MILAN vs napoli

Arsenal will be playing against Barcelona then.

Come on Gourcuff show the world that you are the best by reaching to the final while scoring a hattrick against Inter.

Originally Posted by Gabriel489

Arsenal will be playing against Barcelona then.

Come on Gourcuff show the world that you are the best by reaching to the final while scoring a hattrick against Inter.

So for you, the final will be Bordeaux-Inter ...

Well, I have no idea about what team between Lyon and Bordeaux will reach the semi-finals. All I know is that there's going to be a French team in semi-finals, which didn't happen since Monaco, and before them, a long time ago ...
Anyway, it's quite sad for these teams to play each other, because while both can be happy to be able to pass to the semi-finals (first time for Lyon if that happens) and will allow France to have a team in semi-finals, what is interesting in this competition is to play against the best teams of the other countries ... and this Lyon-Bordeaux will have a smell of Ligue 1, more than CL, so it should be a boring game !!

Originally Posted by GeoTav

Off topic: the next games to be played in 1/4 finals of CL are Arsenal-Barcelona (1), Inter-CSKA (2), Bayern-Manchester (3), Lyon-Bordeaux (4). In semi-finals, it will be the winners of 1-2 and 3-4 ...

I can give you the winner rite now and you can count on it

Arsenal...................
.............................Barcelona...............
Barcelona.................
......................................................Inter..............
Inter.......................
.............................Inter......................
CSKA......................
..................................................................Bayern Munich (c)
Bayern....................
.............................Bayern...................
Manchester..............
.....................................................Bayern............
Lyon.......................
.............................Lyon
Bordeaux..................

This will be the best possible result for us the ACM fans, because:
- We don't have to see jerks like Rooney & Rio Ferdinand as winners
- Alex Fergusen should retire, enough of this 17th century Santa-clause
- Sick Arsene Wenger & over ratted Fabregas well get the real meaning for beautiful football in form of an utter humiliation from Barca
- Inter in the final will be good for Serie-A
- Its refreshing to see a French side in the SF instead of the boring Liverpool etc
- Barca won't be able to do what ACM did in 89-90. This is something only AC Milan can do in future
- Bayern's win will show justice in Football world

Every website is saying that Inter has the easiest path to the semis... i am with CSKA!!!

And now, Inter face the hardest one: Palermo has not losed at home since January, 2009.

Napoli lost 6/14 away matches, so this will be our real chance.

To be honest I don't really believe in this "undefeated at home since __" stuff. There is always a first time. Palermo will def be a really really tough game for Inter, but that doesn't mean that in good form they cannot win. They have shown both good play on the field against Carletto FC and it will do wonders for their morale since their bad period. A plus might be fatigue, but they have a second team which is maybe almost as good as our first.

I recall reading on UEFA's website that teams from the same nation couldn't meet so early on? Hmm...

@ mzk57 … I dont see how Bayern winning the CL would be a sign of justice in football.. after all they got to where they are now thanks to a MONSTROUSLY offside goal... or do you mean in the sense that it will show the injustice which is todays football? Not sure I follow.
If Bayern do however play awesomely in their next games then they certainly "deserve" it, but as things stand right now, I wouldn't say so.

As for us: Borri has got tonsillitis, so he is with almost absolute certainty out.
Pato, Antonini and the injured squad are doing well. Ambro should be joining the group training tomorrow, but he is nonetheless listed as a starter. Not sure what happeend to him?

Originally Posted by Gio-mania

To be honest I don't really believe in this "undefeated at home since __" stuff. There is always a first time. Palermo will def be a really really tough game for Inter, but that doesn't mean that in good form they cannot win. They have shown both good play on the field against Carletto FC and it will do wonders for their morale since their bad period. A plus might be fatigue, but they have a second team which is maybe almost as good as our first.

I recall reading on UEFA's website that teams from the same nation couldn't meet so early on? Hmm...

