Premier League

[roversfan99]

But the initial conversation was about the players and what has triggered this conversation is the addition of the added games I mentioned. They are the ones that shouldnt be added to the calendar.

Obviously Pep is totally wrong to want the League Cup scrapped, although it hasnt stopped him from winning it numerous times.

Im not saying that if you put it to the players, that they can either lose part of/reduce the domestic or continental calendar, and it would hurt them financially if they chose the latter, they may well choose the former. But this whole conversation seems to be based on the addition of needless games into the international calendar, the world club calendar and additional Champions League games. And it is a fair point shown by additional injuries.

[Mike E]

Maybe we should trial stopping any European qualifying teams from competing in the league cup? Gives that Euro chance to any team.

[Hasta]

3 hours ago, roversfan99 said:

But the initial conversation was about the players and what has triggered this conversation is the addition of the added games I mentioned. They are the ones that shouldnt be added to the calendar.

Obviously Pep is totally wrong to want the League Cup scrapped, although it hasnt stopped him from winning it numerous times.

Im not saying that if you put it to the players, that they can either lose part of/reduce the domestic or continental calendar, and it would hurt them financially if they chose the latter, they may well choose the former. But this whole conversation seems to be based on the addition of needless games into the international calendar, the world club calendar and additional Champions League games. And it is a fair point shown by additional injuries.

I agree completely, but I also fear the rich are the most powerful here and that's not what will happen.

Many, many years ago (2005ish) we talked about a European midweek league and a domestic league at the weekends. It's just happened by stealth. I mean, look where we are now with the champions league.

If viewing figures and interest is high in this, and the format proves popular for the armchair fan, then it will become "Why can't we expand it and play 10 games in Europe during Autumn / Winter" and so on. And it will be the domestic game which gets squeezed out.

If they suddenly say that "unless you finish in the bottom 8 in that league above your Champions League spot is secured" then we have the European Super League from a couple of years back.

And the top clubs will lap it up. 

But to your point, I agree. Go back to 6 CL games, ditch the World Club Cup and if you want to do the Nations League do it over a longer period so in each international break you only play 1 game. Otherwise ditch international breaks completely.

 

 

Edited September 19, 2024 by Hasta

[Mattyblue]

UEFA had one chance to bury the European Super League (a league they, on the surface, got very upset about) when the founder clubs of the breakaway competition completely embarrassed themselves - not only didn’t they take their chance, they actually capitulated to the very same clubs who got their way regardless.

[speeeeeeedie]

19 hours ago, Silas said:

I'll give you a different argument. 

I pay a shedload for all the TV subscriptions to watch the matches that make them so well paid.

I want value for my money, I want to be entertained as regular as often.

All the English teams in the CL have massive squads, with strength and quality running deep.

Just rotate more, let those overpaid reserves get a crack more often.

But they won't, because they have to win the competition. What 'City' are saying is- we want to win every competition via as few games as possible!

Course they do. Minimum effort, maximum reward. And the less games, statistically more chance of them succeeding, as less abnormal variance (sending offs, dodgy penalties etc). Less variance means the best team will conquer more, and they're the best team.

But I (and I am millions of viewers) want them to put more shows on, entertain me more. 🤷🏻‍♂️

If you're deperate to protect the players, put a limit on mins played a week. Force them to rotate. Would probably help even the playing field tbh. Make it all more competitive. 

But don't demonise the viewers for thinking they're being a bit whiney about the schedule,  when we can all go to their squad list and compile 2 full strong 11's with change left over. It's gaslighting. 

Some well reasoned points there, with probably none ever making it to serious discussion stages.

My annoyance comes from those who are viewing it through the single prism of footballers get paid well so they should keep quiet.

I agree that there are too many games. International football has pointless breaks. The Champions League is now longer, and now FIFA have decided to add teams to the daft club world cup. 

Guardiola gave Rodri extra leave after the Euros but Guardiola knows that Rodri is indispensable, (I think more so than Haaland and De Bruyne), and for that he will always play. Rodri won't criticize Guardiola so makes general complaints about strikes instead. 

