What the fook was Ronaldo laughing at there. He’s an awful prick.
Feck didn’t know that about Villareal. Did they do anything in transfer market since last year.
Liverpool, PSV, Marseilles, A Madrid. PSV and Marseilles a repeat of recent years.
Not bad on paper, no trips to eastern Europe in winter, etc. Athletico will be tough but will be a novelty, plus sees the return of Luis Garcia. Overall happy enough
Villareal got two 0.0 draws against United when United went out back in 05. Its the draw that everyone wanted to see. United Celtic. Champions of Europe/England vs the Champions of Scotland. Its the game of the games.
Stop licking up to Bandage and Rock
[quote=“John Houlding”]Liverpool, PSV, Marseilles, A Madrid. PSV and Marseilles a repeat of recent years.
Not bad on paper, no trips to eastern Europe in winter, etc. Athletico will be tough but will be a novelty, plus sees the return of Luis Garcia. Overall happy enough[/quote]
I dunno…thats a tricky enough group for Liverpool…should come out of it but none of those teams will be a pushover away from home and all will be good at home
I like the oul sarcasm.
On second thoughts, it’s not as easy as I first thought. It could have been better. I’m happy to have got Athletico even though they were a very strong fourth seed so maybe that clouded my initial judgement.
BATE are going to get a fair cocking…Real, Juve, Zenit…nil points
Any word yet on dates?
Villarreal finishsed ten points ahead of Barca last year. Hope we go over there with a more positive attitude than we did in Camp Nou.
Pl W D L GF GA +/- Pts
1 Real Madrid 38 27 4 7 84 36 48 85
2 Villarreal 38 24 5 9 63 40 23 77
3 Barcelona 38 19 10 9 76 43 33 67
4 Atletico de Madrid 38 19 7 12 66 47 19 64
5 Sevilla 38 20 4 14 75 49 26 64
6 Racing Santander 38 17 9 12 42 41 1 60
7 Mallorca 38 15 14 9 69 54 15 59
8 U.D Almeria 38 14 10 14 42 45 -3 52
9 Deportivo de la Corua 38 15 7 16 46 47 -1 52
10 Valencia 38 15 6 17 48 62 -14 51
11 Athletic Club 38 13 11 14 40 43 -3 50
12 Espanyol 38 13 9 16 43 53 -10 48
13 Real Betis Balompi 38 12 11 15 45 51 -6 47
14 Getafe C.F 38 12 11 15 44 48 -4 47
15 Valladolid 38 11 12 15 42 57 -15 45
16 Recreativo de Huelva 38 11 11 16 40 60 -20 44
17 Osasuna 38 12 7 19 37 44 -7 43
18 Zaragoza 38 10 12 16 50 61 -11 42
19 Real Murcia 38 7 9 22 36 65 -29 30
20 Levante U.D 38 7 5 26 33 75 -
Celtic’s first game is away to Villarael on 16th Sept
then home to Abu… 1 Oct
The back to back is Manure
Initial thoughts before I have time to check things out in detail and conclude that Celtic will win the group:
We were the 6th team out of the third seeds pot and out of the remining possibilities at that stage I would have wanted Liverpool/PSV first, Lyon/Bayern Munich second and Manchester United/Villarreal last.
That was primarily because the European and English champions and La Liga runners-up looked quite a more difficult proposition than the other two pairs. However, it meant we couldn’t draw Atletico from Pot 4 and I was then very anxious not to draw Shakhtar either and Aalborg seems like a decent one to get - they’re managed by Bruce Rioch these days.
That said it might have been better in a perverse way to get one of the really tough 4th seeds as we’ll win our 3 home games in any case and it would probably have suited us to have strong 4th seeds who would take points from the other two teams and then our 9 points would definitely be enough to go through!
I need to do some research on Villarreal. I watched a bit of them last season and they’re riddled with South American players and then ex-EPL players like Rossi. I’m not sure if Cygan and Pires are still with them but they have Senna in their midfield and also had Nihat up front last season.
Manchester United will be very motivated to get the better of us after we defeated them over two legs in 2006 and Aalborg are a bit of an unknown quantity. As Rocko said, it’s similar enough to two years ago except Villarreal are probably a step up from Benfica. However, NOBODY (except Barca) beats us in Europe at Celtic Park and we should win the group, or if not, it will be like 2006 when we were already through after 5 games and experimented in Copenhagen in the last fixture and allowed Manchester United to creep ahead of us.
Any chance of a full fixture list for the group anyone?
Here we go again. This forum was a much better place over the summer.
Keep your eyes peeled on www.uefa.com Shan. Once they do the draws the computer has to generate the game schedule and ensure that no issues arise like Real Madrid and Atletico playing at home on the same night and scheidt like that. It’s usually done within an hour or so and then it’ll filter down to the clubs’ official websites.
I really want to start with a home fixture as the first match day isn’t long after the international double headers when most players will have been off travelling. It’ll be good to start at home and have some fookers have to travel to us.
Cheers Bandage. I have been checking every footballl site I could think of looking. With United having Liverpool and Chelsea away in 8 days in the middle of September an away tie to start off wouldnt be ideal. Alborg at home would be perfect.
happy enough withth draw- should go through - might even pip chelsea for top spot
captainshan - did you get my PM about paddy powers - any advice?
In terms of other groups; Real Madrid, Juventus and Zenit looked dynamite - 'twas a pity Shakhtar didn’t come out as 4th seeds to make it a beast of a group.
Liverpool would have been happy enough with PSV I reckon. They’ve beaten them recently and PSV are on the wane a bit and selling players like Gomes to Spurs. Marseille look like a tricky 3rd seed despite Liverpool hammering them away from home last season but Atletico coming out last makes it’s a pretty hard group overall. Torres will be returning to the supporters that idolise him too.
Arsenal’s group is tricky enough too and particularly nasty in terms of travelling to Turkey and Ukraine. Watch out for them dropping league points if they’ve a televised Sky game at 12.45pm on a Saturday morning after a Wednesday night game in Kiev or something! Porto are a decent enough side too so that group’s not a formality.
I don’t really see one easy group and that’s because of the strength of some of the 3rd and 4th seeded teams too.
Celtic play Aalborg first but dunno if its home or away or if its on the tues or wed