General Football 23/24

[Shaggy]

Oh dear

One incident is said to have taken place at an adventure activity complex, Go Ape, in Newcastle Upon Tyne.

Watching two African players struggling with a climbing frame, Beardsley allegedly quipped: “Why are you taking so long? Your lot should be good at this.”

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/what-peter-beardsley-said-racism-11820038.amp?6=&__twitter_impression=true

[Buzzo]

****ing hell.

Amazing he’s not been outed before with that level of bantz.

[ChesterDave]

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/footba...mpression=true

African players have also given statements suggesting Beardsley regularly accused them of being they are older than they purported to be.

How the **** can journos come up with this ****ing bollocks? Can they not see the massive ****ing red squiggles under their nonsensical arsegravy?

[ChesterDave]

Oh, and it is staggering Newcastle are allowing him to take a training session featuring his accusers while the investigation is ongoing. What a slap in the face for them

[danperkins]

This. It's only really this last year that prices have gone crazy, but they have routinely been buying batches of players for £35m+ each, before we signed VVD they had almost a team of players who cost the about the same or more than our record signing. If you have £30-40m to spend per position on the pitch over the past couple of years that buys you a bloody good team. Particularly with the wages that they are prepared to pay. Admittedly you have to get the right players, but knowing you can afford to spend another £30m if the player you buy doesn't work out must make it a little easier

[danperkins]

Who is better currently then? Klopp aside for obvious reasons of bias from everyone?

Pep sets his teams out really well, no obvious focus on a single player, really attractive fun football.

I cant see many others in the world better than him, and using his owners bank balance to discredit that is doing him a massive disservice.

All top level managers have gross amounts of cash at their disposal. Its obvious that not all know how to spend it well.

I understand what you are saying and I am not denying he is a fantastic manager & City are great to watch but it's not exactly the hardest task for a quality manager to come into an already great side, previous pumped with big money signings & then literally have a blank cheque to sign whomever & pay whatever wages.... chances are it's going to go your way at some point. Obviously you have to get these players playing a certain way like he did with Barcelona. But then again he did inherit arguably the greatest team ever assembled from Rijkaard who transformed Barca and had won champs league and back to back titles before Pepe took charge... not bad inheriting a squad with Messi, Deco, Samuel Eto'o, Giuly, Marquez, Henry, Xavi, Puyol & Iniesta to name a few. I always think people forget what Frank Rikjaard did for Barcelona. As regards Bayern, they've won the league 18 times in the last 20 odd years so refuse to read into that.

It sounds like i'm giving Pep a hard time with my initial comment so scratch that he is a class manager. I just feel then when hundreds of millions is spent on a team every season over a long period of time... it will come together at some point. I said this when he initially took over that I would have loved for him do something a bit less obvious. To me it was like, oh Guardiola is gone to City what a surprise. But he will win the league this season and deservedly so.

[baitman]

Just following on from the pep/city/money saga (but without multi quotes as on phone)...

Not many great managers will stay at a smaller club with little money to spend but still try and make things work.

Rafa at Newcastle. Anyone else?

[dom9]

Not many managers get the choice. They're usually fired.

[Alex]

But he improves players. In measurable ways too. Look at Sterling this season. Look at what he got out of Lahm at Bayern when he converted him. Or him managing to get a tune out of Stones and turning him into a pretty decent ball playing CB.

My point is its easy to dismiss him by saying MONEY. He still is getting a much higher performance level out of a City team that Pelligrini and Mancini couldn't do.

Id argue that he also built his Barca team without buying the worlds best players every year. His most expensive player was probably his biggest flop infact.

https://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/pep-guardiola/spielertransfers/trainer/5672/plus/0?station_id=28649

[gratziani]

Pep deffo has the luxury of buying who he wants, but also seems to work with what he has to improve the playing side.

Putting Delph at left back when they lost Mendy was a great move, and playing Silva KDB and Fernandinho as the midfield three looks like what he had at Barca.

He does seem to leave a club in a good place as well when he moves on.

[Shaggy]

[ame]https://twitter.com/NUFC/status/950759088333492224[/ame]

[Alex]

What's with the finger point emoji

[ChesterDave]

Is he really improving Sterling though or is it similar to his time alongside Suarez when he looked great

[Deano]

Back home again in March and friend has just booked Rangers vs Celtic in corporate hospitably - Thinking id be rather amongst it but **** me I'm looking forward to it

[Fernandinho]

I understand what you are saying and I am not denying he is a fantastic manager & City are great to watch but it's not exactly the hardest task for a quality manager to come into an already great side, previous pumped with big money signings & then literally have a blank cheque to sign whomever & pay whatever wages.... chances are it's going to go your way at some point. Obviously you have to get these players playing a certain way like he did with Barcelona. But then again he did inherit arguably the greatest team ever assembled from Rijkaard who transformed Barca and had won champs league and back to back titles before Pepe took charge... not bad inheriting a squad with Messi, Deco, Samuel Eto'o, Giuly, Marquez, Henry, Xavi, Puyol & Iniesta to name a few. I always think people forget what Frank Rikjaard did for Barcelona. As regards Bayern, they've won the league 18 times in the last 20 odd years so refuse to read into that.

It sounds like i'm giving Pep a hard time with my initial comment so scratch that he is a class manager. I just feel then when hundreds of millions is spent on a team every season over a long period of time... it will come together at some point. I said this when he initially took over that I would have loved for him do something a bit less obvious. To me it was like, oh Guardiola is gone to City what a surprise. But he will win the league this season and deservedly so.

Real Madrid had won the league twice in a row before Pep took over and they hadn't won the Champions League the previous two seasons either. By all accounts they were in a bit of disarray as a club (by their standards), and he had to move on a lot of players including Zambrotta, Thuram, Ronaldinho and Deco who were past it.

The squad was declining under Rijkaard, so while he had done a great job winning the CL in 2006 and the league wins during that period, the generation of players who won those titles needed to be moved on. It was Pep who really brought them right back to the top of world football.

Obviously he has had the opportunity of spending millions everywhere he has been, and no doubt that it had made his life easier. But, as Madrid showed us with their Cristiano Ronaldo generation of Galacticos and Manchester United have seen recently, it isn't as easy as just buying the most expensive players available.