i do that every morning! usually with a sense of pride and satisfaction for a job well done.


for me too, believe me. i kept screaming for schieber to go in-- with a fresh pair of legs, dortmund's late counterattacks could have been much more successful. though santana was a great addition.

and not sure if you guys noticed but this is the problem with dortmund's shallow bench. take out gotze and put in grosskreutz and dortmund's offense goes from magic to meh. compare vs. bayern minus kroos-- "sure, whatevs".

also, i like reus better when he plays on the left. he's right footed, but he makes an awesome left winger.

ANYWAY. tomorrow we'll know for sure.

I couldn't believe the last five minutes. I really thought Real would pull it off. And all without even playing the Pepe card, although tonight's performance makes their collapse in the first leg even more unforgivable.

Yeah, Dortmund don't seem to have much depth on their bench. Gotze was a blow but from what I'm hearing he should be OK for the final.

Excellent analysis of last night's game posted on zonalmarking. Modric has been named as the big difference in Real's performance, and the sidelining of Pepe. And I loved Klopp's little prematch dig at Pepe, “If you block Xabi, you make it so Pepe always has the ball. That is a big difference.” Ouch!

http://www.zonalmarking.net/2013/05/...tmund-tactics/

yeah i read that earlier this morning and the guy makes a great analysis, but mourinho's good strategy aside it bugged me that klopp didn't have a plan b of his own to deal with madrid's 3 defenders. he could have made it so dortmund scored.

this is probably because with gozte gone he had little to choose from. and then bender going out injured didn't help his options with substitutions, though that was last minute. santana did good and stabilized things but that didn't give him options upfront where a goal in favor was more important than two against. he had something like 25 minutes to make a change (madrid's first changes --> madrid's first goal) and he didn't.

re: schieber he is fast but loses his head-- still i'd like to have seen him in the last 20-30 minutes taking advantage of a madrid all thrown forward. problem is grosskreutz was already in that spot. maybe grosskreuts could have come back for more of a 4-3-3 (this before bender's substitution).

anyway i thought klopp erred by playing pure defense instead of going for better counterattacks. but that doesn't matter since they won in the aggregate and up until before the goals happened the commentators were saying "dortmund was the best in both legs".

one more thing though-- i didn't see madrid's changes really gel until khedira came in for alonso. i was like "eh, look, mourinho made 2 changes but nothing happened" and then after khedira came in is when things happened.

anyway here we go for the last deciding match-- bayern best not fuck up!

Bloody love that site.

from the bayern FB page:

Überraschung bei Barcelona: Messi spielt nicht! Weltfußballer heute vorerst nur auf der Bank!

Line-up /Aufstellung: Neuer - Lahm, Boateng, van Buyten, Alaba - Martínez, Schweinsteiger, - Robben, Müller, Ribéry - Mandzukic

Our substitutes / Einwechselspieler: Starke - Dante, Shaqiri, Rafinha, Luiz Gustavo, Gomez, Tymoshchuk.

--

wtf are they saying about Messi? anyway, van buyten for dante??? hmmmm....

--

EDIT: GOOGLE TRANSLATE SEZ:

Messi does not play! World Player today for the time being on the bench!

====

MOAR EHDITT: from barcelona's FB

Line-up confirmed / Alineació confirmada / Alineación confirmada:

Valdés, Alves, Piqué, Cesc, Xavi, Villa, Iniesta, Bartra, Pedro, Adriano, Song

Força Barça!!

Messi will not play...that can't be right?

Oh he's on the bench.

Wow. Well at the leat they aren't dragging him on the field when he clearly wasn't fit.

i feel bad for him. i really really really like him as a player, and for what he projects publicly as a person too. last time w/ juve he was anxious as fuck while he didn't play.

It just looked like an impossible situation for Klopp. By half time they'd taken a bit of a pounding but still hadn't conceded a goal and missed some chances themselves, and the threat from Real did look like it'd subsided by the start of the second. And really, Dortmund, looked home and dry until the last ten minutes. A limited set of options, as you say, as well as having to use a sub early on must've also played a part in Klopp's (in)decisions.