@ mzk57 … I dont see how Bayern winning the CL would be a sign of justice in football.. after all they got to where they are now thanks to a MONSTROUSLY offside goal... or do you mean in the sense that it will show the injustice which is todays football? Not sure I follow.
If Bayern do however play awesomely in their next games then they certainly "deserve" it, but as things stand right now, I wouldn't say so.

As for us: Borri has got tonsillitis, so he is with almost absolute certainty out.
Pato, Antonini and the injured squad are doing well. Ambro should be joining the group training tomorrow, but he is nonetheless listed as a starter. Not sure what happeend to him?

Teams from a same country can't play against each other in the group stage and in 1/8 finals.

What is tonsillitis ? It really sounds like a strange word !!

Team according to corriere:
----------------abbiatti---------
-zambro----thiago--favalinho--antonini--
------------flamini--pirlo-----
---------------seedorf------------
------PATO------------Dinho--------
---------------pippo----------

Good one! Too bad Bonera cant play CB yet...

Originally Posted by Gio-mania

To be honest I don't really believe in this "undefeated at home since __" stuff. There is always a first time.

Just self-encouragement, mate

and for the starting line-up, predicting the back-four is painful for me. I want to see:

------------Pirlo-------------Ambrosini-------------
------------------Seedorf-------------------------
----Pato--------------------------------Dinho-----
------------------Hunter--------------------------

Borri is the best striker playing with his back against the goal and only so, that why he could make wonderful scissor-kick and at the same time, could not score properly He is usefull and useless sometimes. It is good that I'm free from the dilemma this match

with the full-service of Dinho, Seedorf and Pato, I want to see how Hunter performs, for the future of Milan (he is not the Oliveira to be transfered out for just one season). Pippo is good choice, but Hunter should have his chance, then Pippo be cause he can not play full match yet.

2 wingers and a AMC helping a penalty-box striker, I want to see that.

i dont think Pippo can play a whole match but for Hitmanns sake i want him to start because he is WC. Im veryy happy to see Pato back . He sould not play more than a half though.

Originally Posted by Gabriel489

Geo, I actually had been following Seedorf, or at the very least watched him play since he first came out from Ajax. I did remember that Ajax were a very hungry team with one of the most creative style at that time. But to me the midfield engine or their best midfielder at that time was Edgar Davids. HIs running, passing, tackling and overall gameplay was just simply amazing. For those who have not seen Davids play in his prime, he was a combination of Pirlo and Gattuso. Seedorf was not even close to be the focal point of Ajax, he was like Carlo in the late 80s to early 90s in Milan.
His Real days were pretty good, but he was only good for about a season and a half. Same goes for his Inter days. Then comes Milan and everybody knows how he played here. One good game followed by 15 bad games.

WOW, mate you messed this up!

Davids and passing into same sentence? He was as good in passing as Makelele or Gattuso. Combination of Pirlo and Gattuso?! Mate you're on some bad sh.t and I would be very pleased if you tell we what did you take, for me to try the same.

As for Seedorf, I'm surprised because you are saying that you had been following him so long, but in his Inter days he was always injured. One good game followed by 15 bad in Milan? Mate it's like I dreamed about watching football for 16 years and then I'm suddenly awake and I realized that it was just a dream. There's no other way to describe what I'm just reading...

For your info, there are many people in this forum that are MUCH older than teenage years, so you can't sell that story here.

Davids was a pit-bull and nothing more. He was a physical beast + good reading of the game. That's all. He even can't be told in the same sentence as world's greatest DMs from that period, for example Makelele or Vieira. And not even as Gattuso.

And Seedorf, he was most complete midfielder of his time. Period.

Originally Posted by Gio-mania

The final ranking of a season are summed effective only in the season after the next. So, the ranking of this season 2009/10 will be summed up with the previous 4 and make the overall ranking/coefficient valid for the 2011/12 season. So for next years (2010/11) we Italians will be safe, but depending on the events which occur this season, we will lose the spot in 2 years.

Wins/draws/losses give 3/1/0 points respectively and these points are divided by the amount of teams from that nation. (both Europa and CL are counted). And then some decimal points are adjusted, to get a nicer number.

