Czech League football 2016 and on

Antonin Panenka (who played at Rapid Vienna for some years) is in the stadium supporting his former club. Good to see he looks healthy after a rather severe Coronavirus hospitalization.

 

It's not even halftime and 3/4 Rapid defenders are on a yellow.

Rapid have more overall posession, but Sparta are leading in good chances (and has the goal).

 

Sparta really are playing terribly as a team, a modest talent advantage bought them some time, but Rapid just rightly equalized.

 

Dockal with a terrible giveaway and no ability to trackback gifts Rapid a lead. With the way Sparta have come out this 2nd half it's hard to see them getting it together now that they are behind.

 

Karabec on for Dockal, I suspect this will be a starting lineup change by mid-season. Dockal in his prime was a bit slow, now he can barely move.

 

Rapid will take a 1 goal lead to Prague, so Sparta are still very much in this. The 2nd half was a disaster though, Vrba was slow to make changes and only did so after Rapid had made their comeback.

 

Slavia had an unnecessarily ornate press conference today to announce what are essentially unsurprising updates.

1) Stanciu is not for sale (this had been confirmed recently when they rebuffed interest from Galatasaray), the only outgoing transfer they are still working on is Sima.

2) Krmencik is coming, the deal will be a loan with an obligation to buy if they qualify for UCL group stages. The buy price is 2.5 Million Euros, which seems reasonable.

3) They will sign Swedish U-21 defender Aiham Ousou, the Scandinavian invasion of our league continues.

4) sending out a small loan army of surplus players again

The only minor surprise is that Sima still has firm offers, its been rumored that interest waned after his hot-streak ended. Also many assumed Olayinka and Kolar would be up for transfers, but I think Kolar is there until either winter or if they don't make UCL, while Olayinka I think is just at his ceiling with Slavia.

 

Slavia confirmed the signing of the Ousou after the conference (though they were clearly certain at the time.

One more interesting thing about this signing is that he is a product of analytics-based scouting rather than more traditional methods. He's a Youth national team player, but he only played on loan to the 2nd tier of Swedish football, so apparently data analysis recommended him as a good fit on attributes rather than competition.

 

Slovacko and Plzen begin their qualification journey for the new Europa Conference League today. For Plzen this is a bitter pill as they are more used to a higher level, and to make matters worse they are dealing with some key injuries.

For Slovacko this is an honor, the culmination of several years of gradual improvement to have a chance to play in Europe.

I will be following my fellow Moravians' journey more closely.

 

Plzen take an early lead and from what I'm hearing are generally in control.

Watching Slovacko in Bulgaria, the pitch looks so dry it could catch fire.

 

Plzen double their lead.

Slovacko just missed a great chance, but this match has been dreadful.

 

Slovacko have been the better side 2nd half, and should have had a penalty awarded earlier. I do look at this team and wonder where the goals will come from without Kliment though. Still they should advance passed this opponent at home if it stays 0-0 for this leg.

 

Plovdiv scored out of nowhere on a fairly remarkable volley and then Sadilek whiffed on an easy equalizer a moment later. I still lightly favor Slovacko on their home ground as they played much better overall, but they really are missing a true goalscorer on this side.

 

Week 1 is in the books and would be hard to say there are any surprises. Slavia and Plzen won (though not decisively) despite key absences, Sparta won despite Vrba's systemic disregard for defending, and Jablonec & Slovacko picked up key results against Banik and Liberec in what are projected to be the battles for positions 3-5.

 

I actually think Sparta will advance at home, their are no away goal rule, but home field advantage is still a thing. They need a much stronger performance from key players like Hlozek though.

Sadilek makes sense for Sparta, but at this stage I feel he would do better to stay in the Netherlands or move to a lesser team in a top league. Although all the jokes now are that Slavia will make a move for him since they have borderline been trolling Vrba by undercutting him for Plavsic and Krmencik this summer.

 

Better lineup than last time for Sparta, Pesek replacing Krejci I who was ineffective and having DMK and Wiesner overlapping on the right. Defense is still suspect, central midfield is still slow, but at least this group looks more creative.

 

Sparta again take a first half advantage, DMK converts a penalty

It's even on aggregate 16 minutes in.

 

It was a controversial penalty, but unfortunately I don't have any visuals to comment, but it ended with Rapid's keeper and manager on yellow cards. I believe despite initial description in match tracker that the keeper caught Pesek (possibly) while punching the ball away.

Edit: just saw a not very good clip, but am inclined to say it was a bad call.

 

HT 1-0, they benefited from a questionable call, but hard to say Sparta didn't earn the advantage as they have all of the matches chances so far.

 

Hlozek hits the crossbar. Sparta will regret it if they don't start finishing chances.

 

2-0 (3-2)

Pesek puts Sparta ahead on aggregate in the 81st minute, just as the match seemed to be moving inching away from them.