UEFA Champions League 2008-2009

All Italians out. The Seria A is inferior to the Premier league on many levels.

4/4 for English clubs ...
No Italian club qualified for the next round: it's true, without us, there is no good result coming from Italian clubs in Europe (and like we didn't do well the last two years, there has been no result since two years).

Not that I am Roma, Inter or Juve fan, but still Italian teams in CL and almost UEFA cup...

Premier League teams, as someone said (a coach or something), are only better in the starting line-up (players aka money), not the tactic. This is of course not for Inter. Inter lost because they were (and are) just worse than MU, no alibi at all.

I don't like Juve and Roma went out from the competition but not for Inter. Mancini was fired even he won the league and did better than Maurinho (League AND CL), so what will Moratti do? A fake club is always fake, no matter where they are.



ps : I forgot, Maurinho's Inter is better on certain side compare to Mancini's one, at least Maurinho's players didn't fight in or after the game.

Us Milan fans can quietly hope to fly the flag for the Italian cause next season. The truth is we were dumped out by Arsenal 2 years ago, we have been made to look like a mid-table side in games against Man City and Portsmouth and we couldnt even get into the competition for this season. Again we are being made to sweat this season, dont be surprised if we get our @sses handed to us by an English side next year. And why shouldnt we? Are we so arrogant to think that players like Seedorf (Once our box to box player) will be some kind of 4X4 as Ancelotti so horribly put it. Will Kaka and Ronnie suddenly work together when there has never been any suggestion they will for Milan or Brazil? Can we penetrate the almost old Seria A type defenders English sides have with one 18 year old kid as our only true striker? Lets not even get started on our own defence!

The next few years could be painful viewing for Seria A fans. Milan, Real and Juve took advantage of the fact that English sides were given a handicap by being ruled out of the then European Cup. It took them a long time to recover, but how they have recovered. They are attracting the best players, making the most money and doing generally the best business. The league is run in a professional way unlike Seria A, which is haunted by match fixing scandals, deaths on the terraces and riots outside the grounds, old age homes for locker rooms in the case of Italy's only worthy European contenders - Milan and Juve. With the Premier League and the english sides being ran so well and the Seria A and Italian sides being ran so badly, what is the likelyhood of Italian football conquering Europe again?

So like I said dont expect any miracles next year, this Milan unlike that of Sacchi has to compete with a beast that was still asleap back then.

Edit** Oh but we have Beckham, a player that wouldnt get into the United, Chelsea or Liverpool team.

Originally Posted by K77SH C

Us Milan fans can quietly hope to fly the flag for the Italian cause next season. The truth is we were dumped out by Arsenal 2 years ago, we have been made to look like a mid-table side in games against Man City and Portsmouth and we couldnt even get into the competition for this season. Again we are being made to sweat this season, dont be surprised if we get our @sses handed to us by an English side next year. And why shouldnt we? Are we so arrogant to think that players like Seedorf (Once our box to box player) will be some kind of 4X4 as Ancelotti so horribly put it. Will Kaka and Ronnie suddenly work together when there has never been any suggestion they will for Milan or Brazil? Can we penetrate the almost old Seria A type defenders English sides have with one 18 year old kid as our only true striker? Lets not even get started on our own defence!

The next few years could be painful viewing for Seria A fans. Milan, Real and Juve took advantage of the fact that English sides were given a handicap by being ruled out of the then European Cup. It took them a long time to recover, but how they have recovered. They are attracting the best players, making the most money and doing generally the best business. The league is run in a professional way unlike Seria A, which is haunted by match fixing scandals, deaths on the terraces and riots outside the grounds, old age homes for locker rooms in the case of Italy's only worthy European contenders - Milan and Juve. With the Premier League and the english sides being ran so well and the Seria A and Italian sides being ran so badly, what is the likelyhood of Italian football conquering Europe again?

So like I said dont expect any miracles next year, this Milan unlike that of Sacchi has to compete with a beast that was still asleap back then.

Edit** Oh but we have Beckham, a player that wouldnt get into the United, Chelsea or Liverpool team.

Italian people have something special about their ego ... everyone is going to say they are dead in Europe (especially in England). They will probably react to this failure (and probably second year of failure in a row if we consider last year as a failure for Italian football). It's like in 2006 with the NT: everyone said that this team would do nothing because of all that happened in Serie A, and what happened ?!

I think you guys are making a way big a jump here.

Italian teams not doing well doesn't mean that Serie A is not competitive. Just like Premier league team not doing well doesn't mean that Premier league sucks.