EDIT: Brave move from Heynckes, playing so many already on yellow cards.

alexis for xavi! that should open up some holes in barça's defensive scheme.

Xavi going off was Barcelona raising the white flag. Faultless performance from Bayern but Barcelona have been awful. Barely worth watching now.

done and dusted. barca will be back next year though.

but for now. GO DORTMUND!!!

wait, do you mean...


??? :D

anyway--- i feel bad for messi and piqué but that was delicious to watch. even though i thought bayern lacked a bit of finish early on.

if joo guys wanna watch a preview of the final (or something else, who knows), bayern-dortmund face off this weekend. if i were heynckes i'd put 100% benchers and command them to chop legs.

I think they'll remain competitive in Spain but I don't think they're the team they were, Messi or no Messi. They were at the top for about 4 years and it's hard for any team to go any longer than that. Bayern definitely seem best placed to dominate for a while but even they'll have to deal with the upheavals of a new manager. But yeah, go Dortmund, absolutely!

i like bayern more but i'm happy with either. though i'd put my money on bayern cuz they've won everything this year. and i like more of their players than dortmund's. and will gotze play right vs. his new team? this is all hilarious, btw. i'm loving every minute of it.

BUNDESLIGA, COME TO AMERICA!!! MORE TV PLEASE!!!

I imagine most people other than confirmed Bayern fans will go for Dortmund. It's an underdog thing. If I'm honest, though, I think a lot of people (in England, anyway) just won't bother to watch a final between two German sides. You can bet UEFA are sick there's no Spanish or English or even Italian team involved to boost TV revenue. I'll be watching and the media will go all out to try and promote it but I think it'll be largely ignored, here, relative to other finals. Not sure if that'll be the case elsewhere in Europe, though.

You would be an adorable coach...

Such ideas spring to mind over here too.
Harald Schumacher + Claudio Gentile + Marco Materazzi + a slice of Van Bommel, some Der Zakarian (his rough treatment on Cantona while King Eric was still playing in France... EC called the referee, said "that man won't get away with it"; EC then sliced down the bloke, got booked, did it again, got expelled, but was happy he did that to fucking Der Zak)... that would be murder...

That's how whatnationitwasicantrecall got rid of Hungary in the mid-50s, when substitutions were not allowed. If I'm correct. Subs were introduced to protect such teams afterwards.

I'd like to see the final.
It ought to boost the Manshaft confidence for what comes next.

No big revelations but the ZM analysis is up.

http://www.zonalmarking.net/2013/05/...ayern-tactics/

ha ha ha, i forgot to put an "evil" smilie after i wrote that (this board doesn't have them).i remember i was searching for one but got derailed by what i'm sure was some shiny object.


haa ah haaa.

well to be honest i don't think bayern needs that to win. i think they have the better team this year, but the issue is that in a single game luck can influence a lot.

and so there's the strategic dilemma-- do you use this saturday's match to test your opponent, with the downside that you also reveal your weaknesses against them? or do you go completely off-tangent and go for something else, like a team full of subs? (and if you use subs, what do you ask them to do?)


i didn't know that! i should look it up. i know that hungary were a glorious team that invented total football, but i didn't know they were brought down with hatchets.


the whole world should enjoy watching the two best teams in the world right now :D

HEYNCKES IS PLAYING THE SUBS VS. DORTMUND

ps- with alaba as winger!

--

pps- this is madness. they are tied 1-1 and bayern is playing with this formation



and bayern looks like it dominates slightly. gomez almost scored his 2nd goal.

dortmund is playing:

DORTMUND (4-2-3-1): Weidenfeller - Grosskreutz, Subotic, Santana, Schmelzer - Kehl, Sahin - Blaszczykowski, Gundogan (Leitner), Schieber - Lewandowski.\
^ /Gundogan left (injured) afer clashing with Neuer

oh man! a 1-1 tie! i think dortmund is the loser here. gotze and hummels didn't play and reus didn't start (he came in later for kehl) but they fielded many more starters than bayern and they played at home. neuer stopped a lewandowski penalty! ha ha ha. i love this shit. there was drama and fights and rafinha got himself redcarded, the fucking idiot.

