Not sure if this should go here, but Kicker noted that the English nats are quite concerned about racism from the fans in their upcoming Euro qualifier vs Bulgaria, after incidents in earlier Bulgarian matches vs the Czechs and Kosovo... They are talking about simply walking off rather than following the FIFA guidelines if something comes up.
Fanatiz is legit, though the picture quality isn’t the best. That being said, for the convenience and content (La Liga, Ligue 1, Liga Nos, Turkish Superlig, Argentine Superliga, Copa Libertadores, etc) I’ll take it. $8 a moth or $80 for a year. 7 day free trial.
Just a quick, sad note. Former Bundesliga team Wattenscheid 09 has folded their Regional League (4th level) team with immediate effect--they basically are bankrupt and could not afford to continue.
Derby Della Philadelphia Phillies fans today as Roma takes on A German Team in the world's most exciting tournament, UEFA Europa League! I am not to keen on Roma's chances to be honest. Early reports have Pastore as a mediana. Perotti getting his first start of the season. Zaniolo as trequartista. Dzeko playing in a face mask against doctor's orders. No Cristante, Diawara, Under, or Pellegrini leaves our midfield grossly unbalanced. Roma's defense has stepped up over the past month with Smalling really being sensational, but he has limited coverage in front of him with only Veretout providing any grinta (or brains, really) defensively. Rotation means we'll see Fazio alongside Smalling instead of Mancini, who is typically first choice. @kgilbert78 what on earth is the deal with Mochengladbach. First in the Bundesliga, but they gave up 4 or 5 goals to Wolfsberger? Are they taking this competition seriously. Do they view Roma as there for the taking, or are their eyes focused more domestically.
I wish I knew. They have a fair bit of injuries at the moment, so I'm not sure about this trip to Rome. One challenge is that they are playing a different style under Rose and are still learning it. When it works, great--but when it doesn't... My guess is that they didn't take Wolfsberg seriously.
93rd minute penalty given for a ball that hit Chris Smalling in the mother********in face. Germans convert the penalty and walk away with a draw. What a sport. What a fallen and flawed species, humanity....
Evidently Roma's injury crisis is so bad they are looking at Jack Rodwell. A man who Friedel couldn't even convince Kraft to spend money on for New England Revolution. Good times. Serie A has some good games this weekend. Both Rome teams are in varying states of crisis. Lazio plays a very enetertaining Fiorentina team while Roma faces a team in even more shambles than them, AC Milan. The game is at the Olympico and three points is a must for Roma. An under the radar interesting game for me is 5th place Cagliari vs 10th place Torino. Torino should be challenging for European spots, but has dropped some odd points. Cagliari has a terrible coach and some of the most racist fans in Italy, but is punching well above their weight in 5th place and looks like they might hang around a while. The real action of the European weekend is in Portugal though as the top 6 teams in the table face each other on Sunday. This is great since between the international break and cup matches it has been a month since we have had Liga Nos matches. Completely absurd. Get your shit together Portugal. The early match has 2nd place Benfica traveling north to face 5th place Tondela. This should be a win for Benfica, but they did expend a lot of energy midweek in Champions League. Early afternoon we have 3rd place Porto hosting first place and newly promoted Familicao. Familicao is such a weird story. Newly promoted and top of the table. It's a model not unlike Mendes sending a bunch of his clients to Wolves, you had a ton of new players come into Familicao after promotion. It seems shady, but I'm for some excitement and other teams challenging the big 3. They've already beaten one of the big 3 (beat Sporting 2-1). BUT, the idiocy of a month off may have stunted there momentum. In the league cup they needed penalties to advance pass a second division side. I'd expect Porto to win this, even if they just drew at home vs Rangers (lololololol). Finally the late game has 4th place Guiamares traveling to Lisbon to face off against Europe's most ridiculous soap opera 6th place Sporting CP. Speaking of league cup matches, Sporting was eliminated 2-0 by a THIRD division side. They are on their THIRD coach of the season. And they are in fights with their ultras. Good times. Guiamares tool Arsenal to the 92nd minute before suffering a heartbreaking defeat in London in Europa yesterday. Sporting won their Europa league match. Sporting SHOULD win this at home given Guimares travel from London. But, ******** Sporting. Carrega Guiamares!! All three games are on GolTV Sunday. Now, I just need to convince my wife it's best for us to stay in all day.
Pulisic with his coming out game for Chelsea today. Perfect hat trick. Lampard has been impressive in bringing in the academy players and getting them to play at a high level. Such a difference from last year.
