Football

I hope they move the final if it’s City v Chelsea and get some fans in.

But UEFA can’t be expected to apply common sense.

Might have to get up to watch the Chelsea game live tonight. Got a bad feeling about this one, 3AM kick off for me is putting me off massively. Real have a habit for showing up in games like these.

All the City players were brilliant. The press in the second half was quite something. Interesting that walker played deeper than usual with Mahrez tracking further back on the right. It's one of those games where you wish you were there just to see how the whole City team were set up and how they moved from defense to attack.

Very nervous for tonight. Nightmare scenario for me would be 2-2. Also applying a dose of 'expect the worst' and been worried about the 1-1 last week as not being enough. That said, the rational part of me knows we are a very competitive team, tight and playing our best football in some time, so should be an exciting game anyway, if definitely not as straight forward as City's last night. They were brilliant and PSG just couldn't handle them. After Di Maria got sent off it looked like it might have ended up 9v9, not sure why Zinchenko for a time looked so determined to miss out on a Champions League final through suspension 😬

Say what you like about the way Fernandinho plays the game, few have done it as effectively. The guy is a colossus. Up there with Makelele and Gilberto.

He's got the snide, though. Whereas Makelele was a positional master and wonderful at recycling the ball. Citeh's success under Pep has been based on/supported by midfielders who are masters of the tactical foul.

I wish I could take credit for this. Auto type strikes again 😅

There’s no denying it. All the great teams have employed the dark arts.

Arsenal under Wenger (Keown and Viera) used to kick the shit out of players. Keane and Scholes were horrible at times. I could go on.

I obvs hope we win tonight, I can't believe we're still in the competition TBH, but there you are... I would've taken getting to the semi-final at the start of the season...

Up the Chels... And where's Corny?

Talking about the silent contingent. Where are the resident scousers at these days?

Yeah I wonder if that miss from werner might cost chelsea.

Apparently we’re ranked 16th in the league for goal conversion since Tuchel started, I hope it’s not going to bite us in the ass tonight.

True, but the Keane/Keown/Vieira dark arts were a bit more obvious, IMHO. Often booked and sent off. There's a Ramos/Busquets/Fernandinho style which is subtler and much more tactical. It just straddles the line between what a ref will punish and what they won't, I know Fernandinho has had a fair few red cards but honestly he could get two yellows in about half the games he plays.

for the real nasty dark arts i present Dennis wise :)

For proper shithousery look no further than Pepe. Not sure where he drew the line between shithousery and outright thuggishness.

You’d never get tired of punching that face would you?

A genuinely nasty man by all accounts.

nasty bastard annoying shit house 11.

schumacher
pepe Ramos Cattamole

Wise Keane Barton Bellamy

El Hadji Diouf Diego Costa Luis Suarez

3 - 4 - 3

What no Souness? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygVgxYa3mlo

(Good to see the "Look at my sock!" got a mention in Squires this week.)

Simeone as manager.

ooof yeah need to get souness in who to take out ?

him or Jose ?

Literally every game would finish with less than 22 players on the pitch.

Dani Alves should be in serious contention too.

Ben Thatcher deserves to be on the bench at the very least.

https://www.dailymotion.com/video/xh17rw

I'd have Ian Ferguson next to Souness.

Edit to add.. must be a place for Big Dunc.. Costa and Dunc would be the ultimate 442 front line

thought about him and that horrific elbow but didnt think he was annoying enough. just a Thug

None of the Leeds players from the 70s?

Perhaps we need to do XI's based on decades of shithousery.