• Moderators, please send me a PM if you are unable to access mod permissions. Thanks, Habsy.

2024-2025 Cup thread (Carabao, F.A.)

Liverpool played just enough of veterans that they should have won, but they played like crap and Preston wanted it more. Getting a weekend off late in the season when they are playing for the Premiership and Championship titles should be important. Everton, midweek, should be facing a MUCH stronger and focused squad.

As someone who despises Arsenal, and what the likes of Man City & Chelsea have turned football into….even when you beat us in a Champions League final or boot the fukk out of us in Carabao, you guys still land in my good graces for building a team the right way, playing beautiful football, and taking down the evil empires of the Prem for us, 😆

First real bump in Slott’s first season, curious to see how he responds.

Remarkable what Klopp left Slott with, and how perfectly he’s stepped in and taken the helm….continues to be some of the best looking football in the world too.

Will be fascinating watching how Slott progresses down the road if/when he loses a Salah or Trent, and able to successfully usher in the next era of Liverpool football, as well. So far it sure looks like he’ll be more than capable of doing so.
 
The issue with VAR is they let the refs run it completely and they never wanted it in the first place. It's like when the police investigate themselves and always seem to find they did nothing wrong. The reason that video replay, while it has faults, is more positive than negative in American sports is because it's run by the leagues. The people running it have to have the best interest of the league in mind, not the other refs.

While I agree completely with the above statement, the #1 issue with VAR imo, just comes down to the fact it’s most often used to negate perfectly good goals that no football fan around the planet would ever have an issue with being counted (that doesn’t have a bias in the goal), except it’s off by a knuckle so it gets wiped out.

Sport benefits from more goals and more quality goals being counted…..need to adjust the rule so that it’s offside if there is space between the forward & defender….otherwise can’t be overturned by VAR.

The offside rule was never put in place to nullify the kinda of spectacular quality goals we’ve seen wiped off the board by the hundreds, since VAR was introduced…..it completely ruins the spirit of the original rule & the sport itself.

Maybe the ideal of a space between forward & defender for it being offside would be a step too far…..but maybe it also wipes out the defensive gimmick of offside traps etc, which also kinda aren’t the spirit of the original game.

All people should care about is drastically unfair offsides that are borderline cherry picking….nitpicking how much someone was leaning when they took off for a through ball, is trash.


…..also I’d wipe out offside completely once your reach the box. If a forward gets behind you there, that’s on the defense.

/rant
 
For a match with zero CBs on the field, 2-1 is a pretty low scoreline. Exciting match and all the available new Villans looked pretty damn good out there. Malen did a valiant job running everywhere for an hour. Our new RB looked solid. Rashford was playing in a way that said, maybe United is the problem. Asensio is my new love interest. My goodness is he spectacular. His ability on the ball and vision is unreal.
 
Asensio playing at the same time as Rogers and Ramsey was ... oof. Delicious. Three guys who can turn a defender on a dime is fun to watch.
 
While I agree completely with the above statement, the #1 issue with VAR imo, just comes down to the fact it’s most often used to negate perfectly good goals that no football fan around the planet would ever have an issue with being counted (that doesn’t have a bias in the goal), except it’s off by a knuckle so it gets wiped out.

Sport benefits from more goals and more quality goals being counted…..need to adjust the rule so that it’s offside if there is space between the forward & defender….otherwise can’t be overturned by VAR.

The offside rule was never put in place to nullify the kinda of spectacular quality goals we’ve seen wiped off the board by the hundreds, since VAR was introduced…..it completely ruins the spirit of the original rule & the sport itself.

Maybe the ideal of a space between forward & defender for it being offside would be a step too far…..but maybe it also wipes out the defensive gimmick of offside traps etc, which also kinda aren’t the spirit of the original game.

All people should care about is drastically unfair offsides that are borderline cherry picking….nitpicking how much someone was leaning when they took off for a through ball, is trash.


…..also I’d wipe out offside completely once your reach the box. If a forward gets behind you there, that’s on the defense.

