Hi,

I just wandered into this section and it occurred to me that I might create a thread for enthusiasts to talk about football, although I know we may as well be discussing it in other threads.

Personally, I'm most interested in the Champions League and the Europa League, but of course other prestigious competitions such as the Premier League, Liga BVVA, Serie A or Bundesliga can't go unnoticed.

To start the actual discussion, I have to say that this season has brought quite a lot of surprises in the two UEFA cups and I can't help noticing that Spanish football seems to outclass the rest of the world, and I don't have only FC Barcelona on my mind when I'm saying this.

So, what do you guys think? Who's going to win this year?

I feel obliged to go public with my football passion as my cover's blown the moment you look at my avatar.

To my delight, the spanish teams are doing incredibly well this year. On the other hand, it's kinda sad to see teams like FC Chelsea or FC MU go down, but that's the way it is. Maybe the winds of change are blowing through the football world.

To finally answer your question, I personally hope it will be FC Barcelona, but it's going to be an uphill battle as it was the previous years. Especially FC Real Madrid are in great form As for the UEFA European league, I guess FC MC will win, although the competition is tough.

While I agree that Real Madrid has been on a hot streak in the current season, I still believe Barcelona will deal with them, because in my view, Real has had a kind of „Barcelona complex“ having lost both El Clásico matches in „La Liga“ so far; in theory, Real has the quality to defeat Barcelona, but it turns out they tend to get things wrong in real matches. The League title is probably going to Madrid, though, but I suppose the Champions League is a higher-priority matter to Barcelona anyway.

The Citizens I always considered one of the favorites, but after seeing their last match against Sporting Lisabon I stopped being so optimistic about their victory. Frankly, I just think the team lacks the proper team chemistry, which is especially noticeable when things get tough for them on the field. Sure, it's a team full of stars, but we've seen such a constellation in a former Real Madrid and it didn't work well at all at the beginning. Also, there's been a lot of fuss and many affairs with their footballers, I recall those of Tévez and Balotelli, and that doesn't help the teamwork or the club's reputation either.

Pride: what a great idea to start this topic

There has been some unusual stuff going on in the Champions League and the Europa League. Look at the teams that have already made it to the quarterfinals in the Champions League – AC Milano, Barcelona (nothing suprising so far), but APOEL and Benfica? I woudn't bet on those two before the start of this competition. And they are not the only ones. Napoli are also on the right track to advance, Basel seems good as well but I don't think they'll manage to get to the next round (especially after seeing the result of today's Bayern match against Hoffenheim). These teams play some nice football, though, so it's not necessarily bad that they are in this competition. I'm really intrigued to see how it turns out and who will play who in the quarterfinals.

As for me, I'm a fan of Manchester United. I was disappointed when they were knocked out of the Champions League, which was very surprising considering the group they were in. A lot of people doubted their quality then. I was hoping they would prove these people wrong by performing better play in the Europa League but it's been nothing like that so far. They struggled to knock out Ajax and now there's another tough test – Athletic Bilbao, who beat them quite easily in the first leg. On the other hand, MU can now show what they can do.

There's no need to ask Johnnie about his favorite team but I'd be happy to know Pride's.

Pride: Agree about the Real Madrid thing. Barcelona will probably not defend the league title this season. Here's where I see the problem – everybody focuses on Barça, people analyse their play, the media show slow motions of Xavi-Iniesta-Messi cooperation and it's difficult to come up with something new, let alone after four years of dominance. And all this only gives a great advantage to Barça's opponents, ESPECIALLY Real Madrid who definitely don't mind being neglected. Real Madrid don't have a clue how to beat Barça, but what's really driving me up the wall is that Barça keep drawing with mid-table teams, while Real Madrid don't seem to be dropping points with such teams.

Yeah, Pride, who do you support?

A silly question to close with – if I speak about a team, should I use a singular or a plural verb? Or it doesn't matter?

Johnnie: AmE – use singular verbs; BrE – both can be used; Pride's favorite team is Tottenham as far as I know.

I was going to ask the same question because plural sounds a bit unnatural to me, but if I'm not mistaken, it's correct. British commentators use exclusively plural verb with teams.
Edit: mew was a bit quicker with the response and also more precise

The Champions League has been very interesting this season. English teams have mostly failed this year, which is quite a shame. On the other hand, the league has a little different go.
As I see it, of the remaining teams Bayern, Real, Napoli and Inter are the ones to advance. The hottest favorite is most likely Barcelona, which I've been supporting for quite some time now.AC Milan and Real have high caliber too. In my book, Real is going to finish in the top positions. Personally, I wouldn't be pleased if Barca ended up playing against AC in quarterfinals – the toughest opponent they can be matched against. After all, Guardiola himself doesn't wish for Italians. However it comes off, I'm going to root for Barca.