 

[ben_the_beast]

David Raya doing the business again for Arsenal tonight. I was ridiculed for this when I said it last year, but I genuinely think he's in the picture for top 5 goalkeepers in the world. If not top 5, he's definitely top 10. 

Still can't believe Mowbray shipped him out so cheaply. 

[Upside Down]

19 minutes ago, ben_the_beast said:

David Raya doing the business again for Arsenal tonight. I was ridiculed for this when I said it last year, but I genuinely think he's in the picture for top 5 goalkeepers in the world. If not top 5, he's definitely top 10. 

Still can't believe Mowbray shipped him out so cheaply. 

Mowbray was a complete dick head though. He's set this club back decades with his mediocrity.

[roversfan99]

The club was in a far better state when Mowbray left than when he joined. The idea that he out of anyone has "set the club back decades" is laughable. Putting aside needlessly calling him a "complete dickhead."

It was a shortsighted error of judgement to let Raya go. But his development playing in the Premier League for now a 4th season, going into a second in one of the best teams, working with far better coaches and with regular exposure to top level football has accelerated his development far beyond where he would be at had he stayed here. In his final season here, he made so many mistakes and even when he first joined Brentford, he made a number of mistakes there including one at Wembley which cost them promotion. They over those years of Premier League football and better coaching have been mostly eradicated.

[Upside Down]

1 hour ago, roversfan99 said:

The club was in a far better state when Mowbray left than when he joined. The idea that he out of anyone has "set the club back decades" is laughable. Putting aside needlessly calling him a "complete dickhead."

It was a shortsighted error of judgement to let Raya go. But his development playing in the Premier League for now a 4th season, going into a second in one of the best teams, working with far better coaches and with regular exposure to top level football has accelerated his development far beyond where he would be at had he stayed here. In his final season here, he made so many mistakes and even when he first joined Brentford, he made a number of mistakes there including one at Wembley which cost them promotion. They over those years of Premier League football and better coaching have been mostly eradicated.

He was absolutely instrumental in the dumbing down of the fanbase and the club in general. He's by no means the sole cause of this but he's a key figure when it comes to people blindly accepting mediocrity as being good enough for this club.

His constant disrespect towards the club and fans alone makes him a twat as far as I'm concerned.

Obviously I wish no ill on him and am glad to see he's on the mend from illness.

[chaddyrovers]

13 hours ago, Mike E said:

Maybe we should trial stopping any European qualifying teams from competing in the league cup? Gives that Euro chance to any team.

Cut the pointless nations league, stupid champions league format and made it back straight knockout competition with all UEFA competitions and scrap this stupid FIFA world club competition 

[ABBEY]

6 hours ago, roversfan99 said:

The club was in a far better state when Mowbray left than when he joined. The idea that he out of anyone has "set the club back decades" is laughable. Putting aside needlessly calling him a "complete dickhead."

It was a shortsighted error of judgement to let Raya go. But his development playing in the Premier League for now a 4th season, going into a second in one of the best teams, working with far better coaches and with regular exposure to top level football has accelerated his development far beyond where he would be at had he stayed here. In his final season here, he made so many mistakes and even when he first joined Brentford, he made a number of mistakes there including one at Wembley which cost them promotion. They over those years of Premier League football and better coaching have been mostly eradicated.

THE CLUB IS IN EXACTLY THE SAME STATE AS WHEN HE JOINED AND ALWAYS WILL BE UNTIL THE VENKYSCUM GO

[Upside Down]

26 minutes ago, ABBEY said:

THE CLUB IS IN EXACTLY THE SAME STATE AS WHEN HE JOINED AND ALWAYS WILL BE UNTIL THE VENKYSCUM GO

I concur with Abbey's all caps statement.

