Champions League, boring?
Fri Apr 24, 2015 9:30 am
We have the traditional powers in the semi-finals, but for me, it is becoming boring to see the same teams competing for the prize.
Real Madrid
Barcelona
Juventus
Bayern Munich
If you have 2 teams from the same country competing, how can non-league winners be titled as a 'Champion' ? European CHAMPIONS league, those words are a joke.
Madrid have the right to defend their European title but Barcelona have no business to compete as they are not reigning Champions of Spain. I am totally fed up of the set-up, I want to see teams from all European nations competing.
When two teams from the same country get drawn
Money totally corrupted the game, FFP to keep the status quo, Messi will of played Chelsea, Munich etc about a 100 times each before he retires.
Real Madrid
Barcelona
Juventus
Bayern Munich
If you have 2 teams from the same country competing, how can non-league winners be titled as a 'Champion' ? European CHAMPIONS league, those words are a joke.
Madrid have the right to defend their European title but Barcelona have no business to compete as they are not reigning Champions of Spain. I am totally fed up of the set-up, I want to see teams from all European nations competing.
When two teams from the same country get drawn
Money totally corrupted the game, FFP to keep the status quo, Messi will of played Chelsea, Munich etc about a 100 times each before he retires.
Re: Champions League, boring?
Fri Apr 24, 2015 9:49 am
Unfortunately it's not a lot they can do when teams like real barca Munich are so good they are beating everyone
If there was only 1 from each country it would be easier for them to make it imagine barca playing the champions of wales Ireland and An other small nation
If there was only 1 from each country it would be easier for them to make it imagine barca playing the champions of wales Ireland and An other small nation
Re: Champions League, boring?
Fri Apr 24, 2015 9:53 am
CardiffCityBlue wrote:Unfortunately it's not a lot they can do when teams like real barca Munich are so good they are beating everyone
If there was only 1 from each country it would be easier for them to make it imagine barca playing the champions of wales Ireland and An other small nation
True, there are flaws in each system, old & new.
I would suggest fringe countries like Portugal & France would have more power as players would be willing to stay at the strongest club to compete in the elite competition.
The fight for the league titles in every country would be intense too. Arsenal players celebrating 4th place was a bit cringeworthy
Re: Champions League, boring?
Fri Apr 24, 2015 10:20 am
I found the summary of the group stage draw for this season.
Same teams playing eachother every season because of the seedings
"Very few European giants are likely to suffer shock elimination as the selection had a very familiar feel, with regular foes meeting once again in the group stage.
It takes a lot for seeded teams to be significantly concerned about Champions League group stage draws these days, but Arsenal has the most reason to worry after Thursday’s ceremony pitted it against Borussia Dortmund and Galatasaray.
While the English club should overcome Anderlecht, the double-headers against the Turkish Super Lig runner-up and Germany’s vice champion, against which the Gunners were beaten at home in last season’s group stage, will leave Arsene Wenger under no illusions as to the tough task ahead.
The over familiarity involved in Champions League draws is stifling to say the least. While Arsenal meets Dortmund for the third pair of fixtures in four seasons, Chelsea and Schalke are also well acquainted already following last season’s pair of Blues victories. Bayern, Manchester City and CSKA Moscow, meanwhile, have all been pooled together for consecutive group campaigns.
At least the presence of Roma – returning to the competition for the first time since a round of 16 exit to Shakhtar Donetsk in 2010-11 – gives Group E a fresh dimension. It also means a speedy return to his old stomping ground for Mehdi Benatia after he this week completed a move from the Giallorossi to the 2013 European champion.
Rudi Garcia’s men were earmarked by many as the team to avoid in Pot 4, but will be wary of the challenges now ahead, with trips to the Bundesliga and Premier League champions plus a difficult trip to Moscow to negotiate.
Pep Guardiola’s side has many questions to answer at the moment given its initial difficulties adapting to the Catalan coach’s 3-4-3 formation and a glut of injuries to defenders, and will have hoped for a kinder schedule than the one with which Roma and City present.
Paris Saint-Germain provides the biggest name opposition for Barcelona, with the Blaugrana having failed to beat the French champion in their quarterfinal tie of 2012-13. For PSG’s Zlatan Ibrahimovic, meanwhile, Group F throws up another former club, with Ajax being drawn from Pot 3.
