Enough already here's the 2016-2017 Champions League thread

they've dominated barcelona this half, been great to watch

yeah this has been a hugely impressive half. Absolutely battered them

Ozil goal was pretty spesh

https://twitter.com/FutbolNetwork/status/793566807755984896

Spurs have been terrible.

Should have had a penalty just then, though.

there's a moment of utter brainlessness about once every sixty seconds atm

There it is.

Shocking.

Still, Harry Winks off the bench will turn this around.

walker you fucking cunt

stunning return to form for this moronic piece of shit tonight

1-0 with 15 mins to go and their heads have dropped, Alli and I think before that Sissoko ceded possession and just instantly gave up. pisspoor

Legia are beating Real Madrid 3-2. Should have watched that instead.

totally going to lose to arsenal

I'm on the way back from the game and that was probably the worst Spurs performance I've ever watched in the flesh. It was fairly obvious from the team sheet that it was going to be a disjointed, unbalanced second string performance but fucking he'll.

Given the obvious deficiencies in wide areas, why the hell was Danny Rose on the bench?

It's hard to think of any moments of quality from anyone but the withdrawal of every creative player after the goal made me leave before the final whistle for the first time in my life.

you otm

have felt for a while that poch spurs are kind essentially a reactive side, with even the strikers effectively defending and stifling, closing down space and hoping to scuffle an opening from the opposition. against more expansive teams this can be v good, but otherwise there's not much creation of space, it's often very narrow, and there are not many runners. really feel like the team needs one or two decadent creative players with no defensive duties to lurk and provide sudden bursts of incision because everyone is a scrapper atm

...poch spurs are kind essentially a...

yeah. total lack of incision or will to risk the ball.

except for son to ill effect and walker in his own fucking box.

the other trend noticeable without alderweireld is that we defend appallingly. the opposition need only have the ball for a fraction of the time and show nothing more than competence in order to destroy us.

poch out

really feel like the team needs one or two decadent creative players with no defensive duties to lurk and provide sudden bursts of incision because everyone is a scrapper atm

On paper the obvious candidates are Eriksen and Son. Son is completely ill-suited to the CF role - we briefly looked much more balanced when he switched to the left and Janssen came on. Previously there were so many moments when Alli would play a ball through that he failed to anticipate in the way that a proper CF would - unsurprisingly really as Son should be one of the people playing that ball rather than receiving it. Kane's movement off the ball is often excellent and compensates for his lack of pace.

Eriksen has been playing inside himself all season and has had fewer decisive moments than I've ever seen from him. Something's not right there.

We were right in front of Walker for most of the second half and it was really obvious how he would prefer to negotiate some kind of painfully awkward comedy turn with an attacker bearing down on him rather than just put the ball onto his left foot.

Sissoko is powerful but his decision-making is execrable. Consistently.

Dier is a much better DM than a CB and looks very nervous at this level, as does Vertonghen without Toby alongside him.

Pretty much the only new signing to have settled properly is Wanyama, who was also the only Spurs player to have a half-decent game yesterday. Maybe Lloris as well but Leverkusen didn't seem too bothered about scoring until it actually happened.

Speaking as a Leverkusen supporter we more or less just lucked out (for once, given the last weeks) in eventually taking one of the many chances forced on us by Spurs regularly dropping the ball in a hair-rising situation. Nothing of interest in terms of offensive accomplishment coming from our side as well, but this is most probably just Roger Schmidt's ideal of a perfectly executed game.

Dier is abysmal as a CB. Enormously lucky.

commentator here described his challenge as 'rudimentary' and then 'agricultural' (?)

score?

0-0. Spurs are poor tho Monaco extremely lucky not to have a man sent off at the end of 1st half

Borussia Dortmund 5 Legia Warsaw 2 - after 32 minutes.

This is an absolute joke.

lol

I hope CSKA win at Wembley. Spurs don't even deserve be in the Europa League.

The Dortmund match is now 7-4.

Good riddance to Spurs. Theyve been atrocious

I’d like to say Spurs are going out with a bong. But given the slackness of their performance, it would almost be more appropriate to say going out with a bong. But let’s not.

put down the bong

Dortmund 8 Legia 4

presume that's a record?

