Has that loss just won us the title?

[Anonymous]

This coefficient thing is an interesting factor. Personally, I don't care what group we are in as I want us to play and beat the best there is. I want the opportunity of seeing City against the "big" clubs irrespective of where in the draw that maybe.

 

[Project]

The EL has to be treated exactly the way Spurs are treating it - with utter contempt. It's no coincidence that tey are flying in the league now that their squad isn't being stretched.

The league is absolutely winnable this year. We should be pouring all of our resource into winning it. While the coefficient is important, league titles are more important. And I'm confident a second string side can do well in that tournament anyway.

 

[bluebanana83]

Like any cup, I expect us to go in and try and win it. Simple as. I'm sick of this tiredness excuse. There will be two games a week max, and if I was a player not seeing as much action as I hoped I'd be relishing the challenge.

We have enough in our squad to have a good go if we do go out of the CL to win the EL. It's players like Zabs, Kolo, Hargreaves etc that will get plenty of match practice and will also make them more useful in PL and other important games as they won't be ring rusty.

More games the better, lets not get all arrogant like the rags. Unless a monumental catastrophe happens we will be in the CL again next season, so it's not like last season where we had to 100% put everything in to ensuring we qualified for it, and we still managed to win the FA cup.

Our squad is stronger, more cohesive, and has a winning mentality. These games are there now to stake a claim to play in the PL games. Balotelli and Milner are great examples of how they used the Carling Cup to get back into the starting line up for the PL.

If we drop down in the EL, I think the mood will be different than last year and we will embrace it and want to win it. I think it was more of a distraction last year when we though it could effect our league position.

 

[Anonymous]

i'm staying POSITIVE, POSITIVE, POSITIVE!!!

i'd play our second string in every cup until we reach the later stages and just completely go for the league.

 

[TTS]

It all depends, for me, on whether we can jump up a pot in the UEFA rankings for next season because of a strong Europa League run. Has anyone worked this out? I haven't got the time.

I'd be happy with RM putting out a team like this:

----------Pantilimon---------

PZ-----KT-------Savic-------Bridge

-------NDJ----Razak----Hargreaves

----AJ------Dzeko------Kolarov------


Not very exciting, and certainly wouldn't win us the thing, but we'd probably get through a couple of rounds and be able to keep everyone sharp. Looking at that, we could certainly do with a fourth striker.

 

[Prestwich_Blue]

The EL has to be treated exactly the way Spurs are treating it - with utter contempt.

Have you forgotten the excitement of Hamburg and the chance of European silverware? OK it would be a bit of a let-down in some ways after having been in the CL but I would certainly welcome a European semi and final, even if it's only the Europa league. We haven't done a domestic and European double since 1970.<br /><br />-- Wed Nov 23, 2011 3:18 pm --<br /><br />

It all depends, for me, on whether we can jump up a pot in the UEFA rankings for next season because of a strong Europa League run. Has anyone worked this out? I haven't got the time.

The co-efficients are weighted in favour of the CL as I recall. We need about three decent seasons in the CL to get into pot 2 I think.

 

[fuzz barricade]

I %100 Agree with Tolmie

to the rest of you WHY is it so hard to get through your thick skull that being in the europa league DOESN'T THAT IS DOES NOT mean that we will be playing the first team in the competition. it would proberly be whichever players miss out on the starting line up in the premier league the weekend previous will then play in the europa league and all i see it as a good competition to develop our younger players, keep more players happy throughout the season, get our coifficent up , and potentially put another trophy in the cabinet alright it's not the big one but it's a start. I just don't see how it is a hinderence if we don't even send the likes of aguero , Silva ect.
this is all IF we don't go through.

see you all 7/12/2011

 

[Mad Eyed Screamer]

I want us to win the Europa League.

For the last couple of years, the fans have been dreaming of winning it.

Let's not get too big time.

We need to get our co-efficient up with UEFA and avoid another Champions League group of death next year.

It's a European trophy and across the continent, has plenty of kudos.

We will be the strongest side in it. I don't think the Thursday nights will help though, in terms of games now being moved to Sundays in Prem.

We are big time now. Maybe you need to shake off the old 'small time' attitude.

What would you say if a dropped point at home to West Brom, brought on by fatigue from a Thursday night trip to Ukraine, cost us the title?

The league is right up top in our priorities and the Europa League is bottom.

Big Time?

I don't have a small time attitude, I have a winning attitude. I want to win every trophy we compete for.

We have won one FA Cup so far and I have waited 35 years to fucking see it.

That's it nothing more, we are top at present. Much as it may shock you, we could end up with nothing this season, if we put all our eggs in one basket.

We are big time, publicity and hype wise, by fortune of the results we have achieved so far, but we are not big time until we are consistently winning silverware across the board.

We started somewhere last season and that's all it was a start. Your definition of big time and mine seems very different.

Mine is emulating what United, Chelsea, Barca and Real Madrid have done.

Ask United fans what winning the European Cup winners' Cup against Barca did for them in 91.

You belittle the achievements of the City team that also won it back in 1970, are you saying we and they were small time then, also?

We desperately need more European experience ahead of next season and we get that in the Europa League.

Our squad is also good enough and big enough to rotate between Thursday and Sunday.

Agree - the Scousers won the UEFA cup early years 2000 and then 2/3 years later lifted the CL.

How many more games would we play in the UEFA cup than if we won the CL??
What's the difference with going to the Ukraine on Thursday and having to play West Brom on a Sunday, than having to go to Moscow on a Tuesday or Wednesday and playing West Brom on a Saturday?

 

[MCFCinUSA]

No, this has scuppered our carefully laid out plans. Europa league screws up all the fixtures, and add to the mix the Carling and Fa cup games as well. We'll be playing Sundays, Mondays and Thursdays :(

Last night was a disaster, but they will be discussing plan B as we speak. If we win the Europa, we might just claw back some of that 10m in lost revenue.

From a footballing perspective, Napoli played us twice with the same mentality of absorbing pressure for long periods and counter attacking with precision. It worked for them. If I were a premiership manager, I would probably employ the same tactics. I think Liverpool away is now a much harder game than what we had at the swamp or spuds. The dippers tails are up after their Chelsea victory and they will smell blood from our defeat. If we win at Anfield it will show real character and then I will be more than confident of our title winning capabilities.

^^^^ yes

I think it's also worth mentioning that whatever matches we're playing in whatever competitions Manciti wants to win them all, and it's a given that any English team be playing twice a week no matter what if they're successful and chasing the title, domestic and European cups.

Europa does not help us, so hopefully we might still scrape through in the CL, but I'm sure our management team will make the best job of it they can if we don't - starting with a performance at Anfield that will look a lot different from the last one I saw us play there when (under Pearce) we didn't even try to score until we went a goal down, LOL.

 

[cibaman]

The problem with any of the cup competitions is that, no matter how minor they are, getting knocked out of them always creates a drama. If we lose at Arsenal next week it will create huge headlines, particularly after last night. If we end up in the Europa Leage, field a weakened team and get knocked out, the press will turn it into a crisis. Getting knocked out of the Europa League last season may have been a good thing in the end, but it could easily have derailed our season.