I liked learning an own-goal in Spanish is a “contragoal”Sweden's whole offense in the world cup was basically based around Viktor Claesson's ability to throw the ball really far.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hIXeE18R-0
I liked learning an own-goal in Spanish is a “contragoal”Sweden's whole offense in the world cup was basically based around Viktor Claesson's ability to throw the ball really far.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hIXeE18R-0
It has no correlation I’m sure, but the short corner on FIFA always seems to work much better than a traditional one.Of note, most studies have shown that, on corner kicks, short corners that keep possession are worth more goals than using corners as a set piece. So, being "content" to retain possession actually seems to lead to more expected goals.
I wonder if Club America is the club with the largest fan base in the U.S.The second leg of the Liga MX final last night drew 3.3m viewers in the US, beating out the Champions League Final to be our country's most-watched club game of 2019.
There's no data I'm aware of that could settle the issue, but it's a good bet. Liga MX is the most popular league in the country and support for Mexican clubs in the US tends to be concentrated among the big ones like América, Chivas, Tigres, etc. American fans who follow Euro teams are spread out mostly among a larger group of superclubs.I wonder if Club America is the club with the largest fan base in the U.S.
There also a lot of Latin Americans who support their "local" club (America, Chivas, Penarol, etc.) and are also big fans of Barca/Real Madrid/Juventus, etc.There's no data I'm aware of that could settle the issue, but it's a good bet. Liga MX is the most popular league in the country and support for Mexican clubs in the US tends to be concentrated among the big ones like América, Chivas, Tigres, etc. American fans who follow Euro teams are spread out mostly among a larger group of superclubs.
It may ultimately depend on how you measure fandom. I'd guess that there are fewer very casual fans of América than there are people who profess to like Barcelona but aren't really engaged in any meaningful way aside from owning a Messi shirt as a fashion/identity statement.
Yeah, that's an interesting factor as well.There also a lot of Latin Americans who support their "local" club (America, Chivas, Penarol, etc.) and are also big fans of Barca/Real Madrid/Juventus, etc.
Well, until relatively recently, England didn't have many Latino players, so it makes sense for them to gravitate towards the leagues that featured the best Latin players, not to mention the language aspect.Yeah, that's an interesting factor as well.
I believe that Latin Americans in the US tend to support clubs from Spain and Italy more than from England. I wonder if that balances out the Anglophile leanings of white American soccer fans.
Yeah, that's what happens when the Liga makes sure their schedule is Pope friendly. I was in the same boat when my wife and I visited 6 years ago. The only match Benfica played in 3 weeks was in the Acores. We did get to see Portugal play Holland in the Algarve instead.Oh, @Vinho Tinto, I'm sad to report that my wife and I completely whiffed in the soccer department on our trip to Portugal over the holidays. I was hoping to catch a game in Lisbon at Benfica, Sporting, or even Belenenses [though I suppose that would be especially weird given their recent club split], or if not at our next stop with C.D. Santa Clara, but I didn't realize until a few weeks ago that the league takes a short winter break.
That's probably a factor. I wonder if another factor could be language patterns. One reason why the EPL became so popular is that there's no language barrier for most Americans. It's easy to consume the news, forum chatter, twitter, etc. Hispanics might gravitate towards La Liga for the same reasons.Well, until relatively recently, England didn't have many Latino players, so it makes sense for them to gravitate towards the leagues that featured the best Latin players, not to mention the language aspect.
Just kind of bullshitting here, but most typical American soccer fans started watching European soccer within the past 20 years. However, if you or your parents grew up in Latin America, chances are you may have inherited a fandom that dates back generations. So if you are a Mexican American born in 1990, your parents may have been big Real Madrid fans so you inherited that fandom. Since the English Football League was fairly isolated, it is less likely they have Latin fans dating back that far.
Thanks, and we still have one last hurray in Ponta Delgada tonight. This trip has been my second time time through Lisbon and my first time in the Azores. São Miguel may be the most stunning and dramatic place I've ever been.Yeah, that's what happens when the Liga makes sure their schedule is Pope friendly. I was in the same boat when my wife and I visited 6 years ago. The only match Benfica played in 3 weeks was in the Acores. We did get to see Portugal play Holland in the Algarve instead.
I know visiting the Luz wouldn't have been a wasted trip. The stadium tours are offered in English and the museum is bi-lingual. It has pretty much every trophy the senior team has ever won (Even the choochie hardware that is handed out for cash grab matches) with the stories behind the matches. One trophy was just a giant embalmed elephant's foot (I don't know why this was considered a good idea). They also have every trophy for any of the club's non-football sponsored teams and athletes. And they are not displayed in the back corner. Awards won by Telma Monteiro are displayed just as prominently as anything won by Eusebio. You can also take a photo with one of the two eagles that soars around the Estadio Da Luz pre-match.
Hope you had a good trip, regardless. Perfect time of year to catch a big wave.
He's 5'10" and 160lbs, maybe you can bulk him up and make him a safety?Enjoy this photo of Adama Traore asserting his dominance after Wolves’ latest victory.
View attachment 27872
Secretly wonder if BB would use him at TE or OLB or both.
I hope @candylandriots can educate the rest of us after his club's public service. And they'll be squaring off again this Saturday.It isn't just Eintracht and Dortmund, two of Germany's most traditional clubs. The first time Leipzig traveled to Union Berlin, the page in the game program usually devoted to the history of the visiting club was replaced with a primer on bull breeding instead. Fortuna Dusseldorf has updated its bylaws to forbid the club from scheduling friendlies with Leipzig or offering recognition in any way "beyond what is required by the rules of the sport."
