Champions League Matchday 7

Pot 1 - Group Winners

Chelsea
Bayern
Liverpool
Valencia
Lyon
Man Utd
Arsenal
Milan

Pot 2 - Runners Up

Barcelona
Inter
PSV
Roma
Real Madrid
Celtic
Porto
Lille

Pot 2 team are home first on 20/21 February and the second leg is on 6/7 March.

Re: Champions Leage Matchday 7

I’ve always been a big fan of Dunphy but this latest rant is a bit over the top:

Sir Fergie was a liar and a disgrace for employing and condoning wicked cheating diver Ronaldo.

Said Ronaldo never ever produces an end product in terms of crosses or goals, right after he was shown knocking a cross onto Giggs head for Uniteds second.

The Roon was a demoralised broken man because in the second half he went past two players and hit a half-hearted shot.

But most notably, Ronaldinho has a bit to go yet before he can be considered a great player, because of the benchmark thats been set by this man (Gilesy of course) as well as modern players like Roy Keane and Wayne Rooney.

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Typical Dunphy, stupid rant that makes no sense. He was always a caricature of himself but I think he’s hurt by the amount of football on tv these days. I don’t watch that much football on tv but I’d still wager I see more games than him and his knowledge gets shown up as a result.

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Dunphy’s really entertaining but he’s such an idiot too! He trips himself up and contradicts himself continuously. I don’t have a lot of time for Ronaldo but he has shone for Portugal in tournament football and also has a decent assist and goals ratio for a wide midfield player. Obviously with a flair player there’s going to be times when he tries something that doesn’t come off or he’s careless or whatever but he’s nowhere near the liability the RTE boys make him out to be.

I don’t know why he feels the need to compare everybody to Giles. If Gilesy comes out of retirement and wins the European Cup and the World Cup then maybe he deserves to be compared to Ronaldinho. That’s just a ridiculous assertion by Dunphy. As for the Rooney one; Ronaldinho has achieved far more than Rooney who I believe has only won a League Cup in his career so far. It’s plain to see he’s extremely talented but to say Ronaldinho can’t be considered to be in his class borders on insanity.

Just looking at the potential ties in the next round there. Celtic have a 1 in 5 chance of drawing either Valencia or Milan due to teams from the same countries being separated in the last 16 stage. We have a 1 in 7 chance of drawing any of the others. I’m not being the smart arse here seeing the rows we’ve had in the past about the standard of the SPL versus the EPL but it’s clear in my mind that Arsenal or Liverpool would be the best draw we could get. After that I’d perhaps go for Bayern who I don’t think are firing on all cylinders this season but the rest would all be very tough ties.

One of the positives, if there is any, to come out of last night is that Celtic play at home first. We had this debate before but I think the widely held view that playing the home leg second is advantageous is a complete myth. A tight victory at home while keeping a clean sheet is the ideal scenario to take into the 2nd leg away from home. An away goal then can almost kill off a tie. Secondly, given how poor Celtic’s away record is I’d much rather play at home first where I’d be confident of getting a result against anybody. We’d then have something to defend away from home. If we played away to any of those pot 1 teams first and played as abjectly as we did last night then the tie would almost be over before the 2nd leg in Glasgow. Yes, it’s clear in my mind. Batter some fooks at home first suits me fine!

Re: Champions Leage Matchday 7

Proposed Celtic Team for Last 16

Assuming no new signings:

Boruc

Wilson Caldwell McManus Naylor

Lennon
Naka Gravesen
McGeady

Miller Vennegoor of Hesselink

Priorities for me are:

  1. Replacing McManus with better central defender
  2. Replacing Lennon - he didn’t want to know last night

From the papers though we are being linked with Voronin and Petric (2 strikers).

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I’d probably play that team at home but need convincing on Gravesen. Following from the debate on the other thread I’d consider something like this away from home:

Boruc,

Wilson, Caldwell, McManus, Naylor,

Lennon, Sno,

Nakamura,

Maloney, McGeady,

Vennegoor of Hesselink,

It’s something of a 4-5-1 / 4-2-3-1 and might be overly complex I’ll grant you. If the wide players lack discipline we may be very open playing this way but if they apply themselves in both an attacking and defending sense then they can be crucial for us. Naka can feed them the ball and almost play like Riquelme does for Villareal in what the media have termed the ‘quarterback’ role. Just going where he likes to get the ball and knocking it around safe in the knowledge Lennon and Sno are covering him. I suppose the danger is Big Jan might be isolated and we might struggle to get the ball into him resulting in a lot of sideways and backward passing with no cutting edge. Gravesen is an option in the centre or on the right as is Jarosik. Miller could also play one of the wide roles (rocko, you mentioned him man-marking the left back last night!) as he has done so in the past. Either himself or Magic can also be brought on if we need to go back to 4-4-2. I don’t know, I just think that would be our best formation away from home in terms of actually dictating the play. It would probably very ballsy to try it in the next away European game though given the quality of the side we’ll be facing. We could test it out against a quality Rangers side next week though!!!

