August 27, 200915 yr On the face of it, our group doesn't look too bad but away trips to Besiktas and Wolfsburg especially are going to be hard. Looking forward to Milan v Real though!
September 14, 200915 yr Monday, 14 September 2009 18:29 UK Uefa overturns Eduardo diving ban BBC Sports News Uefa has overturned its decision to ban Arsenal striker Eduardo for two Champions League games for diving. The Croatia international was suspended after being found guilty of diving to win a penalty in the Champions League qualifier against Celtic on 26 August. But on Monday, Uefa accepted Arsenal's appeal and he will now be eligible to play in their opening two Group H ties. "I'm very pleased that we have finally arrived at the truth," said Eduardo in a statement on the Arsenal website. "All we needed to do was to prove what happened and we have managed to do that. This decision makes me feel a lot better. "I just want to say that I am a fair player. To score goals you must take your opportunities and I'm not the type of player who needs to be dishonest to score goals." Arsenal also welcomed Uefa's decision. "We were able to show there was contact between the keeper and Eduardo and that the decision should be annulled," a Gunners statement said. "We fully support the drive for fair play in football and believe it is important that Uefa provides clear and comprehensive standards that will be consistently enforced going forward. "We are glad to put this incident behind us and concentrate on the games ahead." Arsenal had called the initial decision by Uefa "deeply flawed". And the decision to charge and then ban Eduardo provoked a strong response from Gunners manager Arsene Wenger who claimed any action against the Croatian would set a dangerous precedent with tens of similar incidents every week in European football. A Uefa statement on Monday said: "Following examination of all the evidence, notably the declarations of both the referee and the referees' assessor, as well as the various video footage, it was not established to our satisfaction that the referee had been deceived in taking his decision on the penalty." Diving has been the subject of much debate since the Eduardo incident with Wayne Rooney also coming under the spotlight following two penalty decisions that went in his favour, first playing for Manchester United against Arsenal and then for England in the friendly against Slovenia. Celtic winger Aiden McGeady was also sent off after he was shown a second yellow card for an alleged dive in Celtic's 1-0 win over Hibernian which occurred only days after the Eduardo furore. Arsenal begin their Champions League group stage campaign with a trip to the Maurice Dufrasne Stadium to face Standard on Wednesday and then play at home against Olympiakos on 29 September. What the f$%&!
September 14, 200915 yr gky7T0e6v30 Eduardo's Cheating Dive "Fouled" in the Box v Celtic How on earth can UEFA do this? If anyone wanted proof that UEFA are about as bent as a 9 bob note this shocking decision that defies common sense and a pair of eyes is it. :arrr: :arrr: :arrr: :hithead: :hithead: :hithead:
September 14, 200915 yr Author I don't think it's that bad a decision at all. The only thing pathetic was that Eduardo dives and gets a two match ban because the ref didn't see it, and then McGeady dives and gets a yellow, a punishment 6 times as harsh because the ref did see it. It's the correct decision I think, I'm still yet to be convinced there definitely wasn't contact. If UEFA can't increase Messi's punishment for his headbutt then they shouldn't punish Eduardo. They'd already set their precendent in not punishing Messi...
September 14, 200915 yr I found Eduardo's comments a bit LOL "I'm very pleased that we have finally arrived at the truth," Not really the sharpest tool in the box is he.
November 5, 200915 yr Lady Luck definitely is not shining around Liverpool at the moment. So gutted last night. With the only team we put out we completely dicked Lyon, and then through a defensive mistake in the 90th minute we get beat. Gutting.
November 24, 200915 yr Liverpool are OUT so let me be the first to say: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:
November 24, 200915 yr :lol: Liverwhool? And seeing that Eduardo story sort of makes you go what? especially after Henry-gate.
November 25, 200915 yr Pretty embarrasing but that's football. In a way i'm hoping (although this is only a slight hope) that some good will come out of it. The club will make no where near as money this year so hopefully the Yanks will pack up and leave. Very wishful thinking though. People can laugh all they want and i'm sure the media will not shut up about it, but FIVE TIMES!!!
