Anyone watched the game? Bayern with really good pressing all over the pitch and a more versatile offense, seems Kovac is using this pre-season to implement a clear gameplan. Sanches and Arp with great games, hope they receive more playing time in upcoming games.
Watched the first half. Bayern looked good, especially compared to the recent preseasons. The longer summer with no big tournament will help this year.
Solid performance by the youngsters. Eddie is really making the push for playing time or just this season's ESR
Was at the game (doing some writing) and got to do some talking and observing. The German teams and players are just different man. In a good way. My friend covered the Bayern -Arsenal match in LA and told me how after the match, heading to the buses, the Bayern players were just talking to whomever(media, fans) and had little security(if security around, the security stayed several feet back) while the Arsenal players..from youngsters to established senior players all had security around them escorting them to the buses, headphones in so as to avoid the media and fans. You'd think Arsenal were the team full of WC winners(Yeah Ozil) and had actually won a league title and UCL title in recent memory. Same thing happened in Houston with Bayern vs Madrid. The Madrid players ignored media and fans for the most part, headphones in, no stopping. Of course Toni Kroos stopped to talk to the German media and take pictures with the fan girls. Kubo stopped to talk to the Japanese media(The Madrid press officer tried to take the blame for the players not stopping but I saw the same thing when Madrid played Juve in DC last year). Then you get to the Bayern players. First thing I see after the managers were done with their press conferences- Manuel Neuer just posted up at the mixed zone having a chat with someone in the German media. Security several feet away. Neuer looking relaxed and unbothered. You wouldn't even know he's a WC winner and one of the 3 best GKs in the world. Mueller walks by with no security, all smiles. Even Renato Sanches, despite headphones in still stops to take pictures with fans. Arp(that kid is going to be a favorite of the young ladies) Gnabry, etc. all stop. I got David Alaba to stop for a chat. Only player that didn't stop to chat was Boateng but tbf he did in LA. I figure Saturday he was advised not to talk to media because of the transfer speculation and the word that he was heading back to Munich immediately.(Not sure if that still happened). Back to my original point, the Germans are awesome.
He's essentially all they have behind Auba and Lacazette isn't he? Emery has no choice unless they buy someone else. (Or maybe they have and I've missed it. I don't even know what day it is smh)
Losing track of time could be refreshing sometimes. August 8th would be the end of transfer window for Premier league clubs.
So guess that saga is finally over. Think he's a good talent, but 50mil for a kid with an expring contract and an achilles rupture seemed desperate, kinda glad we can now focus on other targets.
Awesome.Argentinan club football is absolutely nuts atmosphere-wise, best fans in the world. Feel like every aging pro should go to one of those soccer-crazy countries to experience it once. (Best stuff from 4min onwards and 12min mark).
Setting yourself up for some major disappointment, breh. Liverpool and City should still be far ahead and City made good transfers, especially with Rodri as a Busquets-lite for Pep.
Anyone watch this? The quintessential Diego Costa game. Scores some terrific goals and then gets in a fracas and gets a straight red for his sending off. A perfect night for him!
Zidane wanted him gone for a while now and wanted to replace him with Mbappe. Unfortunately, Bale scored that incredible bicycle kick goal in the CL Final and Florentino fell back in love with him. Mbappe ended up going to PSG that summer and Zidane resigned in that same summer. Now Bale is standing in the way of Pogba. I think Madrid needs Bale, especially with Asencio out for the season, but it's obvious that Zidane can't stand Bale. My theory is that Zidane sees him as a player undeserving of his talent. He could be right. Bale hasn't developed at all since at Real Madrid. He hasn't even bothered to learn any Spanish.