Suarez bites another dude in his career, and then finishes that game with another handball? Dude should be banned. seriously.

Suarez bites another dude in his career, and then finishes that game with another handball? Dude should be banned. seriously.

I caught the highlights. It looked like both managers seemed less interested in winning and more into giving nothing away, which was obviously understandable but hardly made for a great game. Just as well Dortmund don't have to rely on Schieber each week, though. What a stinker!

oh man he fucked the dog on this one. TERRIBLE. i had my doubts about him but today he sank to a new low.

i found the game entertaining, actually. they weren't at their top level but there was plenty of back and forth and lotsa drama.

Yeah, it was an 'interesting', rather than 'good', match, with both sides trying to gain some kind of psychological advantage in time for the final. I agree that Bayern effectively won that battle, if only, as you say, by showing they can be competitive even while playing so many second stringers. The awful performance by Schieber, while maybe just a one off, shows that Dortmund are far more likely to struggle if anything happens to their core team.

In terms of sheer strength in depth, Bayern would put most teams even outside Germany to shame. Look at Barca's decline since Messi's injury, and God help them should anything happen to Xavi or Iniesta. The two teams that can compete on that level are Chelsea and Man City but Chelsea are still in a transition period as they wait to bring in a replacement for Benitez and Man City are shackled with a manager who's out of his depth. But given Chelsea's spending power, and assuming rumours that Mourinho's going back there are correct, they may be one of the very few teams that'll be able to compete with Bayern - but even they're likely to be far more handicapped by the Fair Play scheme than Bayern will. And even if everything does work out for Chelsea as planned, I still don't think they'll be fully up to speed until at least another season or two, at least in terms of the CL. Man City have the resources to compete with Bayern right now were it not for Mancini. And if PSG can get their act together they might be competitive, too. Interesting times.

i've seen schieber fuck up before and i thought maybe it was under pressure but yesterday was the horror. he used to be better!

speaking of core team, there's been some talk of dzeko going to dortmund, though some italians want him too.

and speaking of dzeko-- watched swansea/man city. what a crap game. so many good players and zero goals!

i get what you say about mancini-- with such a constellation of stars and NOTHING!

Dzeko's a decent player but I'd have thought Dortmund would be setting their sights higher, especially given the sales of Gotze and (probably) Lewandowski. I know lots of people think Chicarito at Man U is just a goal hanger but I'd take him over Dzeko (and plenty of other even more expensive and high profile strikers) in a heartbeat. He's probably gonna cost no more than Dzeko and is about as guaranteed a goalscorer as you're likely to find below the price-range of the usual megastars. His attitude is phenomenal, too, plus he's a few years younger than Dzeko. There's a rumour Man U are willing to offer him to Atletico as part payment for Falcao but we know Fergie's a big Lewandowski fan so maybe a deal could be done with Dortmund instead. I also think Man U will lose out to a richer team in their bid for Falcao. Either way, Chicarito deserves to be at a club where he starts more regularly.



That picture makes a lot of sense for me.

agreed! with some much midfield quality at dortmund (even w/out gotze) thats all he would need to do is get into decent positions. what was the last mexican to play in germany i wonder?

Reus and Chicharito would be a great combo, I think, although I've heard Mancini's after Reus. City are gonna need an even bigger stadium just to make room for their bench.

i think they're definitely going to unload some players though: kolo, dzeko, lescott, nasri, maicon, etc... i dont think anyone other than hart, yaya, zabaleta, and silva are bulletproof for next season. tevez and aguero(i hope to barca!) could certainly go elsewhere with the right money.

Yeah, if only because of Financial Fair Play, Man C will have to sell quite a few players. Aguero to Barca would be good. I've also heard they're interested in Kompany. Although this time of year, every half decent player ends up being connected with a possible move to one of the very top teams. It's a bit different this year, though, with so much movement at the management level. Managers won't mention players until they're confirmed in their new post, and players won't go to a team until they know who's in charge there.