November 25, 200915 yr ^ If I may borrow a valid point made by "unbiased" :lol: Radio 5 Live football commentator Alan Green: I can't remember the media calling for Sir Alex Ferguson's head when they failed to make the last 16 in the 2005–06 season, when at the start of that season they were plagued by medium or longer term injuries to first team key players Gabriel Heinze, Alan Smith, Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes; in a season where they qualified automatically for next seasons ECL on the last game of the season and only won the 2006 League Cup. No bias there from the Manchester United fan Rupert Murdoch newspaper bias then is it? Just like the Hillsborough disaster coverage. ;) Still how did Manchester United and Everton do against easy opposition tonight?
November 25, 200915 yr ^ If I may borrow a valid point made by "unbiased" :lol: Radio 5 Live football commentator Alan Green: I can't remember the media calling for Sir Alex Ferguson's head when they failed to make the last 16 in the 2005–06 season, when at the start of that season they were plagued by medium or longer term injuries to first team key players Gabriel Heinze, Alan Smith, Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes; in a season where they qualified automatically for next seasons ECL on the last game of the season and only won the 2006 League Cup. No bias there from the Manchester United fan Rupert Murdoch newspaper bias then is it? Just like the Hillsborough disaster coverage. ;) Still how did Manchester United and Everton do against easy opposition tonight? I know a lot of people say that the media is biased against their team and whatever but it's just stupid. Liverpool have had a much harder group than when Man Utd went out finishing 4th (in 2006 I think?). We messed up. People can laugh all they want, it's not nice to be out but the winning the Europa League could be the start of something good. We've not won anything since 2006 and I think the players need to get that taste of silverware, don't care whether it's the FA Cup or Europa League. Honestly Man Utd were not that bad tonight and probably should have had a penalty near the end (nice to see yet again when Man Utd are losing they always get 5+ minutes added time at home... :P) but it was Fergie's fault for playing such an inexperienced side. Honestly I cannot see the wankfest over some of their players. The only one I can see making it at Man Utd is Obertan unless they want to settle for 2nd/3rd best (ala Foster).
November 25, 200915 yr ^ If I may borrow a valid point made by "unbiased" :lol: Radio 5 Live football commentator Alan Green: I can't remember the media calling for Sir Alex Ferguson's head when they failed to make the last 16 in the 2005–06 season, when at the start of that season they were plagued by medium or longer term injuries to first team key players Gabriel Heinze, Alan Smith, Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes; in a season where they qualified automatically for next seasons ECL on the last game of the season and only won the 2006 League Cup. No bias there from the Manchester United fan Rupert Murdoch newspaper bias then is it? Just like the Hillsborough disaster coverage. ;) Still how did Manchester United and Everton do against easy opposition tonight? Well that's Fergie everyone knew he'd turn it around :P Anyway anyone who knows anything about football knows that Rafa shouldn't be sacked! Infact if I was the yanks I'd give him the £20 million they'd use to sack him to spend on transfers instead :lol: I have no complaints about tonight, all we need to do is draw the last game to win the group and if we lose 1-0 we should still go through top! Hopefully we don't rest too many of the the big guns like Fletcher, Rooney, Vidic and Giggs on Saturday as much as that is another that we 'should win'.
November 26, 200915 yr Well that's Fergie everyone knew he'd turn it around :P Anyway anyone who knows anything about football knows that Rafa shouldn't be sacked! Infact if I was the yanks I'd give him the £20 million they'd use to sack him to spend on transfers instead :lol: Yes because NONE of this is his fault at all. Just ignore poor signings such as wasting money on Aquilani and Johnson as well buying a truck full of $h!te players over the years leading to a very small squad depth. You may as well blame the owners for Rafa's terrible tactics as well, because it's obviously not his fault. Wenger gets by by spending nowhere near the amount Liverpool have spent over the last 5 years and our squad is much better. That's down to Rafa being hopeless in the transfer market and Wenger being shrewd (sp?). It's amazing how loyal Liverpool fans are being to Benitez (it's passed delusional now) and he's pretty much sat on the '05 CL win for the last 4+ years. Let's face it, if he hadn't won that he probably wouldn't still be there and no way would Liverpool fans still back him.