You are talking about two variables here: one is on a team-level, one is on a country-level. You canNOT generalize what happen on the team level to country level.

If this isn't obvious to you, here is another example:

Korea beat Italy in 2002 world cup (country-level), but does this mean Korea teams are better than Italian teams? I hope you'll agree with me that the answer is no.

Similarly, you can't draw conclusion that because Inter/Juve/Roma/Fio didn't qualify for CL, Serie A sucks.

All you can say is:

1) Caciopoli made only one best team in Italy, which is Inter.
2) Inter doesn't know how to play in CL, regardless of coach.
3) Other teams are significantly weaker.

Surprised all teams are out? No.

Premier League stronger than Serie A? I do'nt think so.

After all, are you seeing 4-5 teams fighting for the fourth spot in Premier League?

***

Agree on the attracting the best players, which unfortunately many of them are not from England.

Perhaps most ironically, they even have to hire a coach that's from Italy (which by no means, of course, that Italian coaches are better than English coaches).

Certainly was terrible to see all the Italian teams knocked out. I still feel optimistic about our chances next year, our squad will be stronger, and hopefully we won't have the same injury problems we've had this year, and to some extend last year.

I think Calcio reached rock bottom with Calciopoli after a decline that started with the financial problems for Lazio, Fiorentina and Parma in the early 00's. Inter and Roma haven't been great European teams, in Roma's case never, and in Inters case not in 50 years, so having the two strongest contenders weakened like that has been a big blow.

Juventus are still rebuilding, and I'm still optimistic about our chances. Fiorentina are building an ambitious team, so is Napoli despite their christmas collapse, and Sampdoria to. They might take a while before any of them can compete in CL, but it's certainly a step in the right direction. Also all the teams might've been knocked out, but the English teams weren't as dominant as alot of people would like to think. Juventus got an unfair red card, in a game they dominated, ultimatly lost cause they simply weren't clinical enough, Roma lost on penalties. Don't get me wrong, it was fully deserved that the English teams won, but it wasn't THAT dominant. So I think calcio can come back strong.

Also, if the 6-5 rule gets passed, it'll be a huge blow for English football. Their complete abandonment of Brittish talent have left them in a bad shape for the future, while there are great up and comers in Italy; Santacroce, Davide Santon, Giovinco, Marco Motta are all great talents.

I can also definetly agree on the thing Jeff said. I think it's quite obvious that the 4 big teams in England are on a whole different level than the lower teams. Year after year we see the same teams qualify for champions leauge, only now have Aston Villa possed some kind of thread to Arsenal, mostly due to them letting go of all they're key players (Flamini ;] ), and injuries ofcourse. That kind of consistency only increases the 4 teams strength and widens the range between these and the lower teams.

Just too bad Roma didnt make it. Or at least Italian club will have their representative but.. hell NO for me.. Arsenal qualified And I am very glad with that ^^
LOL for Inter Milan.. they will never reach this highest competition ^^ Hope the special one can accept that was special won for MU Well done Sir Alex ^^

Originally Posted by MLM

Just too bad Roma didnt make it. Or at least Italian club will have their representative but.. hell NO for me.. Arsenal qualified And I am very glad with that ^^
LOL for Inter Milan.. they will never reach this highest competition ^^ Hope the special one can accept that was special won for MU Well done Sir Alex ^^

Are you sleeping? Special won? Won against Inter special? Hueksss!!!!
How can you think like that? If MU couldn't win against Inter, that would be disaster for them! A win against Inter for MU ist just a routine, something that you don't notice that you have already won over Inter.

Selamat jeng Gunnernya melaju ke babak berikutnya.

Originally Posted by Siregar

Are you sleeping? Special won? Won against Inter special? Hueksss!!!!
How can you think like that? If MU couldn't win against Inter, that would be disaster for them! A win against Inter for MU ist just a routine, something that you don't notice that you have already won over Inter.

Selamat jeng Gunnernya melaju ke babak berikutnya.

LOL.. not my intention to defend on Printer Milan.. but.. Jose has good record against Sir Alex.. before this match he just lost 1 game (combined from when he was Chelsea manager and Porto manager) from total 13 matches. So its gonna be personal achievement for Sir Alex.. but for sure MU is way too far for Printer Milan

ps. TENTULAH.. ARSENAL KU OKEH PUNYA

You guys make some god points, but when Italy won the world cup it was down to good management, the team being galvanised by the scandal and brave performances from people like Pirlo and Grosso. There is no doubt the Italians will try to come back fighting next year, but can they?