Yeah, there are a few things that I've encountered since I've been here where I was initially dumbfounded after first looking at things through my American lenses. I expected RB Leipzig to be a fashionable new team based on how they tore up the ladder and challenged entrenched behemoths like Bayern and Dortmund. Think Moneyball-era Oakland A's to picture what I had in mind. I was quickly disabused of this notion.I hope @candylandriots can educate the rest of us after his club's public service. And they'll be squaring off again this Saturday.
edit: that article makes me want to go buy a red bull on general principle for all these haughty haters. The difference between Leipzig's rise and, say, Man City's reformation under the UAE, are different in a huge number of important ways.
The African qualifying format is pretty bad. There are these ten groups of four, which are usually uneven (seeded based on FIFA rankings, naturally). Only one team advances, so usually several strong teams get screwed by the draw and there are a few groups that are way too easy.
Add in the sometimes drastic differences in climate, altitude, and pitch quality and you have the recipe for a lot of upsets. I think this does have an effect on the FAs, who see the heightened likelihood of upsets and decide to make the short term investment in pricier European managers & staff in order to win now instead of developing coaching pipelines and other national football infrastructure.The African qualifying format is pretty bad. There are these ten groups of four, which are usually uneven (seeded based on FIFA rankings, naturally). Only one team advances, so usually several strong teams get screwed by the draw and there are a few groups that are way too easy.
Then there's the randomness of five home-and-aways among the ten group winners for Africa's five spots.
Of all the different confederational qualifying formats, it's the one that's least likely to produce qualifiers who are actually the best the region has to offer.
When the expectation of such owners is that you will use every accounting trick in the book to spend into the red in order to try to win, the NPV of your future cashflows - which is, at least theoretically, your franchise value - doesn't look so hot.Seems like a good price. I’d have thought any perennial EPL club with that size following would be into the B range.
Evertons shirt sponsor is an Kenyan betting site. Part of the sponsorship deal is an annual visit to Kenya/TZ for friendlies, they invite the winner of a tourney there to Goodisin for a friendly, the club sponsors charities there, etc. I hate that we have a gambling site and want to upgrade but if we have to have one, getting into Africa is shrewd. PL is so popular, it’s a growth market, and other clubs have done well establishing fan bases overseas (Newcastle in Thailand, etc).Villa sign Mbwana Samatta, the Tanzanian striker from Genk. Samatta will be the first ever Tanzanian to feature in the EPL. Only 5 other East Africans have ever played in the EPL, the only current player is Kenyan Victor Wanyama.
Samatta was born in Dar-es-Salaam and as a youth joined the country’s top youth side, Africa Lyon. He then spent all of 6 months at Tanzania’s most dominant club, Simba SC, before moving to continental giant TP Mezembe in the DRC. After 5 season there, he transferred to Genk and now the EPL after netting a goal at Anfield earlier this season.
All in all, this is a fantastic story for African football. It blazes a path from one of the continent’s footballing backwaters to the biggest league in the world. I hope this spurs more excitement and investment in the game in TZ. (I have spent some time in TZ and had a student write a thesis about Simba SC supporters several years back...it’s a fascinating, wonderful footballing culture.)
Too bad Everton didn’t sign Samatta, eh @OilCanShotTupac? After playing a friendly there, signing Samatta would have made Everton the most popular club in TZ ever.
It also gets into the competitive edges that can be found for the clubs that use data properly, such as Klopp's throw-in coach:“The idea of doing this in virtual reality is you get a clearer view of what is happening than on a 2D screen,” Pavitt, a West Ham United supporter, says. “You get more context of the players’ positions, and you get the idea of standing in the players’ shoes.
“The graphics aren’t exactly FIFA [the video game] standard yet, there is still work to be done, but this demonstrates what is possible with this technology. You get the sense of how fast the players and the ball move in real time.
“Players may review their performances by watching videos but this takes that analysis to another level as they can revisit moments in games so they can learn from mistakes and experience what they can do differently next time through VR. They can also look at their future opponents."
It sounds like very few clubs actually take advantage of this type of stuff, which is surprising:“Watson has learned over time to distinguish where a play originates and, using data from the Premier League since 2017-18, it analysed that 20 per cent of shots on goal in the Premier League came from plays which began with a throw-in. Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp recently appointed a throw-in coach."
We spoke to a Champions League side in Spain about this and they said they knew that AI would be massive in the sport in the next five to 10 years, but they didn’t know what it was or how it worked so they didn’t trust it...
[In the Premier League]:
There are just three clubs doing it properly that I am aware of: Liverpool, Manchester City and Leicester.
Well, my dream of Arteta slapping an Oculus Rift on Ozil’s head and asking Watson to “show him how to create a goal scoring opportunity” is officially dashed.I wish them luck (moreso the teams than IBM), but this article is PR by a half-informed but very excited football fan. It is not heralding a new era.
My favorite penalty shootout video still is the 2014 finals of the Men's College Cup...The Japanese Cup came down to a penalty shootout. Clearly a few guys need to work on them.
View: https://twitter.com/CayenneAoyama__/status/1226033773969469440
I'm reading Carlo Ancelloti''s book, which is very good - it's a football memoir but also a lite-reading life philosophy and how-to management book, kind of like a footy John Wooden.European soccer has been set up to reward a select few blue bloods; any team that is willing to spend to get a seat at the table with the big boys is imo, healthy for the game. Everyone that complains about Leipzig, PSG, Man City, etc. to me comes across as whiny and insecure, upset that someone is intruding on their established hierarchy. And yes, I understand the difference between what happened at Leipzig and what has been going on at the petro clubs, but it doesn't change much to me. Thank god we have revenue sharing in America.
The executives of the other clubs who are quoted in that article sound like conservative parents in the 1960s complaining about how The Beatles are ruining the youth of today with their long hair.