
50% missing Messi, 50% not having a proper replacement for him. Would be much less of a problem if they still had Alexis or Pedro. Also no Iniesta today. Also fuck off Newcastle and wtf Agüero.
 
The Flash said:
Meanwhile Sergio Agüero making up for the weeks where he went without a goal in a single game. Easily my favorite player in the game, makes it difficult to cheer against City personally.
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And Pellegrini ruins it by taking him off. Piss off Manuel.

Night Prowler said:
50% missing Messi, 50% not having a proper replacement for him. Would be much less of a problem if they still had Alexis or Pedro. Also no Iniesta today. Also fuck off Newcastle and wtf Agüero.
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No disrespect but I disagree. I'm as big of an Alexis fan as you can get but there's no way he would've made it a lesser problem to not have Messi on the team. They still have Neymar and Suarez out there, they do have the players that can take over a game single-handedly but Messi's influence is so grand that they look clueless out there. Alexis is a wild dog on the loose. Both him and Pedro are finishers not creators. Iniesta is a better argument though, Iniesta is one of the best bets available to be a catalyst who can fill in for Messi.
 
Night Prowler said:
50% missing Messi, 50% not having a proper replacement for him. Would be much less of a problem if they still had Alexis or Pedro. Also no Iniesta today. Also fuck off Newcastle and wtf Agüero.
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Pedro was shit last year, so I don't know about that. What bothers me more is that Enrique only rotates players and doesn't experiment with formation. I don't know why he strictly sticks to 4-3-3 when we clearly have a problem in the midfield. 3 attackers are useless without ball getting to them. I would like to see something different formation wise eg. classic 4-4-2 or 4-1-2-1-2. We were also unlucky today. Well deserved Sevilla.
 
I got fucked over in Fantasy Premier League. Bad. Kompany, Sagna, Mahrez didn't play, my goalkeeper was Krul and Pedro is on the bench today. Barring an Alexis Sanchez God Mode performance, I'm going straight back to last place in our league.
 
Chelsea aren't turning this mess around unless Mourinho stops being stubborn and spices things up. They desperately need quickness in their game.
 
His post-match interview :D "the referee is afraid to give Chelsea decisions"

Complete meltdown in the vein of Rafa's "fachts" and Keegan's "I'd love it if we beat them". O schöne Schadenfreude.
 
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Here's what I'd do with Chelsea right now:
  • Kurt Zouma would be the first choice center back. He's easily better than both Terry and Cahill, I have no idea why he's still considered a backup.
  • I'd bench Ivanovic, push Azpilicueta to right and play Baba Rahman on the left instead. Try to get some quickness from my full backs.
  • I'd go 4-3-3, play Matic as holding mid, Ramires as box-to-box and Fabregas as deep-lying playmaker; giving Fabregas more freedom to go near the penalty box without having to worry so much about the back. Bench Oscar.
And there you have it. The defense is placed further up the pitch, the midfield helps out the defense way more, full backs have more freedom to overlap which in combination creates the opportunity for a more direct, quicker style of play. Fabregas has the creative freedom that he needs, which makes him a goal-scoring threat which in turn takes pressure off of the attackers and gives Hazard more room to operate. I think Mourinho's vision of Fabregas is stuck in 2007-2008. Fabregas became a way bigger attacking threat later on in his career, he scored 9, 11 and 8 goals respectively in La Liga in his Barcelona tenure by having the freedom to go inside the penalty box from the middle. He only scored 3 last year and doesn't look like he's gonna score anytime soon this year.

Oscar is currently giving Chelsea a worse version of the two things that they need. He tracks back and defends which is a plus, but he doesn't defend nearly as well as Ramires. He dribbles and attacks from the center, but doesn't have the creativity or the touch that Fabregas has. He has no business in the starting lineup.
 
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They need someone better than Ramires for 4-3-3. I also don't think Zouma is better than Cahill or Terry yet, all 3 are in shit form.

Also, Mourinho had a meltdown in the press conference :D

 
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