You need the foundations to be there. The English have even bigger egos than the Italians, just read some of the press. When they didnt have the best players or the structure in place, Manchester United used to struggle in the group stages. Now a lesser byt similar thing is happening to Italian sides.

If an Italian team will win the CL next year, which one will it be? Apart from Milan the other sides have been really poor in Europe. Where as Man United and Liverpool have been winners and Chelsea and Arsenal finalists. Compare that to Roma and Inter and we are left lacking. Juves last final was a long time ago now and most of their protagonists that season are much older and slower or have been replaced by inferior players.

I dont doubt that Milan has the potential to come back next year and emulate the season after the uefa cup a few years back. But if the club doesnt make the right choices yet again which is likely then we could conitinue emulating Real Madrid's Galacticos.

If the Italians hope to fight over the next few years, then the league needs to take more responsibilty and increase security, professionalism and marketing. The fans need to be more reasonable, especially the fans of teams like Roma.

As far as the clubs, we need the Milans and Juves back.
Inter are doing their part by getting a world class manager world class strikers. they are even for the first time developing Italian youth in Santon and Ballotelli. A few more additions and they will be able to compete.
Milan and Juve need to go and get the George Weahs and PAvel Nedveds of the world rather than pinning hopes on past greats.

We also need clubs like Parma of the 90s back
As far as Im concerned teams like Fiorentina, Napoli and Udinese are doing one hell of a great job of unearthing those discoveries. Lets not forget Thuram, Cannavaro, Buffon all went from these kind of clubs.

We have to be back to compete in CL. If we can't compete to win it, let's not play it.

Inter could fight for CL someday if they don't change everything at the end of this season and if they can have a real tactic (because Mourinho doesn't have any real tactics set for Inter for moment).

Juventus are starting to build their new team. If they can bring Diego or Modric ... but I think they will need two more years to be back to a level allowing them to hope for a win in CL.

You have there the historical trio for CL from Italy.

Then, the last years, the fourth team was Roma, but they never were able to compete for a final win in CL. This year, Fiorentina showed they were far from that too. Lazio showed the same thing last year, and it was even worse for them as they played poorly all the year while they were in CL.

Serie A actually just needs to find back some regularity (which was destroyed by Calciopoli). EPL teams always go far in CL, not especially because their teams are better than all the other ones (they are strong, but I don't think Arsenal or Chelsea are better than Barcelona for example, but if Barcelona plays against Liverpool or MU at the next round, and if they are eliminated while Arsenal and Chelsea qualify, some people will say they are better than Barcelona, which is wrong), but more because after all these years of MU-Chelsea-Liverpool-Arsenal, these teams got the experience to go far. If Aston Villa qualifies for the next CL instead of Arsenal, I'm pretty sure they will fall in the group stage or in the first robin round game.

It's the same for all championships:
- France, why only Lyon can qualify for the round robin games ? They are not necessarly a lot better than Bordeaux for example. But these other French teams qualify one year for CL and the year after, they just qualify for UEFA Cup or nothing. So each time, you have different French teams with Lyon, so only Lyon is able to qualify.
- Germany, what happened when Bayern was out of CL ? Werder still has difficulties to pass the group stage (and they are often unlucky as they often have the most difficult group lol), other teams are a joke at this level.
- Netherlands, when PSV and/or Ajax are not there or in a good year, they have no team.
- Spain, except Barcelona nowadays and Madrid (who can't qualify for quarters finals anymore), the other teams often change actually ...

Originally Posted by Jeff

Italian teams not doing well doesn't mean that Serie A is not competitive. Just like Premier league team not doing well doesn't mean that Premier league sucks.

You are talking about two variables here: one is on a team-level, one is on a country-level. You canNOT generalize what happen on the team level to country level.

Exactly, especially when you consider there are only 1-2 English players in the starting line-up of those EPL teams, and not to forget their foreign coaches and owners

Originally Posted by Nalx

Exactly, especially when you consider there are only 1-2 English players in the starting line-up of those EPL teams, and not to forget their foreign coaches and owners

How many italians have we got in our starting lineup?

Nesta may never come back
Zambro over 30
Maldini about to retire
Bonera cant win a place in our starting lineup for long enough to count
Gatusso, I give you him
Pirlo, him too
Ambro, again over 30
Favalli, no words
Inzaghi, how long more?
Boriello, is he still alive

More importantly how many are we going to have in a couple of years?