Feyenoord beat KR Reykjavík 12–2 in the first round in 1969–70. This is the overall record for all European Cup/Champions League matches.
Borussia Dortmund beat Legia Warsaw 8–4 in the group stage in 2016–17. This is the record for the Champions League era.

Barcelona have a shot of beating it tomorrow night though.

luckily for me i have a day from hell in work tomorrow and won't have the time or inclination to follow how many goals the famous glasgow celtic are shipping

two maybe three decent performances since late April is the kind of thing that generated non-whimsical '[Spurs manager] out' talk back in the day, just sayin

I didn't watch the game but the expanded squad options have really fucked us. Even without injuries Poch has been rotating into systems for which we are manifestly unsuited. Also I miss Toby. When is he coming back?

I've been pochouttino for months but let's be serious here he's earned a lot of goodwill and he's not near spent it all

The Lamela injury hasn't exactly helped either - he's had some subpar performances this season but he's a sorely missed creative spark with Eriksen so out of sorts.

Guessing we'll deliberately tank the third Wembley game in order to try and avoid the Europa now. Hardly £150 well spent in any case. There's a lot to be said for reverting to last year's XI (give or take a Wanyama) as soon as we can.

Poch out is premature but starting a must-win game with Derby, Wimmer and Trippier at the back is straight up negligence. The whole CL campaign has been an embarrassment. It has been the holy grail for years and when achieved taken with the same seriousness as a Europa away leg vs Qarabag. It hasn't just been inept, it has been pathetic.

Dier*

I'm starting to wonder how bad his falling out with Vertonghen was, and whether something escalated ahead of the game. Vertonghen has been poor in the CL but that back line was a disaster even on paper. His selections haven't made much sense throughout the tournament and it has looked like he's been resting players for Premier League ties the following weekend.

Yep, that's the assumption the TV commentators were working on as well - Vertonghen and Walker were being rested for the Chelsea game at the weekend.

Amazing early games - my boy Azmoun inspired Rostov to a 3-2 win over Bayern, Besiktas came back from 3-0 down at half time to draw.

Rte showing celtic AGAIN. game prob picked at start of the group tbf

SV, did Bayern just throw the game or? They sank us to fourth. Which is probably for the best, to be out of Europe entirely. Already cant wait for this dreadful season to be over for us tbh

(Not taking anything away from Rostov btw, they have been impressive against Ajax earlier, just a bit uneven at times)

No, Bayern were on top for most of the game and Rostov scored with pretty much all of their shots on target. It's a bit of a fluke but Bayern were ok.

the despicable ian darke and hargreaves are only on the youtube stream apparently?

Oh ay?

Tbh goalies feet a disgrace for huge goal

"Tony Cruise"

Was that Harvey Keitel in an effing car insurance commercial? Is nothing sacred etc

yeah the bt sport commentators on my stream had nothing but effusive praise for the goal

Fuck everything

RIP Gianluigi

absurdly jammy

that's harsh, on the replay

Poor old Buffon

rip everything

the typical pornographic procession it is again

Corbyn better win this election now.

maybe romantic outliers huddersfield town were really cunts all along

yorkshire's credentials surely confirmed yesterday, apols calz/nv

is this the best ever side to also feel jammiest ever

ugh he's such a cunt

Xpost Juve have looked knackered this whole 2nd half though. Oh God now Cuadrado is off

buffon should just break his leg and retire

ramos' leg

Stupid referee wtf

Oh you fucking prick Ramos.

Referee is the real prick there. Assumed he was sending Ramos off when the card came out

Fucking Ramos man.

Well beaten tbh.

yeah they didn't come back out :(

ynwa

time for a new thread eh

my heart won't survive this team this year

ach it must be beyond hoffenheim already

never always in doubt

it prob is beyond them it's just this utterly bonkers football is torture. still wouldn't rule out at the v least a cagey finale.

not too sure abt that goal celebration

id like celtic and liverpool to be drawn in the same group tomorrow

guaranteed a ton of goals, "battle of britain" guff in the press, rodgers visiting anfield with new club, celtic and liverpool haven't played each other since 2003 (and celtic won).

Ya

didn't see the game -- were the two hoffenheim goals fluke-y or was it just bad defense again?

Wanna know what dunphy thinks

First was very sloppy from open play

Second was a poorly defended cross

PSG ne sera pas sur cette chose - It's the Champions League 2017-2018 thread