Okay, first of all, in case anyone accuses me of being an Arsenal fan, I'm not. I'm a Sheffield Wednesday fan (way to go throwing away a two goal lead in the Steel City derby guys, i hate you sometimes), and yes, on those grounds you can accuse me of being a hypocrite for enjoying attractive football, but whatever.
To me, Liverpool's win tonight is a horrible, horrible thing. I look at Liverpool and I see a team who only sporadically play attractive football, a team who graft from week to week, relying on the incogrous skill of a few players (latterly only Torres and Gerrard, since Alonso decided he didn't want to play as well as he did in the 2004-5 and 2005-6 seasons). I see an ownership structure which flies in the face of my political allegiance, and also that which I am under the impression that the working class foundations of the Liverpool fanbase embody (though judging by their percieved support for DIC, maybe I'm assigning more integrity to them than they actually have). I see a manager who I have some fairly irrational dislike for, but it's also focused on his apparently inward-looking philosophy and his one-dimensional approach, not really showing any respect for the EPL (although you could say the EPL doesn't have any respect/integrity left to play with, and okay, that's not really overly different to Arsene Wenger). In short, I see a lot of things I don't like, as a neutral.
However, in Arsenal I might see a few things I don't like (*coughDavidDeincoughAlisherUsmanovcough*), and yeah, in a lot of ways they're not paragons of virtue. However, I see innovation and excitement, I see aesthetic pleasure in watching them play football, using styles and plans that are, well, pleasing on this neutral's eye. To see them beaten by a team who show so much I dislike, like Liverpool, is disheartening, it makes me sad.
I don't think (unfortunately for the misanthrope in me) it's the death of football, or anything sinister. It's just the point that I possibly once and for all give up on top-four football, it's got nothing left that I can enjoy really, nothing left I can relate to as a neutral, so I guess I'll focus my positive energy (or whatever) on helping Wednesday avoid the drop...
Maybe bamos, ht27, colinzealuk and all the legions of non-league followers have got it right - I've seen two non-league matches this year and enjoyed them thoroughly, there's been nine goals between them, a lot of honest, uncompromising football through players who are not the most talented, but do not always resort to the ugliest, most cynically effective football (in the way that I percieve Liverpool to, often), I dunno...
So, are any other football fans who happily follow top-end football as much as anything else, feeling a bit disillusioned?
I realise this all sounds a bit like a drunk man talking philosophy (it is).
(oh, and Liverpool fans, feel free to call me anti-Scouse or some other twattish thing, but you're wrong and it just makes you a knobjockey)
Some Kittens
have wee meows
woah, that was an essay
and no, I can't remember why I put Liverpool in "'s
hear hear
to bits of that.
I was pleased when Liverpool won the European Cup in 2005 as it was a pretty great victory, and a return to former glories and all that.
However, all the 'special European night' at Anfield gubbins is getting pretty tired now. Have the balls to go for a league challenge! And the balls to take it to teams like Barnsley.
Non-League is better in many ways tis true. Hopefully AFC Wimbledon will go up in the playoffs this year, and the wood stay up!
Theo Walcott
is reason enough to believe Arsenal are the better side. One of the most promising English prospects and shits on Crouch
fuck off
no you fuck off you little shit
and take your fucking fashion statement fugazi tshirt and £100 haircut your mum paid for with you, you withering cunt
it actually says
FUNGAL
INFECTION
Dragons Den: Late Night Edition
:D
haha
to argue back or not?
Ha, that's never a £100 haircut.
nah my mate cut it for me
so it was free :)
this post
almost reminds me of the time llb went crazy that one time.
100% amazing :D
He must have a HUGe ladder to do that
Hug E. Bear
"a team who only sporadically play attractive football"
to be honest that describes all four sides left in it.
* not left in it, but you know what i mean.
no, but what i see when i watch
is the most attractive football from Arsenal
some, but not a huge amount, from ManYoo
not much at all from Chelserpool
oh, and while i'm here
does anyone else feel like the prospect of TWO WHOLE chelserpool matches is enough to make them want to gouge their own eyes out?
absolutely.
but at least we have the United/Barca games to look forward to, although any final after that will probably be quite drab.
have you seen how Barca are playing at the mo?
they'll be snoozefests with the MU Rowdies barely out of their comfort zone
fuck this
i need a bacon sarnie
But Arsenal
also only sporradically played well. They aren't the footballing utopia people like to fantasize that they are.
People just don't like Liverpool, and therefore feel the urge to come up with increasingly inane reasons for it. Just say "I don't like Liverpool", no need to disguise it as faux-philosophical ramblings.
"I see innovation and excitement", bleuurgh
^ I completely agree with this.
I've said before that, if anything, Arsenal overplay, and that's as bad to watch as a team that doesn't play at all. Sneaky little through balls on the edge of the box are all well and good, but they come off once in twenty times. I'd like to see Arsenal be more direct, if i'm honest.