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As a gesture to my arguments last night I put Miller top of the right on my formation above - though I do concede it wasn’t the greatest formation I ever came up with. Still it wasn’t as absurd as some of Farmer’s comments on the league cup. Those 2 guys who were chatting Bandage up nearly fell over themselves laughing at Farmer’s argument.

Regarding your formation I think it has merits but you’ve hit the nail on the head when you speak about Vennegoor of Hesselink getting isolated. He needs support from the middle of the park - i.e. a runner in the middle like Gravesen or he needs someone alongside him like Miller who’ll go in behind.

Miller has been poor of late but I’m backing him still. Reminds me a bit of Henri Camara so far but there is and was a fine line between Camara and Bellamy and I have faith he can become the latter.

Re: Champions Leage Matchday 7

You probably won’t believe this but it’s lashing down outside and I wanted to go into town so I had to abandon that plan. Anyway, I live by the rule that I never allow myself to get bored so I decided to stage the champions league draw for the round of 16 and I just concluded it there 5 minutes ago! I wrote out all the pot 1 teams and placed them in a cup. Likewise for the pot 2 teams and placed them in a bowl. I then drew both the pot 1 and 2 teams myself. The draw ran smoothly enough, there was 2 instances that required my intervention - Lyon couldn’t play against Lille due to being from the same country so they moved down a line when they were drawn and Liverpool can’t meet PSV again so the Dutch side moved down a line too. I must say I am relatively pleased with the draw, there are some cracking ties to be played. The draw is as follows:

Lyon vs Roma
Chelsea vs Lille
Arsenal vs Celtic
Valencia vs Inter
Liverpool vs Barcelona
Bayern vs PSV
Man Utd vs Real Madrid
Milan vs Porto

Ties will be played over the period 20/21 Feb and 6/7 Mar. The second named team in each tie will play at home first.

Thank you.

Re: Champions Leage Matchday 7

Are we playing on a Tuesday or a Wednesday first? Just noticed that we won all our Tuesday games and lost all our Wednesday games this year so far in the CL.

Re: Champions Leage Matchday 7

I just decided we’re playing both games on the Tuesday!

After our discussion last night about the jerseys, I want us to wear the hoops for away games too (I thought it was a requirement of UEFA that you had to wear your away shirt for away games but rocko pointed out it’s not, e.g. ManU wearing their red shirts in Glasgow). Anyway, 3 beatings in the green and black combo - get those fookin’ hoops on bhoys.

Re: Champions Leage Matchday 7

Good lad Rocko

Actually last night was the first time I saw an angry exchange between Bandage and Rocko. Rocko argued that they should sing Celtic off the field but Bandage was having none of it

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Fucking 100% right I was too.

Re: Champions Leage Matchday 7

No, you weren’t.

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Hello from Copenhagen. Cracking atmosphere last night, mostly from the Copenhagen lads, they didn’y stop singing all game and it was difficult to get our voices heard. I won’t go on about the match as Rocko and Bandage said enough on the other thread. One thing I would say is that we won’t go much further if Strachan doesn’t play the wings. Putting Graveson out right just doesn’t work as he just wanders in field and it makes it very hard to try and create anything besides the long ball. The pressure of not scoring in the last 7 or 8 matches has caused Miller toi panic again and he seems to try far too hard to score now. MAgic and Jarosik were pathetic and should be made take a look at themselves as to whether they want to continue with us. Mick, Bobo and Caldwell are only at their best when they have a great partner with them. We need a Malliby type caracter to try and sort that out. Would Pressley be a good addition to the defense or will he just turn out like a caldwell? If Strachan can’t see that we need both Naka and McGeady/Maloney on the pitch then he needs to get hiis eyes tested. Also very disappointed in McGeady last night. He had a lot of chances to try and take on his man and instead he turned around and passed it backwards. There was no pressure on that match, so I expected him to shine and show what talent he has, he still hasn’t done it on the big stage, Man Utd away he bottled it again and look lost. Anyway I not going to go on about the game.

Bandage I’d take Arsenal, defo. Think over the two legs we would take them. The 3 teams I’d fear would be Lyon, Valencia (Besides Celtic they would be my team to go all the way) and Chelsea( to a lesser extent but they would phsyically be too strong for us.)