[Mattyblue]

Going to League 1 was by far the biggest factor of the dumbing down. Before it most of the fanbase still had expectations that Blackburn Rovers should do more than plod about. After it plenty got spooked and it was all ‘let’s be grateful to the owners that we even exist. I mean, look at Bury’.

 

Edited September 20, 2024 by Mattyblue

[Ianrally]

10 hours ago, ben_the_beast said:

David Raya doing the business again for Arsenal tonight. I was ridiculed for this when I said it last year, but I genuinely think he's in the picture for top 5 goalkeepers in the world. If not top 5, he's definitely top 10. 

Still can't believe Mowbray shipped him out so cheaply. 

Much to do with whoever our goalkeeping coach when you hear Raya’s comments.

"Inaki just completely changed my style of being a goalkeeper, to be more proactive and anticipate stuff that has not happened yet," said Raya

"If you see me at Blackburn and then after I signed for Brentford, it's two completely different goalkeepers."

[ben_the_beast]

7 hours ago, Upside Down said:

He was absolutely instrumental in the dumbing down of the fanbase and the club in general. He's by no means the sole cause of this but he's a key figure when it comes to people blindly accepting mediocrity as being good enough for this club.

His constant disrespect towards the club and fans alone makes him a twat as far as I'm concerned.

Obviously I wish no ill on him and am glad to see he's on the mend from illness.

I don't think Mowbray was a twat. I think he was just a man with an extremely fragile ego. He'd say contradicting things every other week. Which was mainly down to his own shortcomings as a manager. As soon as results didn't go our way, he'd revert to little old blackburn, we should be grateful, blah, blah, blah. Simple because he couldn't reflect on the fact his own ability was the root cause behind some of the legendary death spirals. One of his biggest problems was he loved the sound of his own voice. He'd never stop talking and he'd say things he shouldn't sometimes. The Sunderland juggernaut comments really stuck, especially as it came in line with encouraging our staff to jump ship. 

But he did do a lot of good, generally wanted the best for the club and definitely left us in a better state than when he arrived. The issue really was Venkys and Waggot not holding him accountable. Unless you're a very special manager then there is a shelf life and after the good he did, he had stayed on too long. 

[roversfan99]

2 hours ago, ABBEY said:

THE CLUB IS IN EXACTLY THE SAME STATE AS WHEN HE JOINED AND ALWAYS WILL BE UNTIL THE VENKYSCUM GO

That is a seperate issue and I certainly wouldnt argue with any comments about them pushing the club massively back. They are the ones that have continiously held us and pushed us back since they sadly arrived.

[Admiral Nelsen]

7 hours ago, Upside Down said:

He was absolutely instrumental in the dumbing down of the fanbase and the club in general. He's by no means the sole cause of this but he's a key figure when it comes to people blindly accepting mediocrity as being good enough for this club.

His constant disrespect towards the club and fans alone makes him a twat as far as I'm concerned.

Obviously I wish no ill on him and am glad to see he's on the mend from illness.

 

Constant disrespect is a bit much. 

I appreciate that not everyone agrees with me on this, but I think football fans generally are far, far too thin skinned for a group of people who give players and managers absolute pelters. You can get situations like Kean when what they say in the media is an obviously calculated attempt to pull the wool over people's eyes, and that's a bit different, but generally I think we care far too much about what managers say when a microphone is shoved under their nose in what is often a seriously high-stress situation.

 

As for where he left the club, I think with the benefit of a few years hindsight we can say that Mowbray brought in some very good players at this level and his last season was chalk and cheese compared to what he inherited. He didn't make the most of a couple of pretty good squads and the club did a poor job of keeping those assets, but he did a lot of things right. Certainly compares favourably to most others we've had in the last 15 years. 

[rigger]

14 hours ago, ben_the_beast said:

David Raya doing the business again for Arsenal tonight. I was ridiculed for this when I said it last year, but I genuinely think he's in the picture for top 5 goalkeepers in the world. If not top 5, he's definitely top 10. 

Still can't believe Mowbray shipped him out so cheaply. 

