Football 2011/12 Football Season

EJ at the chelsea game in the jacket made by DC and Jake at the chinese Grand Prix!
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Off to Japan to become the best in the world in December.

Or at least try.

Spurs unfortunate but dropped a 13 point lead over Arsenal, so its their fault that it was even in question.
 
Feel happy for Chelsea, as it's been a long time coming. But you've gotta feel for all those Spurs players and fans for having to put up with Europa League football again next season.
 
Maybe they'd enjoy it if they took it half-seriously, as the Spanish clubs do. Indeed, if you want to improve your UCL seeding for when you get there, the Europa is fantastic for that!
 
As The Hamster ( HammydiRestarules ) says, feel happy for Chelsea, especially for Drogba, he wanted it so much that he delivered twice at the death.

Got to feel sorry for Bayern Munich though, it was like Felipe Massa in 2008 losing out in his home turf right at the end by the finest of margins, after so many chances, they finally broke Chelsea and Cech only for it to be taken away from them by the phenom Drog.

Fair play to Chelsea, they gritted out every match, fought so hard for it, throwing their bodies everywhere, the team that wanted it the most, won it. Bayern despite many chances faltered.

In my opinion, the right team one, they showed a lot of spirit and passion.
 
You lot need to notice the difference between the international and club games. In club competitions, the only two European Cup defeats suffered by English sides on penalties were Chelsea's two in 2007 and 2008 to other English sides. In international football no German has missed a shoot-out penalty since 1982.
 
I know! I said the last German to miss a penalty, not to miss in a shootout! You already said the last miss was 1982, which was also the first shootout in the Finals of the World Cup,Uli Stielike was the man that missed
 
Bar the Real Madrid shoot-out Bayern Munich haven't really won that many in recent years and Bastain Schweinstiger has to be one of the world unluckest players ever in regards to been a losing finalist.
 
Well that was a good day. West Ham and Chelsea.

At the start of the season I didn't expect us to finish as high as fourth, and the Europa League is a winnable competition (@teabagyokel - actually, most of the time we have taken it seriously, many of the times we've gone out we've been playing a strong team).

But with the way it has turned out I do rather feel like :givemestrength:all summer.
 
Hmmm, Galahad. I'm not talking about under any manager other than Redknapp - certainly the Spurs team that was beaten by Sevilla when they were exceptional cannot be accused of undercooking the tournament.

However, this year, when they were playing PAOK in the do-or-die game, this was the team (Who Scored):

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Now I can see that Lennon and Modric were playing, but that is not a team that Spurs would put out for a serious league or cup match. Its not even rotation. It is sheer disrespect to either the competition or the opposition to put that side out there.

And I don't buy this argument that playing Thursday-Sunday is any different to playing Wednesday-Saturday as each Champions League team had to do at some point. If the Europa League is too tiring, then so is the Champions League - to win the Champions League you have to play only two games less than to win the Europa League, assuming entry at the equivalent round.

Frankly, if a team wants to succeed when it gets into the Champions League, why wouldn't it want a run in the Europa League first? For one thing it improves your seeding no end when you get there. A successful Europa league run can move you up 10 or 11 places in the ranking - if Atletico Madrid had got into the Champions League for next season they would be in Pot One. And, of course, it gives the players experience of playing two-legged European knockout football.

Whatsmore, the Europa League is a fine competition which deserves better than to be a run-out for Harry Kane. I don't like the idea of a club that hasn't won anything but the Carling Cup for 20 years to turn its nose up at "the wrong sort of silverware".

Hey ho, more seeding points will be on the way to Iberia. Lets hope Italy don't start taking the Europa League seriously or we'll find that fourth place no longer qualifies for a Champions League place anyway.
 
I think that's a little harsh. It's all about context; we only needed a draw from that game to guarantee progression to the knockout stages. King and Van der Vaart aren't in shape to play three games in a week, so the decision to play them in the weekend games was entirely logical. Harry Kane was only in the starting line-up because Pavlyuchenko was injured, while Corluka, Bassong and Pienaar are established internationals. Livermore and Rose are young players and raw, but they've featured more than a couple of times in the Premier League this season too.

It was a team selected to get a result, and the consensus amongst the Spurs fans that I spoke to at kick-off was that Harry had picked too strong a team. To be fair to PAOK they were the better team that night, but only because our players performed so far below their normal level. A similar team had beaten Rubin Kazan, a much better team, already. 85 times out of 100 that Spurs team would have beaten PAOK; if that's disrespecting the opposition then so be it, but that's my honest view on it.

We'll never know what team he would have selected for the knockout rounds. Admittedly, he did throw away our chances in the Carling Cup this year by playing too weak a team at Stoke. Hopefully in the coming season we'll get the chance to find out how seriously Mr Redknapp takes the Europa League, because like you I think it is a fine competition.
 
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