Haha typical Scottish football. They have no business playing international competitions. Now let’s hope our national team at full strength stomps all over them this summer.
Yeah, I'm usually one for moderation and good will, but this has been an utter disgrace. Gerrard should resign in shame that his team acted this way.
As we see in last pages this entire match story is about how.... brutally shitty Rangers approach has been. The real story for Slavia the last few weeks is Stanciu though, he is on absolute fire.
I mean, I hope they find out what he said. If it was racist or otherwise extreme he should be severely punished. It seems out of character and Deli was right by there at the time. Part of why I supported Slavia over Sparta while I was abroad was their fans felt a lot more welcoming to me as brown international student than Sparta's.
For sure, I should have worded my post differently. The situation is unfortunate, but Kudela deserves any punishment if he did in fact racially abuse Kamara (or abuse of any kind). It’s just really frustrating that the game even got to this point.
I actually had sort of tuned out by the time the Kudela incident occurred so didn't really see it live. From the video, I personally do believe Kudela must have made a racist or otherwise very extreme comment to provoke such a reaction even in a match that was already that heated. I would like to say I expect there to be a real investigation and punishment for him if so, but I suspect that UEFA doesn't care enough about Europa League to do more than take a few statements and Slavia are clearly & unfortunately doing the Liverpool & Suarez act of rallying around the player before any investigation... On the football front, Slavia will play Arsenal in the next round. Arsenal will be favored, but I don't think this is that unplayable an opponent for the current Slavia side either.
I would have preferred a continental team honestly: England, Scotland, England is a bit dull in a competition with so many countries still participating. The match yesterday was already terrible to watch because of Rangers's violent play, and Tvrdik just needs to shut up at this point until some kind of neutral investigation happens, his background in politics comes through with how dramatic and stubborn he is.
I hope Kolar is okay. I've read some reports that he will be out for a long time because they can't do much for him until swelling goes down. It's going to be rough for Slavia. As for that match, that was awful too. Felt like every single minute there was a foul. 43 fouls in total and if you include stoppages like the ball going out, etc then yea I doubt much actual football was played. I also really hope the racist stuff gets sorted. I don't understand why Kudela at 2-0 up would decide to do something so stupid. Slavia had the game in the bag, and now if found guilty, we will be banned for a while. This also just perpetuities the racism problem in Czech.
Such a sad situation all around. It’s brought out the worst in both sides. Shameful behaviour from a few fans and officials of each team. I’m also leaning towards Kudela being guilty based on the video footage. His body language (and particularly Simon Deli) says it all in my opinion. The reaction of the Rangers players is also very telling. What he claims to have said really feels like a quick cover up out of panic. A very bad look for Slavia and especially Tvrdik if they did fabricate details of Kudela apparently being beaten post-match. At the very least, they seem to have exaggerated the extent of that incident. Unfortunately, it will just be a back and forth between the clubs as to who deserves more of the blame and resulting punishments. With that said, I really hope that Rangers conduct yesterday isn’t suddenly overlooked. Kemar Roofe should be banned for a handful of games as Kolar suffered a facial fracture in addition to those lacerations. Sad that a potentially career-ending injury is sort of set aside and hearing the guys on BT Sport insisting it was a “football play” or “he had eyes for the ball” won’t convince me otherwise. Of course Danicek has to deal with the brigade of Twitter idiots. Little do these people know the majority of his work before starting his Czech football account was dedicated to covering and promoting football across Asia and Africa. He’s literally the most inclusive and open-minded Czech journalist in the sport that I can think of.