There is something about this Roma team this season that just might be special. The team has been crestfallen with injuries since the beginning of the season. At numerous points we have been missing Lorenzo Pellegrini, Cengiz Under, Diawara, Pastore, Zappacosta, Florenzi, Dzeko, Kalinic, Juan Jesus, Mert Cetin, Diego Perotti, and Bryan Cristante. A few of these guys are out through the new year or the season. The crisis in midfield was so bad that Roma was looking at free agent and malcontent Jack Rodwell earlier this week as reinforcement. How has Roma handled this crisis? Only one loss in Serie A, where they currently sit fourth, and joint top of the table in their Europa League group. We mentioned the heinous handball call against Smalling when it hit his face against Mochengladbach. Some teams would lament this misfortune and go into a shell. Roma responded with a 2-1 win over Milan. They face Udinese yesterday and go down to 10 men on a horrible red card call against Fazio. How do they respond, by scoring 3 goals in the second half and winning 4-0. Fonseca after the Udinese match, “Most teams defend when down to 10, but we do not. We all fought together and continued playing our football, even playing with 10 men. I don’t want to talk about the red card, it’s all pretty clear.The team showed a lot of character, understanding that we needed to defend, but also to attack and be consistently dangerous at the other end. Most teams clam up and defend after going down to 10 men, but we do not.” Fonseca is absolutely wonderful. There is no time for this team to feel sorry for themselves about ref decisions. No excuses about injuries. Just the match at hand, and the next match. It's so damn refreshing to support a team with a coach with this mentality, one that works it's way down to the players. Napoli this weekend in the Derby Del Sole will be EXTREMELY tough. It always is. But this is a team that's taken on the personality of their manager. No excuses and ready to fight. I was excited about Fonseca's hire before the season. 13 matches into Serie A and Europa League he's exceeded all reasonable expectations. I hope he's at Roma for a very long time.
Another disastrous weekend in Serie A this weekend with the FIGC and clubs essentially unwilling to do anything to change it. In the Roma vs Napoli match play was temporarily halted as the Roma Ultras were chanting territorial discrimination at the Napoli players. Think along the lines of chants about Vesuvius and wishing it would erupt again and wipe Naples off the map. Territorial discrimination is very real in Italy, and the fact that Rome, a two-three hour drive from Naples goes in on this is both absurd and speaks to the problems within the country. Dzeko, wearing the captains armband, attempted to get the crowd to support the team instead of jeering Naples, and the game went on without further incident. Still, just a brutal scene. Maybe @hardhead can speak more to this shit that Napoli faces virtually every match. Then this morning Ballotelli punted the ball into the stands and walked off after being subjected to racist taunts in Verona, of the notoriously most racist supporter groups in Italy. He was eventually persuaded to return by his teammates and even scored a wonder goal in the 85th, but Brescia lost 2-1. Of course, Serie A seems more concerned with piracy than doing anything to stop these acts. Some clubs are not proactive at all (Cagliari, Verona, etc) others like Roma and to a lesser extent Inter have taken measures to ban fans from matches for this shit, but it's never enough. Just a bad and embarrassing scene. Racists exist in every fan base from Italy, to England, to MLS. It's just that Serie A and the FIGC do so little to stop it in Italy. On the field Roma had another absolutely brilliant performance, beating Napoli 2-1. They are unbeaten in 7 and have risen to third in the table. Fonseca's leadership and the player taking on responsibility in this injury crisis is something to behold. No excuses. No whining. Play the game. Expect to win. Attack even a man down and with a third choice midfield. And onto the next one. What a man. What a manager. However, sadly I'd be lying if I said my joy from the win wasn't blunted a bit by the idiots in the stands. This shit has got to change, though nobody that follows calcio has any faith in the powers that be to make it happen.
I'm sure this is music to the EPL fans out there.... NFL considers moving Chargers to London, eyeing Tottenham Spurs' stadium as home field Much more speculation than real work, feels almost like a threat for LA to up the attendance. Still, given the increase in playing and marketing in England over the last several years...
How are the Chargers supposed to increase attendance when they’re friggin playing in the Galaxative’s stadium for two years?
As mentioned in the article, large chunks of the attendees are there for the visiting team. Which means there is not a large local support for the team.
Strange day in Champions League.... Benfica once again put out a ridiculous starting 11 and essentially cede the game to Lyon pretty much ending their chances at advancing, and possibly even Europa. Napoli have a chance to secure a ticket to the round of 16 and fall victim the greatest living American coach, Jesse Marsch. Barcelona held 0-0. A typical (and delightful!) Antonio Conte European Disasterclass sees Inter throw away a 2 goal lead and get zero points in Dortmund. And Italy's worst referee was front and center at Stamford Bridge where Chelsea dropped two points at home, failing to strangle control of the group and unable to take full advantage of a 9 man Ajax. Remarkable day.
Chelsea came from 3-0 and 4-1 to tie 4-4 with a two man advantage for 20 minutes in which they got two of their four goals. Let the EPL hate flow through you..