Perhaps there aren't that many good keepers at the moment.

[Eddie]

On 18/09/2024 at 21:13, Silas said:

I'll give you a different argument. 

I pay a shedload for all the TV subscriptions to watch the matches that make them so well paid.

I want value for my money, I want to be entertained as regular as often.

All the English teams in the CL have massive squads, with strength and quality running deep.

Just rotate more, let those overpaid reserves get a crack more often.

It's a valid point, but it still poses some problems. 

Plenty of people are dissatisfied with the value that they get out of their TV subscriptions as we are now watching lower-quality football as a result of the number of matches being played.

Rotation would solve this problem, but then many would complain that they're paying for TV subscriptions or showing up for matches and not seeing the stars (see the NBA).

The other fix would be to reduce the overall number of matches, but vary kickoff times and match days more so that TV viewers would feel like they were getting better value. The downside here is that it makes life difficult for those actually attending matches (see the general complaints about the Championship this season).

The Nations League should be scrapped and players should be given proper breaks throughout the season. A 2ish week winter break and a week off in each half of the season would suffice. I don't mind scrapping the League Cup. Big teams don't take it seriously until the later rounds. Even a club like us will only take it seriously a couple of rounds in. It serves virtually no purpose and no one really cares about it.

Do players earn millions? Yes. Does that mean we should not care about their wellbeing our how playing too many matches could impact the quality of football that we watch? No. We just watched a pretty dire European Championships and tiredness was certainly a factor.

Did players in the good old days play tons of matches for far less? Yes. But they also played at half the speed and had their careers typically finish around 32/33.

There's plenty of room to remove fairly pointless matches from the footballing calendar. 

 

[simongarnerisgod]

23 minutes ago, Eddie said:

The Nations League should be scrapped and players should be given proper breaks throughout the season. A 2ish week winter break and a week off in each half of the season would suffice. I don't mind scrapping the League Cup. Big teams don't take it seriously until the later rounds. Even a club like us will only take it seriously a couple of rounds in. It serves virtually no purpose and no one really cares about it.

30000 rovers fans certainly cared when we won the league cup,pretty sure the swansea fans felt the same when they won it,ditto every other side who appeared in the final as well,if you take away competiton the game becomes pointless

[Silas]

On 19/09/2024 at 16:10, speeeeeeedie said:

My annoyance comes from those who are viewing it through the single prism of footballers get paid well so they should keep quiet.

 

1 hour ago, Eddie said:

Do players earn millions? Yes. Does that mean we should not care about their wellbeing our how playing too many matches could impact the quality of football that we watch? No.

I get, and fully back, that earning obscene amounts of money doesn't mean we can run them into the ground. 

And of course I'm looking at it from a consumer point of view where I want bang for my buck.

Rodri has also riled me up by moaning about it before it even happens. I understand he's fully capable of reading and judging a fixture list, but maybe wait till the congestion and potential fatigue occurs before going in with the strike threats.

But if, by Xmas, players are dropping like flies, he'll look bang on, and I'll be the idiot. 

It's the theory that they HAVE to put their big guns out every match to be successful that I contest. The strength in depth is greater than ever.

If I try to compile a rough super 'B' team from City/Arsenal/Liverpool (I'll leave Villa out as fresh to CL):

                    Jesus/Nunez

Doku/Gakpo         H. Elliott          Trossard

       C.Jones/Endo       Jorginho

Tsimikas  Stones   J Gomez   Walker

                      Ortega

 

Let me manage that team and I fancy my chances for Top 4. 😀

I don't believe that would have been the case a decade ago. 

They're complaining more than ever, yet they have better player (quality) resources than ever.....imo. 

[Tyrone Shoelaces]

23 hours ago, ben_the_beast said:

David Raya doing the business again for Arsenal tonight. I was ridiculed for this when I said it last year, but I genuinely think he's in the picture for top 5 goalkeepers in the world. If not top 5, he's definitely top 10. 

Still can't believe Mowbray shipped him out so cheaply. 

