You were doing very well this year until recently...
I used to be a Valencia fan as I grew up there, but totally lost interest when music took over and I got fed up with all the fucking corruption in the management (they do say that there are two things Valencia does better than anywhere else: paella and corruption).
I've now been in Barcelona for a few years and kind of got into following them, but they're so used to winning everything all the time that anything else is a major tragedy...

Last night Sporting CP won the Portuguese League Cup for the fourth time by beating Benfica 2-1.

Well my team from Greece PAOK made it to the quarter finals of the Europa Conference League and will face Marseille.

Never thought I would watch my team fighting such strong opponents and I really hope I can see the boys moving forward even more.

Good to see PAOK on a scale like this, they’re also my favourite Greek team. I remember going to Florina before covid began, and literally every single wall or available space has “PAOK” graffitied on it. You could be driving in the middle of nowhere, nothing except highway for hours and hours, and there will be a random object in an open field and you’ll still see PAOK tagged on it lol.

Yeah we pretty much are the most popular team in northern Greece. The south is home of the big three Olympiakos, Panathinaikos and AEK; all of them great teams with great atmosphere.

Two big clubs relegated from the French Ligue 1 this season. First Bordeaux. And today St. Etienne after losing the qualification on penalties against Auxerre.

Sorry for Stade De France's mess, our gouvernment is a joke and they organized that any old how in 93, known to have a big security problem for years...

My team, Djurgården as mentioned on the first page of this thread, reached it's first European group stage yesterday except for the strange Intertoto cup in 1996.

Granted, it's only the Conference League, but it's good money by our standards and a big boost of prestige for the club.

We eliminated three teams in the qualification rounds:

First Croatian side Rijeka, 4-1 on aggregate (2-1 away, 2-0 at home).
Then Romanian side Sepsi, 6-2 on aggregate (first 3-1 away and then the same at home)
And finally Cypriot side APOEL, 5-3 on aggregate (3-0 at home and then losing 3-2 away)

The finest goal of these games was in the first leg against APOEL. Victor Edvardsen scoring from the half pitch line:

And now the group stage draw is done. We got Gent, Molde and Shamrock Rovers. This is a great draw, because we have a good chance at winning the group. Some other supporters were wishing for big clubs from high-ranked leagues, but my preference will always be on the possibilities to win matches and advance.

We actually faced Shamrock in the UEFA Cup qualification in 2002, and won both games.

If ManUtd manages to beat Arsenal (the match is right now) could be the real turning point of their fortunes!

GGMU

As An Arsenal fan I am not even mad that we lost. I think we played ok-ish and you can expect the derby matches in PL to go all ways. I still think that Arsenal is finishing in the top 4-5 this year. Arteta has done a good job.

Success in the Conference League for my Djurgården. With one game left in the group stage, we've already secured first place in the group and thereby gone straight to round of 16. We've beaten Gent twice, Molde twice, and drew away against Shamrock Rovers. We still have Shamrock at home remaining, but so far we're unbeaten, and in good company:

Does anyone still care about this thread?

Manchester City vs. Inter Milan in the Champions League final. Who'd have guessed back in September that Inter would reach the CL final this season?

Anyway, if City don't finally win it this year, then they'll never win it. They have the best team by far and Haaland in absolute beast mode.

I couldn't care less about that plastic club, but I'd rather they be the ones winning the final due to having former Benfica players such as Bernardo Silva, Ederson and Rúben Dias. And I also like Guardiola and Haaland. Haaland is not even human, I feel. He's like a robot.

It's up to Inter to save football this season. No chance I'm watching the final though, as I'm expecting City to win relatively comfortably.

And City won their 5th Premier League in the last 6 seasons.

Arsenal really threw it all away in a year that was supposed to be theirs. Must feel so frustrating.

I'm just glad that someone besides us Liverpool fans felt the pain of going against that fucking machine. Liverpool managed to win 97 points and still not win the league one year, which is absolutely mental when you consider the maximum possible points in a season in 114.

Dortmund blow it on the final day of the season. Bayern take their 11th title in a row with a 90th minute winner.

Benfica are Portuguese champions for the 38th time.

Gonzalo Montiel is in a good phase of his career. First he scored the winning penalty in the World Cup final, and yesterday he did the same for Seville in the Europa League final against Roma.


The level of choking from Dortmund is just incredible.

Messi to Inter Miami...

Checked the table and they're bottom of the League haha. I'd say credit to him for not going to Saudi like so many others are doing, but he's already taken their money. Still the MLS is a much more dignified retirement league than the Saudi League (most dignified is being an EFL legend and moving to Australia for two years).

I'll finally get a chance to see Messi play live, in person.

Saudi Arabia making big moves with player signings. Outside of Ronaldo, Kante, Benzema, Ruben Neves and now Mahrez, one of the more controversial discussions is PIF owned Newcastle "negotiating" a transfer for Allan Saint-Maximin to another PIF owned club. I have no doubt at all the transfer will be market rate, and not at all hyper inflated because of FFP.

So I don't know if anyone heard it but Mbape is rumored to sign in Saudi as well. For the astronomical price of 700 million. 300 will go to PSG, he will sign for 1 year and then he will be a free agent.

This is totally absurd. If Mbape agrees it will be the nail in the coffin for modern football.

I hope everybody in Europe will ignore sandpitfootball.

They will. Apart from people from Portugal and Argentina - hardcore CR7, Messi fans - and the people that watch this league; most Europeans know that these footballers are entrepreneurs now.

You can buy all the star players in the world; but you cannot buy class. Form is temporary; class is permanent. See how the Galacticos failed, how low had Man City had to fall before assembling a team that had literal S tier players on the bench.

Saarbrücken from the third division eliminated Bayern Munich from the German cup, scoring the winning 2-1 goal in the 96th minute. I wonder how long ago it was when Bayern got eliminated this early in the tournament.

What are your thoughts on this? https://www.theguardian.com/football/20 ... man-rights

they have been booted shamefully early in each cup competition since they won the triple in 2020. in 2021 they got booted by holstein kiel (second bundesliga). the last time they got eliminated from the cup by a team from the third or lower division was in 2000/01 (FC magdeburg/then 4th division).

And today Ajax got eliminated from the Dutch cup by USV Hercules, currently on tenth place in the fourth(!) tier league...

Anybody into Dundee United?? Wonder how the team is doing...