I also agree with Bandage that the fans shouldn’t have clapped them off the field. The fans there would pay anything to go see Celtic and then they turn around and put on a performance where they weren’t interested in being out there. I was disgusted when with 7/8 minutes to go, Celtic start playing around with the ball in their own half and were happy enough to wind down the clock. An utter disgrace and a lack of professionalism. I was shocked when I saw many fans jumping around and singing at the final whistle. WHat the Fcuk?? I hate this mentality, Oh we lost 3-1 to a poor side but hell, we are through and we’ll have a party anyway. The good thing that came out of last night is that we will be underdogs again going into the next tie and Celtic always shine when they are underdogs in Europe. I didn’t Boo them but I couldn’t clap for such a pathetic performance. They should be docked next weeks wages for that performance.

Whats the craic with the next trip? With work I won’t be able to go to the first match.

Anyway heading off to the pub now.

HAIL HAIL.

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Thanks for the post from Denmark pagey. Very disappointing obviously but fans came across well on the tv and it looked like a great atmosphere.

On the couple of points you made on the match I agree with pretty much all of them. Pressley is an interesting one but I don’t think Hearts would sell him to us. I think he’d do a job alright even though I don’t like the guy.

I was watching Celtic TV one night about 2 weeks ago and it was some random SPL game and Mjallby was sensational. A real bully but not reckless like Balde and he could play a bit on the deck. Rangers have found it very hard to buy in centre halves over the years (Svensson, Papac, Fanfan, Rodriguez, Kyrgiakos, Konterman) have all been joke figures in Glasgow. We got lucky with Balde, Mjallby and Valgaeren but the latter two faded badly at the end and the same is applying to the big Guinean. A quality centre half has to be a priority for us.

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Alright pagey. I see there that Mick is out for Sunday after aggravating a long standing groin injury the other night. I hope for his and our sake he was injured early on in the game and tried to play on cos frankly he was gash all through. Darren O’Dea will be playing now so a great chance for him and the other young centre back Cuthbert is back from injury and will probably be on the bench.

On the E-Tims site today they’re saying that Robert Kovac is a very real possibility for January. He’s still at Juve in Serie B and at the age of 32 wants to make the most of the time he’s got left by playing in the CL rather than at that level. I’d be more than happy with that to be honest.

They also mention Distin who’s on a Bosman in the summer and is refusing to sign a contract with Manchester City. He’s one of these players that flatters to deceive. He has all the attributes; strength, pace, good in the air but he can lack concentration at times. It’s no coincidence that he’s actually playing excellently lately - he’s putting himself in the shop window but he seems to be motivated hugely by money. He’s on a ridiculous contract apparently what with him signing during the Keegan era when money flowed freely with no thought of the consequences. He’s definitely better than Bobo and Mick and might be a good partner for Caldwell.

All speculation anyway.

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Kovac would be quality, though short-term. I’ve never rated Distin and never saw what all the hype was about.

Didn’t know Cuthbert was back from injury. He’s been out for a couple of months so he’d really struggle if required I think.

Apparently McManus has been injured for months and has been playing through the pain because we’d no cover.

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Champions League draw tomorrow morning at 11am.

I’m on designated flight booking duty provided a) I wake up after watching the cricket all night and :slight_smile: my broadband is working.

Once I find out what day we’re playing at home I’ll book the relevant flights to either Glasgow or Edinburgh.

We discussed away options last night. Is it a fair conclusion to make that Milan is the only viable away option given the size of the stadium? What about Munich? Anywhere else?

rocko, what sites should I have open and primed?

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Bandage

Check this thread again before you book - I will confirm details with thepiedpiper on his availability.

For me I’d like out to Scotland the morning of the home game back the afternoon after.

You should have aerlingus.com and ryanair.com open.

Aer Lingus look at Dublin to Glasgow and Edinburgh. Ryanair look at Dublin to Glasgow Prestwick and Edinburgh. Glasgow the preference obviously but there’s not too much in it really.

Flights shouldn’t be too expensive I wouldn’t think because most people will just be booking the away leg.

Caution if we are playing a Milan or London team make sure there aren’t two fixtures in that city on the same night because one of them will be switched as a result.

For away legs I’d definitely go to Milan. Munich should be ok for tickets I reckon - I know a couple of guys in Germany - so that might be worth a punt too.

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Bandage a couple more points:

thepiedpiper wants to go out on the same flight as us and to come home on the first flight from Glasgow the next day (i.e. 7am from Prestwickor whatever) - basically he needs to work so has to get home ASAP. Give me a ring to discuss in the morning.

If you’re in proper doubt about the bookings in the morning let me know and I’ll do it here.

Thirdly place no reliance on access to the HB tomorrow. You need 500 posts for access and you’re short. I’m not far off but I won’t get to the mark.

I’m off out now but I’ll give you a shout in the morning. HAVE YOUR PHONE ON.