As the club begins its quest for an 11th European title, Real Madrid will be fairly happy with its lot. The Spanish club will face Liverpool, arguably the toughest tie to come from Pot 3, but Basel and Bulgarian newcomer Ludogorets should not prove to be too taxing for Carlo Ancelotti’s side.
City rival Atletico Madrid would not have been entirely happy to have been drawn with Juventus, although Diego Simeone will rightly back his side to get positive results in both fixtures after last season’s run to the final in Lisbon. In any case, the inclusion of Olympiakos and Malmo in Group A also provides a fairly comfortable route should things become sticky against the Serie A champion.
So for many, this is a Champions League draw that gives us the best of both worlds. We’ll see Barcelona face PSG, Real Madrid v Liverpool, Bayern against Manchester City, Arsenal taking on Dortmund and Atletico and Juventus going head-to-head. But there are very few genuine giants in serious danger of elimination on the face of it either, given UEFA’s insistence on seeding so heavily on reputation.
It may be rocky along the way, but the big guns should still be firing come knockout time."
Same teams playing eachother every season because of the seedings
"Very few European giants are likely to suffer shock elimination as the selection had a very familiar feel, with regular foes meeting once again in the group stage.
It takes a lot for seeded teams to be significantly concerned about Champions League group stage draws these days, but Arsenal has the most reason to worry after Thursday’s ceremony pitted it against Borussia Dortmund and Galatasaray.
While the English club should overcome Anderlecht, the double-headers against the Turkish Super Lig runner-up and Germany’s vice champion, against which the Gunners were beaten at home in last season’s group stage, will leave Arsene Wenger under no illusions as to the tough task ahead.
The over familiarity involved in Champions League draws is stifling to say the least. While Arsenal meets Dortmund for the third pair of fixtures in four seasons, Chelsea and Schalke are also well acquainted already following last season’s pair of Blues victories. Bayern, Manchester City and CSKA Moscow, meanwhile, have all been pooled together for consecutive group campaigns.
At least the presence of Roma – returning to the competition for the first time since a round of 16 exit to Shakhtar Donetsk in 2010-11 – gives Group E a fresh dimension. It also means a speedy return to his old stomping ground for Mehdi Benatia after he this week completed a move from the Giallorossi to the 2013 European champion.
Rudi Garcia’s men were earmarked by many as the team to avoid in Pot 4, but will be wary of the challenges now ahead, with trips to the Bundesliga and Premier League champions plus a difficult trip to Moscow to negotiate.
Pep Guardiola’s side has many questions to answer at the moment given its initial difficulties adapting to the Catalan coach’s 3-4-3 formation and a glut of injuries to defenders, and will have hoped for a kinder schedule than the one with which Roma and City present.
Paris Saint-Germain provides the biggest name opposition for Barcelona, with the Blaugrana having failed to beat the French champion in their quarterfinal tie of 2012-13. For PSG’s Zlatan Ibrahimovic, meanwhile, Group F throws up another former club, with Ajax being drawn from Pot 3.
As the club begins its quest for an 11th European title, Real Madrid will be fairly happy with its lot. The Spanish club will face Liverpool, arguably the toughest tie to come from Pot 3, but Basel and Bulgarian newcomer Ludogorets should not prove to be too taxing for Carlo Ancelotti’s side.
City rival Atletico Madrid would not have been entirely happy to have been drawn with Juventus, although Diego Simeone will rightly back his side to get positive results in both fixtures after last season’s run to the final in Lisbon. In any case, the inclusion of Olympiakos and Malmo in Group A also provides a fairly comfortable route should things become sticky against the Serie A champion.
So for many, this is a Champions League draw that gives us the best of both worlds. We’ll see Barcelona face PSG, Real Madrid v Liverpool, Bayern against Manchester City, Arsenal taking on Dortmund and Atletico and Juventus going head-to-head. But there are very few genuine giants in serious danger of elimination on the face of it either, given UEFA’s insistence on seeding so heavily on reputation.
It may be rocky along the way, but the big guns should still be firing come knockout time."
Re: Champions League, boring?
Fri Apr 24, 2015 10:30 am
how can Barcelona play PSG x4 times in one season 
call me old fashioned, but surely the only way you can meet the team you played in group stages is the final?
I'm starting to get fed up the more I look into this
call me old fashioned, but surely the only way you can meet the team you played in group stages is the final?I'm starting to get fed up the more I look into this
Re: Champions League, boring?
Fri Apr 24, 2015 10:48 am
Who cares about the Champions League?
