General Football - Weird Results And Other Things Worth Sharing

[BishopBrennan]

[HamCam]

There tends to be goals in it. That's how they determine the winner.

 Thank you for pointing out that I could have expressed my ramblings a little better. That said the most common score-line in football is 1-0 tending towards goal rather than goals . You could also argue that at 0-0 and a penalty shoot-out there are no goals!

[TRVMP]

 Thank you for pointing out that I could have expressed my ramblings a little better. That said the most common score-line in football is 1-0 tending towards goal rather than goals . You could also argue that at 0-0 and a penalty shoot-out there are no goals!

 

That 1-0 stat was based only off the English league, and in any case that same study showed that only 7.2% of (English) games finished 0-0, and that a further 16.1% have just one goal scored. So a total of 23.3% of games don't have "goals", but just "goal". In other words a huge majority of games are decided by goals.

[HamCam]

Looking beyond the English league interesting stats at http://sargasso.nl/the-average-number-of-goals-in-a-football-match-is-277/

 

1-1 is the most common score!

[TRVMP]

Was reading the other day about what their fans are describing as “Espanyolification”- basically their club’s turning into an Espanyol, Torino or 1860 Munich in relation to their local rivals now, such is their irrelevance.

 

Of course the downside of that is that it brings such joy to the Celtic support, but it is delightful nonetheless.

 

Not sure any of the clubs I mentioned have suffered quite the humiliation of liquidation, although I know 1860 suffered licensing issues after relegation last season and ended up in the amateur leagues.

 

 

1860 are enjoying the journey, top of the Regionalliga Bayern and about to come back up to the 3. Bundesliga at the first attempt. They also beat Bayern's reserves in the league earlier in the season, which is nice (for them.)

 

 

Just going back to this - a few years ago AEK took voluntary relegation from the second to the third tier in Greece and started again in the amateur ranks. Then last month they won the Super League title with games to spare. Meanwhile Olympiacos, who won the previous seven titles and were regulars in the Champions League group stage, collapsed and will now finish third, not even getting a Champions League qualifier (the second spot goes to PAOK.)

 

I haven't read a huge amount on it but I imagine this is a case of AEK doing literally everything right and Olympiacos, who went through several managers, doing everything wrong.

 

Over in Denmark, Brondby haven't won a title in over a decade but are neck-and-neck with Midtjylland, while Copenhagen are already out of contention.

 

Just goes to show that few things last totally forever, but Rangers really face an uphill struggle, not least because in both of those countries there's more than one competitive team (Greece also has PAOK and - current basket cases - Panathinaikos; in recent years AaB, Midtjylland, and Nordsjaelland have won the title in Denmark).

Edited May 3, 2018 by TRVMP

[Guest capitanus]

Times running out for Wenger. He won't get a better chance of European Silverware than he will tonight either.

 

Edit to add: Arsenal out.

Edited May 3, 2018 by capitanus

[Guest capitanus]

Salzburg beating Marseille 2-0

[vikingTON]

Atletico Madrid are the best organised team in football right now by some distance; they're excellent defensively and always move the ball with purpose in the final third. Difficult to see a big club (i.e. those still much richer than Atletico) that wouldn't be better off with Simeone as manager. Diego Costa was in top form as well this evening and ragdolled the entire Arsenal backline throughout the match, Two good cunts. 

[Guest capitanus]

Atletico Madrid are the best organised team in football right now by some distance; they're excellent defensively and always move the ball with purpose in the final third. Difficult to see a big club (i.e. those still much richer than Atletico) that wouldn't be better off with Simeone as manager. Diego Costa was in top form as well this evening and ragdolled the entire Arsenal backline throughout the match, Two good ****.

 

I doubt that he'll come to us though.

[Guest capitanus]

Marseille just scored. 3-2 on aggregate.

 

The Fritzls are losing the plot now. Marseille running the clock down.

 

Edit to add:

Marseille through to final.

Edited May 3, 2018 by capitanus

[TRVMP]

I have a soft spot for Marseille so this isn't sour grapes, but Salzburg were absolutely cheated out of a Europa League final. They had one stonewaller and one good penalty claim turned down in the first leg, and tonight the corner that led to Marseille's goal was clearly and obviously a goal kick. Their manager was going absolutely spoon at the refs after the game. I don't blame him one bit. Their best chance at a European final since the 90s (inasmuch as this is still Casino Salzburg) and it was taken away by the officials.

[TRVMP]

Atletico Madrid are the best organised team in football right now by some distance; they're excellent defensively and always move the ball with purpose in the final third. Difficult to see a big club (i.e. those still much richer than Atletico) that wouldn't be better off with Simeone as manager. Diego Costa was in top form as well this evening and ragdolled the entire Arsenal backline throughout the match, Two good ****. 

 

When Thomas made that defensive error, had Arsenal just clipped a little speculative ball over the top, they could easily have gone one-on-one. But Arsenal don't play like that, they spray it out for Monreal to trip over. Simeone absolutely had their number in that regard.

