New CL Format Thoughts | After GW2 (pg13) | GW3 (pg33)

[Millwallawayveteran1988]

At least the Villa fans are getting some value for money! I know a Villa ST holder and he paid £79 for his ticket and it would have been £97 had he not been a ST holder!

 

[Tricky_Trev]

Starting to get interesting now.

Villa given themselves a great chance of finishing top 8. PSG’s top 8 hopes are looking slim.

A loss for Bayern/Barca tomorrow would be a nightmare too.

I think there’s quite a bit of pressure on us to get the job done tomorrow. Can’t lose pace on the top eight - especially given that this is probably our easiest remaining game.

We are going to need to beat Sporting away too, which won’t be easy this time.

 

[MCFC1993]

So 1 game where we both 'settled' for 0-0.

And possibly the 2 worst sides we've faced in the CL.

Not sure any amount of drama in the last game will make up for the first 7 games.

 

[ysmsa]

Arse letting the EPL down, at least the top 3 are English

 

[ysmsa]

Right lads, how do we get 55 national champions (and possibly the previous winner) into a group stage format? And we'd need several "history clubs" to keep the broadcasters (and the clubs) happy.
16 groups of 4 perhaps.

Well there is your problem, about 40 of those 55 national champions should be nowhere near this competition!

Like it or not "History Clubs" are of a far higher standard than some of the shite shoehorned into the competition.

How the hell Scotland doesn't get 2 automatic places is beyond me, I reckon Berwick would have beat our oppo' tonight

You mention the broadcasters but it's only possible because we all lap it up, you included.
Our match tonight is the highlight of my working week and probably every other Blue too.

 

[ysmsa]

Better quality games? You have to be joking.

If the Champions League was restricted to the League Chamions that would leave us with City, Internationale, Bayer, PSG, Sporting Club, Real Madrid, PSV, Club Brugge, Midtjylland, Sparta Prague, Slovan Bratislava, and Jagiellonia Bialystok. That is before we get around to to the likes of Lincoln Red Imps, UE Santa Columba, TNS, Larne, Shamrock Rovers, etc. etc.

So no Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, RB Leipzig, Juventus, Atalanta, Milan, Atletico, Barcelona, Porto, Benfica, Arsenal, Liverpool, Villa, Monaco. etc.

It is not going to happen. Harking back to the crap situations of the late 1970s to the 1980s, Forest won the European Cup in 1979 by beating Liverpool (holders), AEK, Grasshoppers, Koln, and Malmo. Forest retained the title in 1980 by beating Oster, Arges Pitesti, BFC Dynamo, Ajax, and Hamburg.

It would be a tough sell to sponsors and I suspect to many supporters. It is not going to happen.

The truth.

European Cup wins pre CL are fuck all compared to the current format.

Great in the day but Jesus, who were you beating.

 

[SkyBlueFlux]

Starting to get interesting now.

Villa given themselves a great chance of finishing top 8. PSG’s top 8 hopes are looking slim.

A loss for Bayern/Barca tomorrow would be a nightmare too.

I think there’s quite a bit of pressure on us to get the job done tomorrow. Can’t lose pace on the top eight - especially given that this is probably our easiest remaining game.

It just all has a feeling of just not really mattering though. If somebody good misses out on top 8 and they come say, 10th... oh well... they get seeded against 22nd or something and have to beat somebody like Club Brugge over two legs. Which they probably win. There's just no jeopardy in it.

Even in the old format it wasn't interesting until the last 16 when we might come across a half decent team, and that's still true - except now we have to put up with 10 rounds of fixtures against the likes Bratislava. It's a drag.

Sure, we will play PSG and Inter Milan, but as demonstrated already, winning those games has never really been less important. In the old groups of 4, losing home and away to a team like that could be terminal.

 

[East Level 2]

Well there is your problem, about 40 of those 55 national champions should be nowhere near this competition!

Like it or not "History Clubs" are of a far higher standard than some of the shite shoehorned into the competition.

How the hell Scotland doesn't get 2 automatic places is beyond me, I reckon Berwick would have beat our oppo' tonight

You mention the broadcasters but it's only possible because we all lap it up, you included.
Our match tonight is the highlight of my working week and probably every other Blue too.

Most of those "undeserving" national champions were ditched in the qualifying rounds. Only two of the four additional clubs at this stage are the "shite" you refer to.
I'd settle for a real European Super League with entry based on coefficients, if only because the rags might end up in the second division.

 

[urban genie]

I must be the onlyone it has grown on after intially not liking it.

Thank fuck it isn't 3 of the same boring teams played home and away like the goup, 8 diferent teams is a bit fresher and 3 fames in no one is assured of automatic qualification.

It is still a bullshit competion and a farce as it always has been since teams finishing 2nd, 3rd, 4th etc were allowed to be in it not Champions only in straight knock out ties from the start.

 

[Stoned Rose]

Too many daft teams in it.

The last 2 we’ve played would get beat by decent Sunday league sides.