A stale competition between mega-rich clubs, the loss of the Champions League from terrestrial screens is no great tragedy.
BT Sport has won the Champions League TV rights. Is it a good thing or bad thing? It’s clearly a massive coup for BT. However it also means that Britain’s football-obsessed couch potatoes will no longer be able to watch the Champions League on terrestrial TV. It’s bad news, too, for BSkyB, ITV and Adrian Chiles. As for me, however, I’m in the couldn’t-give-a-monkey’s camp. Not bothered in the slightest. I couldn’t care less if Al Qaeda had bought the rights. The Champions League has lost its lustre for me.
Nobody saw BT Sport’s mega-bid coming. Certainly not BSkyB who were blown out of the proverbial water by BT’s whopping £897million bid, which, to quote BSkyB, was ‘far in excess’ of their own valuation. BSkyB says that it wasn’t prepared ‘to pay over the odds’ for the rights - the BT bid was double the amount BSkyB and ITV paid for the current deal. Is BT on course for a repeat of the ITV Digital disaster? Until we know their pricing model or see how viewing figures hold up, it’s difficult to call. It’s possible that BT is using the deal to protect its share of the broadband market. Or perhaps it’s a more ambitious statement of intent that BT is ready to slug it out with BSkyB for domination of the pay-TV market.
Should football fans really give a toss about a commercial face-off between two telecoms giants? Of course not. The new deal is clearly a blow for ITV who will lose the rights to show European games on terrestrial TV. But is it bad news for football fans? There will be some free-to-air matches on TV, though exactly how many is unknown - BT Sport has only made a commitment to show one game a season involving an English club free-to-air. Gavin Patterson, BT’s chief executive, claims that ‘European football will be far more accessible and affordable with BT’. But until the company announces how much customers will have to pay, either on TV or online, it’s something of an empty boast.
Inevitably, there is a degree of wailing and gnashing of teeth over the loss of Champions League football on terrestrial TV. The Daily Mirror reported that ‘many fans were less than impressed’ – a dramatic claim substantiated by quoting two Twitter posts. Writing in the Telegraph, Jonathan Liew claimed that the battle of the broadcasters ‘risks obscuring the bigger picture, which is that the BT deal banishes regular, live top-class football from terrestrial television, perhaps for good’. Liew also bemoans the social costs of the deal: ‘The poor – a demographic that modern football has little time for in any case – will have to make do with whatever scraps BT sees fit to dangle before them. Football’s new beginning also feels like an end.’ Heart-wrenching stuff. Except my heart isn’t wrenched. Forgive me for really not giving a damn, but it’s hardly the End of Times, is it? We really don’t have an inalienable right to watch football on television. If you want to see a Champions League game, then pay for it. Or go to the pub and watch it. Or find one of those dodgy web feeds and watch it on your laptop. But please, please stop bleating about the rights of fans.
My lack of sympathy for the grieving couch potatoes is only exacerbated by my utter indifference towards the Champions League. Listen, I know it’s the world’s top club competition. And I’m not questioning the quality of the football. I’ll even watch the odd game if I’ve got nothing better to do – which is not very often. But the Champions League group stage goes on far too long and is way too predictable. From time to time, a big club might get eliminated in the group stage, which can be fun. But, in general, the seeded clubs progress to the knock-out rounds without really extending themselves. In effect, the Champions League is 80 per cent cash cow and only 20 per cent football tournament. There used to be something exotic and exciting about the old European Cup. The European teams, the players, the tactical systems – these were all strange and alluring to us. The tournament also felt more open. A Champions League final between Malmo and Nottingham Forest would be inconceivable today. In its early years the Champions League felt novel and exciting. But over time it has become bloated and predictable. The lucrative prize money has created a self-perpetuating elite. The winners are drawn from a diminishing pool of super-rich clubs.
As a BT Sport customer, I should be thrilled at the prospect of Champions League football on my laptop. But I’m not celebrating. Sure, I can admire the excellence of Barcelona or Bayern Munich. But admiration isn’t the same as interest. I have no emotional stake in the Champions League. I don’t really care who wins (as long as it isn’t Chelsea). I can’t summon up any enthusiasm for a tournament which is out of the reach of 95 per cent of English league clubs. And that’s why I’m shedding no tears that it won’t be on terrestrial TV. The Champions League might be the most glittering prize in club football. But it’s dead to me.
DULEEP ALLIRAJAH http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/ar ... ToeKNJViko
A stale competition between mega-rich clubs, the loss of the Champions League from terrestrial screens is no great tragedy.