Exactly
The match lasts for 90+ minutes, and a handful of cute interchanges of play during the first 20 minutes doesn't seem quite so fulfilling now, does it? People just don't want to give Liverpool any credit. Which I can understand, but it gets tiresome. I'm so glad that I was brought up supporting Arsenal, it'd drive me fucking insane having to support them and their bipolar football.
That said, Hleb was amazingly good again tonight, and has been all season.
Yep completely right just look at Torres' goal
would Adebayer turned and SHOT at goal like that or passed it onto Fabregas only for him to dodge a shoulder and find Mascherano up his backside and being forced to play it to Hleb and have that forward position that they had completely wasted.
i don't have anything against Liverpool as a club, place, whatever
just against how the football club is playing/being run at the moment - there's enough people out there at the moment who are convinced "people just don't like Liverpool" - it's completely silly to suggest that (well, maybe some Mancunians don't), when I was a wee nipper I supported Liverpool, i've nothing against the idea of them, you suggesting otherwise does nothing for your argument and just makes you look foolish
Sorry, I should have said originally
I meant that I was referring to Liverpool the football club, as opposed to the city as a whole.
I stand by the point that football fans are loathe to give them credit where credit is due though. Plus we have to support a team with Dirk Kuyt in it week in week out - feel our pain!
Liverpool's victory cut me deeply
Arsenal need to sort their right midfield slot, as Eboue is a fucking liability. Senderos isn't a top level defender. Adebayor has regressed over the past couple of months.
Liverpool are just a fucking despicable team, but in comparison to Chelsea they're saints so I suppose I'll be rooting for a Liverpool Barca final.
i'm all for wengers player develepment
but we need to sign a quality centre back, and a right winger to replace Rosicky (his career is basically over by the looks of todays press releases, a real shame)
Eboue is the only player in the squad i really don't like that much - silly decisions and a shitty attitude, despite whatever talents he has
Liverpool have
scored 26 goals in 10 CL games this season. Not bad for such a 'dull' team.
common misconception
goals don't necessarily equal entertainment
and also remember seven of those were against a besiktas team that didn't turn up (not that 19 in 9 is especially bad, though)
his CAREER is basically over?
Season, perhaps?
i was being a bit dramatic
but according to doctors, his muscle structure is fundamentally wrong, and these kind of injuries may well continue thoughout the rest of his career.
Meaning it will be constant on-off injuries, and never reaching his full potential.
wut?
um i think there were two teams making it a great game tonight. And if this is the game which makes you not want to watch the top 4 then i dont know what to say because it was a great game. Me thinks youre just unhappy liverpool won. The things you levelled at liverpool could be levelled at any club.
It is also ONLY A GAME! im a man utd fan. I frankly couldnt care less about any other team apart from my own. If united dont win the champions league i dont care who does. Just stick to watching sheffield wednesday if you wish.
you're right
the things i levelled at liverpool could be levelled at (m)any clubs, but especially liverpool for me as they are so much in the public eye, have such an enthusiastic and often reviled fanbase, and also i say this because i just watched their match tonight
my point was that as someone who enjoys watching football generally, i tend to care who wins beyond my own club (also because, if i only cared if sheffield wednesday won, i'd have slit my wrists by now), and seeing liverpool beat arsenal, where arsenal are the team i've enjoyed watching play week in week out for a few years now, was a bit depressing. but hey, fuck it, if liverpool start suddenly playing beautiful football (whatever that may be), i'll enjoy watching them win too
could arsenal
possibly be the 21st century version of Keegan's Newcastle in 90's? Playing attractive football, adored by the purists and an untouchable manager. Yet distinctly lacking the backbone, tactical nous or cutting edge to actually win the trophies that history remembers you for....
thats a viewpoint
rendered pretty wrong by the 2 championships, 3 FA cups, and a double won by Arsenal this century, including an unbeaten season that will likely never happen again.
I think history might remember that.
The Champions League is gash
Why on earth are Liverpool, who were nowhere near the top of the league last season, playing in the thing anyway? If it is a "Champions League" Man U and Fenerbahce are the only two sides from the last 8 who deserve to be there. The hyperbole is nauseating.
that argument annoys me
people forgot how absolutely dismal 90% of champions league games used to be when it was the european cup.
I don't care how entertaining it is
If Liverpool or Arsenal can be crowned "Champions of Europe" when finishing 4th in the league it renders the whole thing pointless. Rafa Benitez should be sacked for leading his vastly expensive team to failure in the league - but then their league position has earnt them megabucks and the chance to win the "biggest prize in world football" so who cares, better luck next time.
disagreed
if it was only the champions that entered the champions league often the team that then finished 2nd or 3rd the next year would be in the champions league
And the group stages are just thrill a minute weren't they?
aren't? were?
bedtime methinks x
So you're old enough to remember the glory days of the European Cup
are you?