Then there are bonus points:
- reaching the group phase in CL = 4 pts
- reaching the second round in CL = 5 pts
- reaching the quarter, semi and final (CL + europa) = 1 bonus point

As the season stands right now (19 Mar 2009 and overall coefficient):
- England: 15.5 / 79.4
- Spain: 15.6 / 77.5
- Italy: 14 / 62.9
- Germany: 15.75 / 61.8
- France: 14.1 / 52.9
- Russia: 6.1 / 43.8

Right now, we keep our spot, but as you can see it is a very very slender lead. But they have two teams left in the Europa League (Wolfsburg + Hamburg) and Bayern in CL, whilst we just have Inter. So things might very well change.

Hope that cleared things out.

For future reference, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_coefficient)

(Also thanks to MVBasten for clearing it out to me some weeks back)

Thanks. but that's too much calculation if I have to do it my own. Honestly, I don't care that much that if we will have only 3 left. One or two good season from Italian teams in Europe will turn it around in no time.

Originally Posted by Revolver

WOW, mate you messed this up!

Davids and passing into same sentence? He was as good in passing as Makelele or Gattuso. Combination of Pirlo and Gattuso?! Mate you're on some bad sh.t and I would be very pleased if you tell we what did you take, for me to try the same.

As for Seedorf, I'm surprised because you are saying that you had been following him so long, but in his Inter days he was always injured. One good game followed by 15 bad in Milan? Mate it's like I dreamed about watching football for 16 years and then I'm suddenly awake and I realized that it was just a dream. There's no other way to describe what I'm just reading...

For your info, there are many people in this forum that are MUCH older than teenage years, so you can't sell that story here.

Davids was a pit-bull and nothing more. He was a physical beast + good reading of the game. That's all. He even can't be told in the same sentence as world's greatest DMs from that period, for example Makelele or Vieira. And not even as Gattuso.

And Seedorf, he was most complete midfielder of his time. Period.

I am with you on Seedorf. I hate his gut from time to time, but he is that type of player when you count on him, he lets you down; when you write him off, he sneaks back in with a bang. He is in a league of his own.

As for Davids, I actually also agree with you that he doesn't pass balls like Zidane or Rui Costa, but I think if you can't compare him to Gattuso for that. We all know how Gattuso passes. I think Davids was definitely a pit bull but if he had to, he could play as an attacking midfielder. Somehow I believed that happened in some games? His shooting is also much better than Gattuso, even though it isn't exactly that difficult for anybody that shoots decently, heck, even Dida might shoot better than Gattuso.

Davids was just pure unlucky with Milan. His time at Juventus and Barcelona had shown that he was truly a great player.

Originally Posted by Revolver

Davids and passing into same sentence? He was as good in passing as Makelele or Gattuso. Combination of Pirlo and Gattuso?! Mate you're on some bad sh.t and I would be very pleased if you tell we what did you take, for me to try the same.

Davids was a pit-bull and nothing more. He was a physical beast + good reading of the game. That's all. He even can't be told in the same sentence as world's greatest DMs from that period, for example Makelele or Vieira. And not even as Gattuso.

And Seedorf, he was most complete midfielder of his time. Period.

Hi mate. Davids was a true pit-bull, but he did have something more. His individual skills with the ball was exceptional:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mW8wd0WpWQU

He was good at dribbling, but he chose the modern, simple, quick control and most of the time just passed it short, because he played deep as DM where losing the ball is very dangerous. Because of the requirement of his possition, and he played along great player like Zidane, he did not need to be creative. But when he played at Tottenham, he passed the ball more, he was not bad at passing, like every graduated midfielder of Ajax academy.

I dislike him for his performance: bad with Milan and worldclass with Juventus. But he was special.

IMO: Edgar Davids = Rino Gattuso + Jeremy Lynch

Off topics: Edgar Davids will be in my BEST-11 of all time in the midfield along side Diego Maradona, Pavel Nedved & Frank Lampard

Awesome midfield

Plus, i agree, Davids was a great defensive, hard working midfielder, but the best thing about him was his goggles