General Football Discussion

[Orange14]

Atlanta is a pretty nice place to live but it's big in terms of population and size. They play matches in the American football stadium and were drawing crowds of over 60,000. Normal soccer seating is 42,000 but they can use all the seats bringing it up to 72,000. In contrast, my club DC United have brand new stadium but it only seats 20,000. The club set an attendance record this year.

It will be interesting to see how Frank does over here. We have a larger number of teams and there is no promotion/relegation. Like all American sports there is a post-season championship involving the top teams so winning the regular season division is not as important.

[SPL]

Do you ever go and watch DC United live?

[Orange14]

Do you ever go and watch DC United live?

I try to go to a half dozen matches a season. The team was quite poor for several seasons and Wayne Rooney's arrival changed things around. The general problem with our league is the quality of the football is quite poor in terms of ball movement. The best American talent go to Europe early which is good for their career.

[Orange14]

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/24/spor ... lands.html is a really nice article in today's New York Times on what is ranked as one of the top 20 rivalries in world football. Apparently it is a destination match for a lot of Euro football supporters.

Maybe Cruijff can figure out a place on the Dutch section to post this; I could not find an appropriate section. I'm sure some of them would enjoy this!!!

I still think Ajax-Feyenoord is more important!!!

[Orange14]

Brexit's impact on the Premier League: https://www.theguardian.com/football/ng ... ier-league

[SPL]

Only real change if we leave EU is that EPL clubs cannot sign any overseas player before their 18th birthday ,this is FIFA law.Obviously EU has freedom of movement thus EPL can sign our 16 year olds.

[Orange14]

The man who brought us four straight Eredivisie championships, Frank de Boer, is now the manager of the Atlanta team in our top division professional league. He brought his team to Washington last night to play my local club DC United. Atlanta is the defending champion and their former manager Tata Martino now is head of the Mexico NT. DC United won easily on a cold rainy evening 2-0. It will be interesting to see how de Boer does this season.

[Manneken Pis]

The man who brought us four straight Eredivisie championships, Frank de Boer, is now the manager of the Atlanta team in our top division professional league. He brought his team to Washington last night to play my local club DC United. Atlanta is the defending champion and their former manager Tata Martino now is head of the Mexico NT. DC United won easily on a cold rainy evening 2-0. It will be interesting to see how de Boer does this season.

Third defeat in four matches for FdB. Looks like he's heading into the same trajectory as at Inter and Crystal Palace...

[Ayman]

If you think about it, Ajax are setting a new precedence. By inspiring clubs from smaller leagues to emulate them. People look at Ajax's performance, despite what Real Madrid are going through, by all accounts it's impossible to overturn such a deficit. But Ajax turned conventional wisdom on it's head. That is what can wake other football clubs. Not to mention how they changed their purchases of experienced players along with homegrown talents. It's a recipe for those who dare not dream. Now all Ajax have to do is go as far as possible and keep this up in consecutive seasons

[SPL]

I cannot think of another club that has had such a big influence on the game. Milan coach Gattusso wants AC Milan to play like Ajax but admits its in our tradition to play the way we do.

Before they played PSG Man u coach said Ajax result should encourage them to overcome 2-0 .

[Orange14]

All four EPL teams are through to the quarter finals of the CL along with Juventus, Porto, and Barca. Not too many weak teams left. Ajax will have their work cut out for them in the next round but they are fearless!!!

[SPL]

Real Madrid was the biggest club in the competition we will fear no one .

[SPL]

We get Juventus but apart from Porto and maybe Spurs all the other sides left are very tough.Spurs v Man City winners v winners of our game for semis.

We can hope Ronaldo gets injured or is missing as he carries them and is still a great finisher. Anyway we went to Madrid and won so no fears.

After Salzburgs win last night(they were ko'd by Napoli), Austria are ahead of Netherlands in UEFA Coifficients .We need to get a draw to go ahead of them so that the 2019/20 champions qualify automatically for 2020/21 CL

[Orange14]

We get Juventus but apart from Porto and maybe Spurs all the other sides left are very tough.Spurs v Man City winners v winners of our game for semis.

A chance to get some revenge for the PK shootout that Ajax lost in 1996.

After Salzburgs win last night(they were ko'd by Napoli), Austria are ahead of Netherlands in UEFA Coifficients .We need to get a draw to go ahead of them so that the 2019/20 champions qualify automatically for 2020/21 CL

Dutch teams have been terrible in Europa League competition over the past years (other than Ajax's run to the championship two seasons ago). This is the thing that has really hurt the Eredivisie. I think all the qualifying teams went out in their first matches this season.

[Cruijff]

Very strange that UEFA draws the two biggest favorites for the Champions League, Juventus and Ajax already in a quarter final

[kezme44]

juve it is then. again, not as good as people might think. their center backs are old and slow, and they will struggle with our front 3. i hope the ajax coaching staff watch the atalanta bergamo-juve copa italia game where an offensive atalanta put juve away. another example was the first atletico game, but they got punished in the 2nd game because they sat back. of course the issue will be veltman going against ronaldo. but i believe we can do it

[rjf1]

We just have to be careful about the last 10 minutes of each half which is when they will put on a big counterattacking push. We have gotten burned this way too often in the past by Italian teams.

[Ayman]

Remember Ronaldo could be suspended for the first game subject to a UEFA investigation

[boro'ajax34]

The way city and spurs are defending our forward players will be having the time of their lives!!

[Cruijff]

The way city and spurs are defending our forward players will be having the time of their lives!!

Who can call this defending?
Even a bottom table Eredivisie team like De Graafschap showed in Eindhoven against PSV they can do in their defense a much better job than these jokers.

[boro'ajax34]

Both are showing they cannot handle the high pressure defending that ajax will put on them.

[Amol]

I like it when Man City and Tottenham let in 3/4 goals and keep attacking its called exciting. When Ajax does it, we're called naive.

[boro'ajax34]

What a great result this will be if Tottenham hold on. Man City much the better team, Tottenham getting away with this big time. Plus son would be suspended for first leg and Kane currently injured
**plus dele alli has got to be one of the most overrated midfielders I have ever seen

[Amol]

What a great result this will be if Tottenham hold on. Man City much the better team, Tottenham getting away with this big time. Plus son would be suspended for first leg and Kane currently injured

Yeah I'm rooting for Tottenham right now.

[boro'ajax34]

Man City have so many match winners in comparison, much rather be facing up to alli and llorente than de Byrne and auguero