If Burnley makes it to the EL I think they'll throw it by fielding a B-team. They definitely don't have the resources to make a run and shouldn't probably try to.
Premier League 17/18
- Thread starter LionNYC
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Superb article about Klopp.
https://www.joe.co.uk/sport/the-ins...iverpool-to-the-champions-league-final-178445
https://www.joe.co.uk/sport/the-ins...iverpool-to-the-champions-league-final-178445
Read it, and I will confirm that it's a great read. I wanted to post it, but I felt like I've about used up my allocation of LFC posts.
Mel Reddy does a spectacular job covering Liverpool. If it comes from her, it is absolute gospel.
She touches on the closeness of the club personnel (players and staff) a good bit. I found that a confirmation of what it seems like following the guys on social media. They all seem to genuinely get along and root for one another.
It's not always been the case since I've followed Liverpool, but it's fair to say they have their shit together these days. Losing your "best player" and the top assistant at different critical stretches in the same season would wreck most clubs for the season.
I have supported Liverpool since I started following club soccer, but it's fair to say I've never been so "in love" with a team as I am this one. This group of players just seem like really good guys.
It is a really good article, nice to read about Klopp and his ways. Happy for him and his family, kind of miss him in the Buli though as those BVB FCB matches back in the day were tits up awesome to watch.
I hated Liverpool for no reason other than I thought their fans were whiny assholes, but with Klopp in charge I will say my perceived notions of them have changed. He has brought a spark back to Pool.
Best of luck to Klopp & the Reds,
Midas Mulligan . Please plunder Real so all their fans can cry and go home.
Aren’t Burnley already qualified for Europa?
They finished 7th, and none of the cup winners were below them.
Or am I missing something?
This article raises the question of what the role should be (or can be) of the teams in the EPL which are outside of the Top Six. Are fourteen teams in the Prem basically doomed to be the equivalent of the Washington Generals? Is any mid-table side which tries to be something more then guilty of "not knowing it's place", as many pundits have enjoyed saying recently? And finally, isn't it critical for teams in any league to make a firm decision about how to succeed on their own terms?
In La Liga, for example, Atletico Madrid is a team with one overriding mission: deploy a style of play capable of occasionally beating Barça and Real Madrid while spending a lot less on payroll. What should the mission of various mid-table EPL teams be? Simply qualify for the UEL?
http://www.espn.com/soccer/english-...ose-but-ultimately-long-term-ambition-won-out
In La Liga, for example, Atletico Madrid is a team with one overriding mission: deploy a style of play capable of occasionally beating Barça and Real Madrid while spending a lot less on payroll. What should the mission of various mid-table EPL teams be? Simply qualify for the UEL?
http://www.espn.com/soccer/english-...ose-but-ultimately-long-term-ambition-won-out
In 2016, Leicester won the Premier League after finishing the previous season in 14th after being promoted the season before that.
I was thinking it is rather amazing that we have this total lack of parity only 2 years after they made that crazy run. Of course, that year was an outlier all around, as 3 of the top 7 spots were not from the Big 6.
But the year before that and the two years since, the top 6 has been held by the Big 6.
Outliers gonna outlie. Doesn't seriously challenge the prevailing trend.
I still don’t fully grasp how that happened. Best try at an explanation: Liverpool were rebuilding, changing managers mid season. Pellegrini knew he was leaving. Spurs were still finding themselves. Chelsea won it the year before and they quit on Jose. ManU was in post-Fergie turmoil. Arsenal was just doing Arsenal.
Sound about right?
I don’t see it happening again soon. Those outlier champions are far less likely to happen with high point total champions, and I can’t see anyone winning the league without pushing, or more likely breaking, 90 points so long as Pep is at City.
Exactly. It was the perfect storm for the unbelievable. As you said, the big five/six were in chaos. LC figured out how to play this perfect COUNTER intuitive style. And it turned out with JV et al they actually had the right cast to capitalize if he and others had the out of this world season they did. Who needs to pass and control? They had incredible luck with no injuries whatsoever. And they were able to play the same 11/18 for essentially the entire season. It still doesn't make sense. Including to the poor guy who cashed in on his 5000-1 future bet after they won the first game.
Leicester was also awarded 13 penalty kicks, the most any team has had in the PL since at least 2002. Everything, absolutely everything, went perfect for them that year.
To add to what everybody else has said, Leicester's players across the board also had career years. Vardy & Mahrez were basically the top two players statistically in the league at their positions. The defense was playing 3 rungs above their normal career levels and shutting down offenses they had no business manhandling, and all of the worker-bee players ran their engines continuously in 5th gear..... it was a perfect storm to take advantage of the big clubs' issues.
My bad. I realize in hindsight that my response to your more-considered post was glib. I tend to have a bit of a kneejerk reaction when it comes to lament or pessimism. Or what I perceive to be pessimistic. It's not a good thing.
As you say, there are always going to be outliers. When we deconstruct that particular outlier though, I think the individual factors are far from rare. Big clubs fall victim to complacency in a fairly cyclical fashion. Finding diamonds in the rough (or finding new "roughs"). Tactical revolutions seem to come around every 4 to 8 years. (to your point that it makes sense for clubs to develop specific strategies based on their means). Sleeping giants like City attract major investors (what about Newcastle, Leeds?). Major TV deals change the dynamics for clubs.
If you don't believe in the affordances of those factors for disrupting the established order, then maybe one can take solace in the idea that the gratification of such outliers is proportional to the delay between them. Or the idea that maybe people care more about seeing the best football than parity (https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.hu...omics-stefan-szymanski-talks-dollars-data-mls).
This is probably worth its own topic because of how it relates to what MLS is and where it’s going, but I tend to think of it more as two separate groups. Some care more about “best football”and follow big clubs at home and abroad, others care more about parity and find things more enjoyable in the lower divisions and are open to enjoying MLS as a league that hasn’t separated (yet?).
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