I love Barca because of their game philosophy, approach (that is, the more goals, the better) and, of course, because of the magnificent display they show on the field. This year's La Liga is decided. Real deserves it – good for them!

As for the Europian league, I root for Bilbao. They are feisty and what's more all of them are Basks.That is incredible! I consider their footbal academy (right after the Barcelona's – Le Massia) one of the best there is.
I guess that is why they call it „A little Barcelona“.

Euro 2012 is around the corner. I'm so glad that the CZ qualified. The group is more than decent; We can at least go through from our group. I'd like Spain to be the overall winner, mind you, only if we don't win. If Spain won, however, they would be rewriting the recently rewritten history AGAIN! Let's wait and see.

I agree with CarloS1 that Barcelona is most likely to win but I don't think AC Milano is their biggest opponent. For me, it's certainly Real Madrid. I don't watch Serie A, so I shouldn't be judging but I don't think AC are nearly as good as Barcelona (or Real) (although it didn't seem so in the group stage).

I hope CarloS1 is wrong about Bilbao winning the Europa League MU could be boosted by yesterday's win over WBA and subsequent going on top of the table (they're now one point clear od City). I wish for a better line-up this time and, hopefully, MU will control the game and score soon. They will have to show something and that's what I'm looking forward to.

Our group in Euro 2012 is maybe the best possible. I think Russians will win the group but we could very well finish second and then we'll see. It's hard to say who will win Euro. There are three possible candidates for me – Spain, Germany and Netherlands (they all have a great squad). I'd be happy to see England somewhere high but for some reason I'm not so optimistic.

Howdy, guys,

to start with, I will half confirm, half deny Tottenham being my favorite team. No matter how stupid it may sound, I can easily explain that – Tottenham really is one of the teams I support, but we're not talking typical single club devotion, because above all, I'm a fan of good football, so clubs such as Bayern, Leverkusen, Benfica, Porto, Madrid clubs, AC Milan, Manchester United, Arsenal or Viktoria Plzeň rank among the teams I like, too.

I definitely forgot to mention a bunch of teams, but I guess I managed to give you an idea about my football taste, so to speak. However, I omitted Barcelona intentionally, and don't get me wrong, it wasn't because I didn't consider their game first-class, which would be truly foolish, but because their football simply doesn't appeal to me. It's just a matter of my personal liking, but it's not that I send Pep Guardiola hate letters and never watch any Barcelona match. As a matter of fact, I've seen more than just a couple of them and I have to admit their passing and teammate awareness on the field is outstandning and so is Messi. They're just not my cup of „football“ tea.

I have the same opinion on Barca as Pride but I wasn't sure if I should go public with it (considering how many Barcelona fans are here ). I watch some of their matches in the Champions League and they play good football but almost everything goes through central midfield (Dani Alves may feel a bit aggrieved now ). I like more playing through the wings (but that's just how I see it).

Guys, what do you think about the champions league draw? Barça vs. Real in the final, are we agreed?

Yes, it's very likely. Only Bayern could jeopardize this but I don't think it will happen.

Well, too bad for AC Milan again, they're not going to get rid of Barcelona in the Champions League, are they? But yes, El Clásico will probably be the final this year, although personally, I'd rather see Bayern instead of Barcelona or Real. I'm looking forward to watching how Benfica will play Chelsea, I sense an interesting show in their duel.

Anyway, back to the Chelsea – Neapol struggle – which was, all in all, a great football clash for all fans of the sport, but there were a few stains to it, at least from my vantage point. I'm talking about the unsportsmanlike behavior of some players of Chelsea, Didier Drogba's frequent diving and overreacting to basically negligible touches of his opponents is a case in point. A few other players resorted to such low tricks in the dying minutes of the game – even the claim to fame of Czech football Petr Čech was trying to delay it, claiming there was something wrong with the ball or something of that sort, or David Luiz falling over in „agonizing pain“ in the Chelsea box.

Such dirty techniques are exactly what spoils the notion of foorball in the eyes of many people, and even such a die-hard fan like me is disgusted with it. I'm convinced that referees should punish diving and other unsporting conduct much more severely, but for that to happen the UEFA policy on that would have to change in the first place.