BT Sport has won the Champions League TV rights. Is it a good thing or bad thing? It’s clearly a massive coup for BT. However it also means that Britain’s football-obsessed couch potatoes will no longer be able to watch the Champions League on terrestrial TV. It’s bad news, too, for BSkyB, ITV and Adrian Chiles. As for me, however, I’m in the couldn’t-give-a-monkey’s camp. Not bothered in the slightest. I couldn’t care less if Al Qaeda had bought the rights. The Champions League has lost its lustre for me.
Nobody saw BT Sport’s mega-bid coming. Certainly not BSkyB who were blown out of the proverbial water by BT’s whopping £897million bid, which, to quote BSkyB, was ‘far in excess’ of their own valuation. BSkyB says that it wasn’t prepared ‘to pay over the odds’ for the rights - the BT bid was double the amount BSkyB and ITV paid for the current deal. Is BT on course for a repeat of the ITV Digital disaster? Until we know their pricing model or see how viewing figures hold up, it’s difficult to call. It’s possible that BT is using the deal to protect its share of the broadband market. Or perhaps it’s a more ambitious statement of intent that BT is ready to slug it out with BSkyB for domination of the pay-TV market.
Should football fans really give a toss about a commercial face-off between two telecoms giants? Of course not. The new deal is clearly a blow for ITV who will lose the rights to show European games on terrestrial TV. But is it bad news for football fans? There will be some free-to-air matches on TV, though exactly how many is unknown - BT Sport has only made a commitment to show one game a season involving an English club free-to-air. Gavin Patterson, BT’s chief executive, claims that ‘European football will be far more accessible and affordable with BT’. But until the company announces how much customers will have to pay, either on TV or online, it’s something of an empty boast.
Inevitably, there is a degree of wailing and gnashing of teeth over the loss of Champions League football on terrestrial TV. The Daily Mirror reported that ‘many fans were less than impressed’ – a dramatic claim substantiated by quoting two Twitter posts. Writing in the Telegraph, Jonathan Liew claimed that the battle of the broadcasters ‘risks obscuring the bigger picture, which is that the BT deal banishes regular, live top-class football from terrestrial television, perhaps for good’. Liew also bemoans the social costs of the deal: ‘The poor – a demographic that modern football has little time for in any case – will have to make do with whatever scraps BT sees fit to dangle before them. Football’s new beginning also feels like an end.’ Heart-wrenching stuff. Except my heart isn’t wrenched. Forgive me for really not giving a damn, but it’s hardly the End of Times, is it? We really don’t have an inalienable right to watch football on television. If you want to see a Champions League game, then pay for it. Or go to the pub and watch it. Or find one of those dodgy web feeds and watch it on your laptop. But please, please stop bleating about the rights of fans.
My lack of sympathy for the grieving couch potatoes is only exacerbated by my utter indifference towards the Champions League. Listen, I know it’s the world’s top club competition. And I’m not questioning the quality of the football. I’ll even watch the odd game if I’ve got nothing better to do – which is not very often. But the Champions League group stage goes on far too long and is way too predictable. From time to time, a big club might get eliminated in the group stage, which can be fun. But, in general, the seeded clubs progress to the knock-out rounds without really extending themselves. In effect, the Champions League is 80 per cent cash cow and only 20 per cent football tournament. There used to be something exotic and exciting about the old European Cup. The European teams, the players, the tactical systems – these were all strange and alluring to us. The tournament also felt more open. A Champions League final between Malmo and Nottingham Forest would be inconceivable today. In its early years the Champions League felt novel and exciting. But over time it has become bloated and predictable. The lucrative prize money has created a self-perpetuating elite. The winners are drawn from a diminishing pool of super-rich clubs.
As a BT Sport customer, I should be thrilled at the prospect of Champions League football on my laptop. But I’m not celebrating. Sure, I can admire the excellence of Barcelona or Bayern Munich. But admiration isn’t the same as interest. I have no emotional stake in the Champions League. I don’t really care who wins (as long as it isn’t Chelsea). I can’t summon up any enthusiasm for a tournament which is out of the reach of 95 per cent of English league clubs. And that’s why I’m shedding no tears that it won’t be on terrestrial TV. The Champions League might be the most glittering prize in club football. But it’s dead to me.
DULEEP ALLIRAJAH http://www.spiked-online.com/newsite/ar ... ToeKNJViko