November 26, 200915 yr What Rafa has done for the club is nothing short of spectacular. From where we were 5 years ago to now is amazing. We're going through a bad period at the moment but that's mainly due to a lot of injuries to key players, and not a lot of luck. Johnson's been our best signing this season imo. He's immense, adds so much to the Liverpool team, it's just we've been let down by key lapses of concentration from areas of our defence. Aqualini is not even fit yet, and there's no point playing him and risking him getting injured again. Over the years he's bought dud players yes, but what manages haven't? The criticism rafa gets over the likes of Fergie and Wenger for buying flops is quite frankly ludacris. A lot of the time Rafa's not had the money avaliable so he's had to buy stop-gap players. Even this season, Rafa's had f*** all money to spend from the owners and its all come down to player skills. The academy has also been completely turned over thanks to Rafa and i'm sure over the next 2/3 years some of those players will come into the first team like Insua and N'Gog have. It's just unfortunate at the moment that we've had injuries to players such as Gerrard, Torres, Riera, Benayoun, Agger, Skrtel, Aurellio, Johnson etc. and the team's not really recovered. A lot of players have no confidence at the moment (Insua, Lucas, Kuyt, Skrtel) and you can easily see it on the football pitch. Sacking Rafa at the end of the day is the worst thing that Liverpool could do. The club needs stability and with Rafa they have that. Who else would we get? There's no-one I can think of who'd be good enough. And i'm sure if we sacked Rafa there'd be no shortage of top teams sniffing around trying to get his signature... that's the sign of a class manager.
November 26, 200915 yr Yes because NONE of this is his fault at all. Just ignore poor signings such as wasting money on Aquilani and Johnson as well buying a truck full of $h!te players over the years leading to a very small squad depth. You may as well blame the owners for Rafa's terrible tactics as well, because it's obviously not his fault. Wenger gets by by spending nowhere near the amount Liverpool have spent over the last 5 years and our squad is much better. That's down to Rafa being hopeless in the transfer market and Wenger being shrewd (sp?). It's amazing how loyal Liverpool fans are being to Benitez (it's passed delusional now) and he's pretty much sat on the '05 CL win for the last 4+ years. Let's face it, if he hadn't won that he probably wouldn't still be there and no way would Liverpool fans still back him. Well name someone who can come in and do better then?
November 26, 200915 yr Author Whilst I don't think Rafa deserves the amount of stick he gets from some corners I also don't think he deserves the defence he gets from a lot of Liverpool fans. As an outsider I've always thought he's been very average and very lucky. He sells average players for more than they're probably worth and then uses the money to sign slightly better (but still quite average) players for more than they're probably worth. It took him four years to realise how to approach the Premier League tactically, he seems a very poor man manager, relies far too heavily on the same players and the same system and has managed to create a pretty unbalanced squad. To have one recognised (and injury prone) striker and one half decent youth is not recipe for success. Especially when Craig Bellamy, Peter Crouch and Robbie Keane have been on their books in recent seasons. No matter what people say I still think he had a fantastic chance with Robbie Keane and completely ruined it. People say he didn't fit the Liverpool system but he was never given a chance, it took Peter Crouch four months to score and he became a figure of ridicule but he went on to be a success for Liverpool and I don't think anyone could put a particularly compelling argument forward to say they don't miss him now. When Robbie Keane did hit a bit of form scoring three goals in two games the tactical genius thought it would be best if he was left out completely for the next game and never started for the club again. I'm sorry, but playing players when they hit form is basic stuff, even if the form is only temporary.
November 26, 200915 yr Robbie Keane was never going to fit into the Liverpool team. Rafa tried it and it didn't work. Robbie Keane is a fantastic player, but he's an individual player - not a team one. It's why he's never stayed at one club for so long. He can't play to his ability unless the team plays around HIM. That was never going to happen at Liverpool, which is why he was (rightly) moved on. Anyway if the rumours are true we're going to get Van Nistelrooy on loan in january... can't say i'd complain - proven striker in the Premier League and Fergie will hate it!!! :D Also Crouch, he's awesome. But he wanted to move on as he wasn't going to be playing week in week out at Liverpool with Torres which is what he wanted at the time so Rafa let him move on, no point having an unhappy player in your squad. Although now he's kind of in the same situation at Spurs...
November 26, 200915 yr Also Crouch, he's awesome. But he wanted to move on as he wasn't going to be playing week in week out at Liverpool with Torres which is what he wanted at the time so Rafa let him move on, no point having an unhappy player in your squad. Although now he's kind of in the same situation at Spurs... His own stupid fucking fault. He was given the opportunity to move up here and play for us. He'd have been liked by the fans, he'd have been playing week in/week out, but Crouch is that far wedged under his missus' thumb that in the end he refused to move. I'd still have him here without a shadow of a doubt but whether or not he'd be starting every game is debatable with the form Jones and Bent have been in this season.
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