GoN_

Not bad. Except for Emerson.

Drogba's not injured, no. When I said "Torres has to start", I meant "he had bloody well better".

I just found it odd, because our sports newspapers are also placing Torres in the probable starting eleven.

Well, if you beat us in the aggregate, just beat us 4-0 tonight so our coach just fucking concentrates in the league. The guy just rested some of our most important players last Friday and ended up drawing a relegation team, in one of our worst games this season. I prefer being champion to beating Chelsea now and ending getting squashed by Barcelona in the semis.

Is Drogba injured? I hope Torres has a bad night, because Garay is injured and I don't trust our defense right now.

We should play with something like:

I doubt we won't lose this Tuesday. Our last game was pretty bad.

I think we have a chance against Chelsea but it will depend largely on how our league goes until then. We and Braga are one point behind Porto, and both quarter final legs will be close to the two most important games we have until the end of the league (against Braga at home and Sporting away). If we mess up until then, we may concentrate solely on those two Chelsea games, if things go our way here we might do just the opposite just like two years ago against Liverpool in the Europa League where we ended up thrashed at Anfield. We don't have that many options to rotate our squad so we might have to concentrate on just one objective.

Fan's fInal: APOEL v Benfica

I love you too.

I like our draw. It might not be easy but it could be worse.

It was a great save by Patricio on that last play. It would have been the most epic goal ever

This one wins.

Some pretty aggressive play, moaning all the time, etc.

Deserved win for Sporting. City gave them 135 to play. And congratulations to Sa Pinto who as a rookie coach took a destroyed team mid-season and got some pretty interesting results so far.

How can Balotelli not be sent off in this game is beyond me.

Mancini is so bad.

Edit: Oh and Renato Neto is so fucking awful.What a stupid foul.

Yeap, no surprise there.

San Mamés is one of the worse stadiums in Spain to play in. I don't see any chance that United goes through.

Oh, and would love to see Bilbao winning the Europa League. It's such an unique club...

Benfica qualified to the quarter-finals after a solid performance against a rather defensive formation. All of this to say that Howard Webb is fucking dreadful. Not that he clearly benefited anyone in this game, but he made so many mistakes... Jeez.

Was still infinitely better than the corrupt pieces of shit we have in the Portuguese league.

After last Friday, I have to agree.

Benfica qualified to the quarter-finals after a solid performance against a rather defensive formation. All of this to say that Howard Webb is fucking dreadful. Not that he clearly benefited anyone in this game, but he made so many mistakes... Jeez.

Porto did not only win the League with a huge advantage but also won the Europa League, playing some really good offensive football. And I'm a Benfica fan so I hate everything that comes from that place...

Another good manager to get sacked from Chelsea. Really hard to change something when the same prima-donnas have been undermining anyone that gets the job. Hoping AVB doesn't come back to Porto.

Just out of interest, out of the last 10 UEFA/Europa League winners (Feyenoord, Porto x2, Valencia, CSKA Moscow, Sevilla x2, Zenit, Shakhtar Donesk and Athletico Madrid) how many of them started the season in the Champions League?

Looking at that list, I'd assume only Feyenoord, Sevilla and Athletico Madrid.

Porto, when they won the first one, with Mourinho.

One way or another, either Dwight or Paul is coming to LA. I hate to break it to you, but it's the stupidity of the other owners that allow it to happen. Don't blame LA.

I don't have a problem with one of them ending up on the Lakers. If they both did, the whole lock out would have been rendered pointless since 2 small market teams would have gutted themselves so that LA could win another title or two before a game was even played.

I know you hate LA but the idea that Pau Gasol and Lamar Odom are just "spare parts" is pretty ridiculous. Gasol is a perennial All-Star and Odom has been a major part of the team's success the last few years.

The Lakers would be giving up a 31 year old starting PF, and a 32 year old 6th man for one of the best PGs in the league. When you add in that the PG happens to be 26 and the Lakers would be saving money in the process it's a trade of spare parts for a superstar. Spare parts for the Lakers may not be the same as spare parts for the Bobcats, but whenever you can trade two guys who at best are top 20/top 40 players for a guy in the top 10ish area you do it. When you can compound that deal by giving up a well known prospect for the best big man in the game, the system is (still) broken,

So, instead of getting 3 good players, the Hornets get either a far worse deal or nothing. Great job.

And Pau Gasol is still one of the best in the league in his position.

YES! Easy group for us

I'm happy with Benfica, one of the 'easier' teams out of Pot 2.

Let's see in a few weeks.

What a surprise Man.Utd get a relatively easy group in the Champions League.....

Yes, since the two best qualify they have a good chance.

I'm happy with Benfica, one of the 'easier' teams out of Pot 2.

Let's see in a few weeks.

I meant easy in the sense of location and Benfica being the lesser of the other evils in Pot 2. Shakthar would have been the best draw for us but Benfica was a close second, this way we avoided Italian (hostile crowds), Spanish (high quality teams) , French (bad record) and Russian (long and cold away days) teams.

But I still think we'll beat Benfica easy though.

It wouldn't surprise me, but to be honest, after we beat you in 2005 and put you out of the Champions League, with an awful team and coach on our side, I can believe in everything.

Hate to say, I told you so... Oh fuck it, I love to say I told you so.

I think AVB deserves some time. The guy knows how to put a team playing some nice offensive game, with a solid defense too. The thing is, he may not have the players needed to all of that.

Was it Holland/Portugal who had the most bad-tempered match ever a tournament or so ago?

16 yellows, 4 reds

That was in the World Cup. In Germany'2006 do be exact.

So... We're screwed.

Can't believe someone fell for that.

Qualified... It was hard tonight, but we got what we needed.