Not to speak ill of the, er, ill, but Vilanova's future at Barca feels like a massive topic nobody in the game really feels comfortable bringing up. I always thought he was an interim manager when Pep left but it seems the side have forged an even deeper loyalty to him since the return of his illness, despite their relative dip in form. He's become almost unsackable, like it would feel too callous to replace him after what he's been through, but I do think they need to, and wonder if he might not stand down himself over the summer. Certainly, were it any other manager, even having won La Liga, Barca's decline in the CL would be causing all kinds of speculation about his possible replacement. I've heard that they're grooming Xavi as a future manager which is a great idea but won't happen (if it happens at all) for a few years. And by their very nature, Barcelona will find it a lot harder recruiting someone from outside.

As an aside, while I take this with a massive pinch of salt, the Spanish press seem to have it in their heads that Guardiola is trying to bring Messi to Bayern. That'd be the coup of all coups but I really can't see it happening.

the zonal marking website has a bunch of people calling for tito's head.

i feel sorry for the guy, but mang, maybe he could use a vacation.

pep sure knew when to walk away.

I feel sorry for him as much as I would anyone battling cancer but I'm not sure he has what it takes to be a top top manager. Although I obviously hope he recovers fully and proves me wrong, albeit with another club. By all accounts the Barca board are split on whether to stick with him, but seem to have decided to give him at least another season.

I think you're right about Pep. I don't think he'd have chosen Bayern had he known they'd improved the way they have but I certainly think he saw the writing on the wall re Barca. They've not suddenly become a bad side but too little has been done to build for their future. They're still relying far too heavily on their Holy Trinity. And a large portion of blame for that has to be levelled at Pep himself.

All this time I never noticed the comments section on ZM. Some of them are even more interesting than the articles they're commenting on. Great stuff!

__

On another note, I'm now officially sick to death of Fergie's arrogance and hypocritical complaints, after fielding a weakened side against Chelsea, completely disrespecting Arsenal and Spurs who are also fighting to get a CL place: the very thing he's accused other managers of doing in the past. And to complain about Chelsea players crowding the ref? He obviously has a short memory and can't remember the likes of Keane doing the exact same thing, and even currently, with players like Rooney or Ferdinand. He's insulting people's intelligence, not least Man U fans, who are expected to shell out major money to effectively watch a second string team. Aside from the disrespect it shows to the league, if he wants to field his B team Man U should be charging B team prices to watch them.

Plus there's his refusal to talk to the BBC, who should respond by boycotting coverage of Man U games. It's not like they rely on the revenue.

/rant

__

And there's something inevitable about this ...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2...cial-fair-play

Big rumours that Fergie is about to announce his retirement. Meant to be some kind of announcement later today.

Inevitable speculation in the media about who would replace him if it's true. Moyes? Mourinho? Klopp? This could be massive.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/b...rement-rumours

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...ek-is-out.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/f...d-8606905.html

EDIT: It's official, he's gone.

Only reason I can think that they've made the decision now is to pip Chelsea in getting Mourinho, even though the bookies make Moyes favourite. Either way, a definite end of an era. For the Prem almost as much as MU.

Moyes, really?

I'll be surprised either way.

whoa. he probably wore out his jaws with all the chewing!

*sob* I can't bear to think about it. If he does go, you be sure that he'll take Baines and Jagielka with him. Just the idea of having to return to the dark days of the 90's is making me feel sick.

I will say this though-it's a strange choice if they did go for him. Someone who never won a cup in 11 years at Everton, minimal experiance at the Champions League and NO experience with money (fun fact-all the transfers Everton made since the Premier League started still doesn't cover the money Abramovich spent buying out managers at Chelsea) it doesn't really make sense.

Surely Benitez would be a better cover?

haha, its funny that the timing is perfect and yet mourinho shant be getting his dream job.