 

They're no plucky underdogs anymore, they have a very strong (and expensive) squad and a superb manager and a recent Liga under their belt, but it was still enormously satisfying to see them bully Arsenal out of Europe.

[Guest capitanus]

I have a soft spot for Marseille so this isn't sour grapes, but Salzburg were absolutely cheated out of a Europa League final. They had one stonewaller and one good penalty claim turned down in the first leg, and tonight the corner that led to Marseille's goal was clearly and obviously a goal kick. Their manager was going absolutely spoon at the refs after the game. I don't blame him one bit. Their best chance at a European final since the 90s (inasmuch as this is still Casino Salzburg) and it was taken away by the officials.

Do you think that the authorities would have wanted an Austrian team in the final?

[TRVMP]

Do you think that the authorities would have wanted an Austrian team in the final?

 

I'm generally not one to look for conspiracies where simple inadequacy will do (so I shouldn't have said "cheated", really) but I doubt it would come down to the nationality as much as it would the Red Bull thing. UEFA are almost as territorial as FIFA when it comes to sponsorships and the like*, hence even the Salzburg logo can't say Red Bull on it on any official UEFA website, TV graphic, or document. Having a corporate entity like that in the final would open a floodgate that UEFA would rather remain closed for now.

 

*In what was actually quite a funny piece of 'guerilla marketing' - and whoever came up with that expression should be dropped in the Peruvian forest with a machete and a dozen MREs - the South African airline Kulula in 2010 branded itself 'the official carrier of the you-know-what'. FIFA took a dim view and (successfully) asked them to stop.

[TRVMP]

Off-topic for a moment but in shades of Scotland vs. Lithuania from the 90s, Besiktas opted not to bother showing up for their cup game at Fenerbahce tonight. In the original game last month, either the Besiktas manager or chairman (I forget which) was hit by an object thrown by hooligans, and it was postponed midway through the second half. The TFF called for the game to continue behind closed doors tonight. Besiktas appealed and said they should go through automatically; their appeal was rejected yesterday and they were told the game was going ahead. Tonight Fenerbahce showed up and warmed up, the referee gave Besiktas time to appear (which they clearly weren't going to do; they were halfway across town at their own training ground) then cancelled the game.

A sticky wicket for the TFF: Besiktas by the letter of the law had to play tonight, but they do have a pretty good moral case here. Their man was attacked and that was what caused the game to be postponed. This all happens during a very close title race (indeed, they lost 2-0 to Galatasaray at the weekend, falling to 4th.) And during this race they then have to play yet another Istanbul derby, if only for 33 minutes? 

 

Anyway, Fenerbahce will probably be awarded the tie.

 

In the league, Galatasaray on 66, Istanbul BB (or to give them their full English name, Emmanuel Adebayor's Istanbul BB) on 65, Fenerbahce on 63, Besiktas on 62, everyone else irrelevant.

[Guest capitanus]

Fortuna Düsseldorf and Holsten Kiel are currently drawing 1-1 in a top of Bundesliga 2 clash. Game finished Kiel promoted.

 

Next weekend Dusseldorf have the league decider against Nuremberg, both clubs on 60 points.

 

FC Kaiserslautern (remember them?) to be relegated into the abyss that is Regionaliga. Eintracht Braunschweig also in danger of relegation.

Edited May 6, 2018 by capitanus

[Guest capitanus]

Apparently there was a crush at Tynecastle today:

 

http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/news/16208334.Watch_the_shocking_moment_Tynecastle_stewards____crush____Celtic_fans_entering_the_stadium/

[TRVMP]

Good for Holstein, with Hamburg going down* it's good to have a northern team.

 

*The only team to have played every Bundesliga season!

 

Edit: also, re FCK, there's a 3. Bundesliga now so they'll drop into that from the second tier. There are a few (formerly) major clubs in the Regionalligaen though, such as Alemannia Aachen, Energie Cottbus, and of course 1860 Munich. The latter two have already qualified for the playoffs. The six Regionalligaen teams are drawn into three two-legged ties and the winners go up to the third level. So that's three promotion spots from around 100 teams.

 

The Regionalliga, then is a complete dungeon. Also, the China U-20 national team played in one of them. Weird but true. They played a few games to fill in for some bankrupt team until ze Germans kicked them out because of Tibet. Some fans were waving Tibetan flags at the players, the players walked off the pitch, the police got involved etc.

 

That'll surely have the Chinese rethinking their Tibetan Autonomous Region policies. Colonize their only realistic source of water en route to their status as global power, or let their youths play in the German fourth division? It's a toughie.

Edited May 6, 2018 by TRVMP

[TRVMP]

And that is dreadful crowd management from the police there. If you're going to close the gate you do so AFTER you stop people marching towards it.

[Guest capitanus]

And that is dreadful crowd management from the police there. If you're going to close the gate you do so AFTER you stop people marching towards it.

The mounted police just seemed to sit there watching this. No attempt at crowd control.