Thought not...
i lived them vicariously
through your many posts on the subject
Get to fuck
Do arsenal fans not count the trophies they won under george graham anymore?
all this this talk about pure pure football is nonsense and is not spouted by people who have never played the game. football is not for neutrals
believe me mate
if you support sheffield wednesday
you need to be a neutral sometimes
otherwise it's just too depressing
"a team who only sporadically play attractive football"
Arsenal ALWAYS play attractive football and never win anything. That makes them the ultimate losers.
whoa whoa whoa
does everyone have the memory of goldfish round here?
Wenger's Arsenal have won 3 Premierhips, 4 FA Cups, including a double and an unbeaten league season. All playing attractive football.
More than Chelsea in the same time period for instance.
yeah but whos won the champions league in the past 10 years?
Man U and Liverpool
but 3 years
no trophies. Hey, even Spurs won a trophy this year. That's not great for such a club with such expectations. Be honest.
Just listening to Wenger on SSNews, how bitter, can't give Liverpool one ounce of credit (despite fact scored 5 goals over the two games)>
i didnt realise that
not winning the champions league meant not winning anything at all.
I think this is what the original poster was getting at. This top 4 obsession with the champions league at all costs. There's more to football.
As an Arsenal fan, i'd love us to win the european cup for sure, but that doesn't mean there hasn't been great times at arsenal this decade.
Im not arguing with that
but in terms of real success, thats probably what most people would consider the pinnacle
deep down
this fact knaws away at Arsenal fans.
But i'd use the term 'complete success' not 'real success', especially as the league is harder to win than the european cup.
fair enough yeah
Winning the league consistently
is a much bigger achievement.
which arsenal havent really done
3 under Wenger, but theyve now won nothing for 3 years
true true
and on a smaller budget
however wenger does seem to wear a halo
Get the fuck over it
Liverpool won, end of story.
The Champion's League, nor the Premier League, nor any Cup is about playing attractive football.
Its about winning.
Which Liverpool have done.
End of story.
to quote danny blanchflower
"The great fallacy is that the game is first and last about winning. It is nothing of the kind. The game is about glory, it is about doing things in style and with a flourish, about going out and beating the other lot, not waiting for them to die of boredom."
Can't believe i just quoted spurs, but its true!
OK
ask all the Liverpool/Arsenal/Chelsea fans on here whether they would have preferred to see their team play attractive football, or win tonight. And then see how many people agree with you.
this is a misleading argument
ask people if they'd like to see their team win, they'll say "yes"
ask people who don't support either team involved who they want to win, see what you get then
Well you could never argue
Spurs have been about the winning...
haha
true true.
I'm a gooner, just playing devil's advocate. But there is more to life, and sport, than winning.
danny blanchflower ftw
articulates it way better than i could have
I bet Blanchflower
had just lost to a team that defended really well and scored on the break. When the Italians do it, it's hailed as genius.
See you later.
Never won the Premier League though have they?
Which makes a complete mockery of their admittance into a so-called Champions League.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Not really
If we'd had the current system back in 1996 I'm sure you'd have been gunning Big Brian Roy to fire you into the 4th Champions League spot which was a possibility back in them days. HILARIOUS now of course but if you had qualified I'm sure you'd have reminded yourself daily of how much of a folly it was Forest being there... Hypothetical situation alert but, y'know, you're clutching at straws when you're questioning a team's entry into a competition which simply puts 'Europe's Top Clubs' against each other... You know the Champions League is purely a syntactic/marketing issue which is used to overglamourise what the competition actually IS so... see ya.
Plus I think Liverpool have done enough to justify their place in the modern pantheon of great European clubs (and therefore fit in with what the competition is about) by I dunno... WINNING IT within the last 5 years? Makes sense to me...
"you'll never win anything with kids"
see alan hanson was right he was just talking about the wrong team
alan, the missing Hanson brother?
you win nothing with mmmbop
if your a fan of sheffield wednesday,
then way the fuck to give a shit about what the "big four" do?
The Champions League is just another
bi-product of corporate football designed for non-football loving football fans.
what a load of bollocks
but what else do you expect from fans of minor clubs like Sheffield Wednesday & Nottingham Forest, if either of your teams were in the Champions League you'd be loving every minute of it. Just a quickie would you rather be playing in the Champions League or the Championship / League One ?
^agreed.
to me, this whole thread just reeks of jealously and envy.
but mostly jealously. i don't give a fuck whether sheffield wednesday or southampton stay up or not, and i'd wouldn't be surprised of a fan of millwall gave a shit about liverpool's run in the champions league. in short, this is just jealously on others' part.
nothing to do with jealousy
it's like when someone, usually an idiot, says 'don't hate me man, hate the game'. I don't hate you I just think you're a cunt.