Champions League and Other Stuff

February 21st, 2007 | by: Laurie |

I just read that Patrick Vieira is injured and out for the Inter-Valencia Champions League game today. Too bad. I’ve never seen Inter play and was considering checking this one out. Now that he’s out I’m hyperventilating again at the thought of finding Lyon-Roma somewhere. I really, really want to see this game, but I can’t decide whether or not I want it bad enough to pay UEFA $9.99. If I could even get it to work. My experiences with technology lately do not leave me hopeful.

Speaking of getting video links to work, I finally heard from the French Football Federation today about my problems watching the France Argentine game. They have forwarded my concerns up to tech support, blah blah blah. Sad thing is, I’ll probably believe them and try again next time I’m desperate to watch France play. (What can I say? I’m a sucker for form letters written in French.)

And this is not particularly relevant to the French National Team, but I watched Real Madrid – Bayern Munich yesterday, partly to see the underrated Willy Sagnol and partly to see Beckham (for my LA Galaxy blog.) An incredibly awesome game. Why is it that even teams that aren’t playing well in general come alive for Champions League? It would be fun to flip that same switch for everyday games and see that kind of football all the time.

Sagnol played pretty well, Beckham was awesome. And Oliver Kahn still scares me. (Seriously, having transparent eyebrows should be illegal.) And I decided I seriously dislike Ruud Van Nistelrooy, the diving crybaby. And since I didn’t really care who won and it was fantastic football, the game put me in a cheery mood all day.

And now I really, really want to see Lyon play.

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sandrahn

I am desperate to see the Roma-Lyon game but have no way of seeing it. Incredibly frustrating. No access. And unfortunately Arsenal did NOT show up at yesterday’s match against PSV. They were absolute crap! I was livid. Much as I love Henry, I’m now leaning on the side of those who say he’s got to go. He seemed to be back in form after his rest late last year but now he’s crap all over again. Maybe his cycle with Arsenal has just reached a natural endpoint.

And anyone with good sense loathes RVN! Everyone talks about how unpleasant Henry is (and they’re right) but for my money, RVN wins the award for most irritating, self-serving, obnoxious player on the pitch in the last decade.
http://france.worldcupblog.org Laurie

Oh, Sandra, you missed less than nothing. I couldn’t NOT see it and forked over the $9.99 to UEFA and it was the most depressing, most infuriating, most BORING game I’ve ever seen. Thirty-three fouls in the first half alone, eleven yellow cards in the game, more diving than the summer olympics. Neither team able to keep possession long enough to mount a sustained drive and nearly every drive ending in a whistle. Not surprisingly, a 0-0 draw.

I couldn’t force myself to watch the second half and switched to Inter-Valencia. And the funny part was, the Inter-Valencia announcers kept saying what a bad game we were seeing, and all I could think was how much BETTER it was that the one I’d just come from.

I’m glad I got to see the Madrid-Munich game yesterday — it allowd me to keep some faith in football.
sandrahn

Laurie, I heard about the shocking Roma-Lyon game. Apparently it has the CL record for booked players. I don’t necessarily mind a lot of bookings but if the game is boring too, then forget it.

Now mind you, the ref was a certain Mike Riley who has a MISERABLE reputation in the Prem (he should never ever ever officiate at an Arsenal match again!) – but still from what you and others are saying, most if not all those bookings were merited.

Fascinating CL round this was — the one game I had ZERO interest in watching (Madrid-Bayern) was the most exciting one! Capello’s Madrid and Bayern are not teams I watch out of choice. The great ManU could barely scrape 1 goal against a weak Lille, and only with a free kick (aided by a player who was offside). Chelsea could only muster a draw against Porto, and *LIVERPOOL* beat the champions Barca with 3 open play goals. And Barca were awful! Inter-Valencia was a good game as well. What’s interesting there too is that the powerhouse Inter could only muster a draw against a mixed record Valencia.

Football never ceases to surprise me.