Great save but what was the penalty taker doing heading the ball down when Raya was on the floor and the lad had all the goals to head the ball into ?

[roversfan99]

4 hours ago, Eddie said:

It's a valid point, but it still poses some problems. 

Plenty of people are dissatisfied with the value that they get out of their TV subscriptions as we are now watching lower-quality football as a result of the number of matches being played.

Rotation would solve this problem, but then many would complain that they're paying for TV subscriptions or showing up for matches and not seeing the stars (see the NBA).

The other fix would be to reduce the overall number of matches, but vary kickoff times and match days more so that TV viewers would feel like they were getting better value. The downside here is that it makes life difficult for those actually attending matches (see the general complaints about the Championship this season).

The Nations League should be scrapped and players should be given proper breaks throughout the season. A 2ish week winter break and a week off in each half of the season would suffice. I don't mind scrapping the League Cup. Big teams don't take it seriously until the later rounds. Even a club like us will only take it seriously a couple of rounds in. It serves virtually no purpose and no one really cares about it.

Do players earn millions? Yes. Does that mean we should not care about their wellbeing our how playing too many matches could impact the quality of football that we watch? No. We just watched a pretty dire European Championships and tiredness was certainly a factor.

Did players in the good old days play tons of matches for far less? Yes. But they also played at half the speed and had their careers typically finish around 32/33.

There's plenty of room to remove fairly pointless matches from the footballing calendar. 

 

Your comments about the League Cup hopefully arent shared by many. To remove that would be a terrible idea, of course it serves a purpose. Im guessing that you wasnt in Cardiff at any point in 2002. Both cups see rotation in the earlier stages, fine, but it is a great opportunity for smaller clubs to have experiences they wouldnt otherwise have.

The primary focus of football should always be matchgoing fans, TV games moved should be limited. For example, 3 or 4 Championship games all starting at 12.30 each Saturday is totally unnecessary. 

Nations League, this new Champions League format, the planned club world cup, these are the additional games that are really provoking the understandable issues around too many games. Scrap them. Regarding TV deals, the main issue is the price of the packages. The extortionate cost in this country of Sky and then TNT/Prime on top is why people expect so much to justify it. The issue is the price.

[ABBEY]

14 hours ago, Eddie said:

It's a valid point, but it still poses some problems. 

Plenty of people are dissatisfied with the value that they get out of their TV subscriptions as we are now watching lower-quality football as a result of the number of matches being played.

Rotation would solve this problem, but then many would complain that they're paying for TV subscriptions or showing up for matches and not seeing the stars (see the NBA).

The other fix would be to reduce the overall number of matches, but vary kickoff times and match days more so that TV viewers would feel like they were getting better value. The downside here is that it makes life difficult for those actually attending matches (see the general complaints about the Championship this season).

The Nations League should be scrapped and players should be given proper breaks throughout the season. A 2ish week winter break and a week off in each half of the season would suffice. I don't mind scrapping the League Cup. Big teams don't take it seriously until the later rounds. Even a club like us will only take it seriously a couple of rounds in. It serves virtually no purpose and no one really cares about it.

Do players earn millions? Yes. Does that mean we should not care about their wellbeing our how playing too many matches could impact the quality of football that we watch? No. We just watched a pretty dire European Championships and tiredness was certainly a factor.

Did players in the good old days play tons of matches for far less? Yes. But they also played at half the speed and had their careers typically finish around 32/33.

There's plenty of room to remove fairly pointless matches from the footballing calendar. 

 

breaks haha 😄 😆 

they "work" say 12 hours a week.

[Norbert Rassragr]

I was so surprised when I heard that footballers trained from around 9am to 2 or 3 pm. That's nothing if we're talking 4 or 5 days a week. This was a while ago so I don't know if they stay on, and go to the gym etc. outside those hours.

If those hours include fitness work and they're let loose in the early afternoon, it's no wonder why they wander into a pub or bookies to pick up bad habits.