I feel like because the match was so brutal and tempers are so high that solving this matter is getting even less likely. Alexander Bah apparently told Danish press that Rangers were violent and abusive the entire match (true) and while he doesn't deny the racist incident per se (he says he wasn't near it and that Kudela is a great guy...) it seems more like scripted solidarity. I do think the person that could perhaps clarify matters is Deli, he was standing close by, and as adam cz mentioned seemed in no hurry to defend his teammate at the time... but so far he hasn't done anything but post a team picture with "on to the next round." I think Slavia as an organization and team are going to make this a your word against ours. I think with 2 Rangers players there saying that he made a racist remark it should be enough for a multi-match player ban.... if UEFA really take this seriously, which is always hit or miss. This really applies to almost all situations. Slavia have been an amazingly effective club the last few years, but the likability boost of not being Sparta wearing off in large part due to his ego (also it's just natural to hate a dominant team). Honestly, its clear at this point that he rather clumsily embellished the post-match happenings in hopes of deflecting blame from his player. Depending on how much he is embellished or lied then it becomes an issue where the club should be reprimanded as well. Actually seems like at least today cooler heads are prevailing minus the odd idiot when I checked, probably because despite being a Slavia fan he is objectively responding to the available video evidence instead of many Czech responses being a combination of deflecting outrage (beyond what is justifiable from the match), "what-aboutism," or resentment of British media. One thing I noticed is a lot of people that don't know better see "CzechFooty" and think he is an official account like the FACR or something... when in fact Czechfooty is a way better twitter feed than ceske_repre.
This whole situation has taken away and tainted this Slavia Team. This Slavia team has been fantastic for a while now, and played Rangers off the park. Rangers were forced into cheap fouls that completely disrupted their play. As for Roofe, that is not a football play. You can't say he had eyes for the ball like that makes his actions ok. That was horrendous. Your foot should never be that high ever. Every other time this has happened, long suspensions proceeded it. I hope Roofe is banned for a while, and if Kudela did call him a monkey, then Kudela needs to be banned for a while too.
Think Sima still thought he was playing Rangers there... Not ideal that our international players have to play in a 10 man team for well over an hour in addition to an already taxing workload.
While Sparta are still unbeaten since his arrival, Vrba is kind of already showing signs of his usual stubbornness and preference of experienced players. I think he needs to dissolve the Pavelka - Krejci - Dockal midfield that was already proving to be too slow and overkill under Kotal. I’d play Krejci in central defence and have Hancko out wide to prevent Hanousek from being on the field. Then depending on the match up, one of Soucek or Karabec in midfield for some much needed dynamism. Hlozek is clearly rusty, but that was to be expected and probably best he took this international break off. A returning Karlsson would be a huge boost if combined with an in form Hlozek.
To be fair, Opava are playing a lot like Rangers. They themselves see a red card and it’s now 10v10. Stanciu converts the penalty for his 10th league goal to continue his unbelievable streak.
Between the Slavia-Rangers aftermath and then Brno once again failing to get 3 points when they should I stepped back from football a bit since Saturday. For Brno, it really looks like we are going back down, which hopefully is Lisen is the team to replace would compel ownership to realize we've been passed by a recently semi-pro suburban team and either sell or invest in the team. As for Slavia, I've said most of what I have to say. I believe Kamara's version of events on the field based on the video. As for everything after that, it's really where Slavia as a club failed. The statement they released 3 days after about respecting UEFA's investigation was the exact response they should have made originally, but because Tvrdik declared an all out defense the damage was already done. His conduct directly emboldened fringe ultras to display racist messages online by not treating a serious allegation with respect and many regular fans online followed his lead with all the whataboutist crap about Rangers own fan issues or Gerrard defending Suarez (also a massive mistake that clubs/players should have learned from). Others' conduct doesn't change the fact that in this match your player, a highly paid employee, was credibly accused of racist misconduct and needs to be investigated and punished if confirmed. Instead they chose to unconditionally support before the investigation even began. At this point even if Kudela were found innocent in the end, the club's initial response was completely disgraceful and damaging.
I realize Teplice are terrible, but that was a very impressive Sparta performance (the first hour of play at least), and a big statement ahead of the derby next weekend. A number of good signs for Sparta that included: a brilliant Dockal, who must’ve been motivated by his national team snub, a dominant Hlozek returning to his pre-injury form, an improved left side tandem in Polidar - Plavsic, and finally a first half hat trick for Krejci II, who certainly should be on Silhavy’s radar at this rate. Again, the fact that it’s Teplice might negate some of these positives that Slavia could completely erase, but this was a very enjoyable Sparta to watch today.
I'm just here to point out that Brno are responsible for 40% of points taken from Slavia this season.
I suppose it wouldn’t be a proper Brno match if VAR wasn’t heavily involved. I personally have Sparta winning the derby next weekend, although I could see a high scoring draw play out as well. I think the demanding European schedule ahead and past international break is catching up to Slavia.