General Football Thread

[IAceI]

Two leagues of 19, then at the end the best 19 were going to go into a 'champions' league to decide the winner and the other 19 were going to go into a league to fight against relegation.

[Gazz]

I swear in South America, the only goal the FA's have is to make their domestic leagues as complicated as possible.

[IAceI]

Yeah they're very backwards, and it isn't helped by wanting to change it whenever somebody finally grasps it. I think the majority do just use the open and close leagues, but obviously places like Brazil have regional leagues as well that they compete it.

Fuck knows. I'll stick to European football I reckon.

[Summers]

Seriously, in FM I'm managing a lower league Brazilian side. I have no idea what happens. I won a league. No promotion, but qualified for something. But I have another league starting soon. I don't know what I'm doing!

[Starvinho]

It's Van Der Sar's testimonial this evening, and it should be a very interesting one.

Amsterdam ArenA, 3 August 2011

16.45: Ajax U13 v Man Utd U13

17.10: Ajax '95 v Holland '98

18.15: Ajax v Edwin's Dream Team

19.20: Edwin's final farewell

A Dream Team managed by Sir Alex and Rene Meulensteen will face Ajax as part of a bumper evening of entertainment at the Amsterdam ArenA, with several United first-teamers due to turn out for their former colleague.

Rio Ferdinand, Nemanja Vidic, Michael Carrick, Ryan Giggs and Wayne Rooney are all in the squad along with former Reds Gary Neville and Louis Saha.

An Under-13s match between Ajax and United kicks things off (approx 16:45 BST), with Edwin's son Joe and Meulensteen's son Melle to play for the young Reds.

Then the famous European Cup-winning Ajax team of 1995 tackles the Dutch World Cup side of 1998 (approx 17:10 BST), with Edgar Davids, Marc Overmars, Dennis Bergkamp and Jaap Stam all named in the squad.

Finally comes the main event (approx 18:15 BST) before the keeper is given a proper send-off by the 52,000 fans in the stadium after his distinguished service to the game.

The Dream Team squad includes: van der Sar; van Bronckhorst, Neville, Ooijer, Ferdinand, Vidic, Cocu; Carrick, Giggs, Zenden, Kuyt; Bergkamp, Del Piero, Rooney, Saha.

The dream team match looks like one to watch, some class players in that line-up.

[Asuka's Gonna Kill You]

I really wish I had of subscribed to MUTV, keep meaning to.

Rooney, Del Piero and Bergkamp together looks unbelievable

[IAceI]

Where there's a will there's a way JP . Hope Zenden scores and dances. :-D

[IAceI]

Naoki Matsuda the latest professional footballer to die from heart related issues. Absolutely horrible. RIP.

[Starvinho]

Just heard about that. It's always a tragedy when any athlete dies young of a heart attack. RIP.

[Summers]

Just heard about that. It's always a tragedy when any one athlete dies young of a heart attack. RIP.

[Starvinho]

Just heard about that. It's always a tragedy when any one athlete dies young of a heart attack. RIP.

Indeed

[Lineker]

Sad news. RIP.

[IAceI]

I suitably trust that everyone here has bought The Blizzard? And if not you will be?

[therockbox]

How many graphics/pictures are in it? I'm looking at the Kindle version but I'd rather not if it's graphic heavy.

[IAceI]

None, not in the hard copy anyways. Well, that's a bit of a lie - there's a piece on Man Utd 2 Real Madrid 3 and there's a couple of team sheets and there's a graph or two on one of the pieces by Kieran O'Connor of the Swissramble. Then each 'chapter' has a hand drawn picture at the start.

But in terms of pictures accompanying written pieces; none really.

[therockbox]

Oh that's cool, I was just worried there'd be loads of Chalkboard style graphs all over the place.

[IAceI]

There isn't too much tactical analysis in the book as you'd expect from J Wilson and friends. Very much a collection of interesting stories to read, and the interview with Dennis Bergkamp is probably worth buying it on its own.

[King Ellis]

Just had a quick look at Issue 0, the FM story caught my eye and was wonderful.

[Lineker]

Am I the only one who doesn't know what the hell you're all going on about?

[Crybaby Bunting]

Just downloaded

All the images you talked about can be seen on my kindle so I guess it's as good as the print version bar the homely musky smell :/