/rant

So I'm completely against the daylight rule as I feel like that would ruin the sport. You could not play a high line if they changed the offside rule to that degree. I do completely agree that it's an issue with trying to subjectively determine offside to the degree they do. I'm fine if they switch to semi-automated offside. Even if things end up getting called to a minutia, it's quick fair and unbiased. My issue is when they sit there for five minutes trying to draw two lines that are basically on top of each other and then act like it's definitive. They're limited by both technology and human error that gives a degree of error that is often much higher than the margins they are trying to determine. Either we use semi-automated technology or we set a time limit on determining offside. If you can't make a definitive call within 45 seconds let's say, the call on the field stands. Blatant offside violations like Maguire's game winner would be easily overturned almost immediately and things where there might be a toe two inches offside would be allowed to stay. In the end, that's all people want. The absolute egregious errors fixed and if it's super close, we can leave it to the call on the field.
 
So I'm completely against the daylight rule as I feel like that would ruin the sport. You could not play a high line if they changed the offside rule to that degree.

I agree with the inability to play a high line to the degree we see today, but I also think it would open up offenses so much you’d have less need for playing systemically like that….and again, part of it’s purpose is to trap forwards, which is just a gimmick to kinda manipulate the offside rule in your favor. I’d rather see more quality goals scored than defenses successfully having a goal nullified because they trapped a forward for instance.

That said, I do basically agree that I wouldn’t want to see such a rule just applied at the top levels without it spending years with it implemented at lower levels to learn what impact it would have on the game, what new ways teams might exploit it etc, and what its big picture impact was on the game.


…and honestly anything they agreed on inbetween the two extremes that was plausibly implementable, I’m all for.
I do completely agree that it's an issue with trying to subjectively determine offside to the degree they do. I'm fine if they switch to semi-automated offside. Even if things end up getting called to a minutia, it's quick fair and unbiased.

100%

One issue is too many quality goals being wiped off the board, but even if worse is goals being scored that even end up standing, but fans aren’t able to fully lose it and enjoy the goal. Cause they know it might come back after VAR checks it out and a ref goes to the monitor etc….you just can’t have that huge extended wait to learn if it’s good or not, especially SO often.

Get it automated, and have it almost be light the goal lamp in hockey, so fans know almost instantly it’s offside. (Possibly before a shot is even taken)


My issue is when they sit there for five minutes trying to draw two lines that are basically on top of each other and then act like it's definitive. They're limited by both technology and human error that gives a degree of error that is often much higher than the margins they are trying to determine.

10000%

Either we use semi-automated technology or we set a time limit on determining offside. If you can't make a definitive call within 45 seconds let's say, the call on the field stands. Blatant offside violations like Maguire's game winner would be easily overturned almost immediately and things where there might be a toe two inches offside would be allowed to stay. In the end, that's all people want. The absolute egregious errors fixed and if it's super close, we can leave it to the call on the field.

Yeah we want as many high quality goes to be allowed as possible, we want to know quickly whether it’s good or not…..and then last of all, yes we do still want a VAR type system to overrule egregious errors on the field.

And yeah, any super close offsides they technically “miss”…..like cmon, it’s almost never an amount that decided whether it would have been a goal or not. There’s SO many great goals taken away now genuinely have absolutely nothing to do with them having been off by a bit, and would have been scored regardless of whether they’d been in side by an entire foot.

Ultimately it’s just a shame because the game is so beautiful because goals are so hard to come by, and it’s such a rush when you do score one….and the current implementation kills that enthusiasm because you may have to wait so long for it to be official, or a perfectly good one gets nixed because of a fingernail being offside.
 
FA Cup final four ... Man City, Villa, Nottingham Forest, Crystal Palace

The draw has City playing Forest and Villa playing Palace. I'm SURE there was no ping pong ball weighting involved, but somehow they kept the possibility of the two biggest fan bases meeting in the Final. Weird, right?
 
The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. I have a hard time forcing myself to leave my bed every morning instead of just cuddling with my dog all day. Villa looks like shit and can't figure out how to play against Palace. Some things in life are just a given.
 
I ran into couple of guys wearing Villa shirts at Brewgaloo (a beer festival in Raleigh) on Saturday. I shouted “up the Villa” but didn’t get a response. There were also a few in Crystal Palace shirts, they responded when I shouted “up the Palace”.
 
Weird ... Villa getting popular enough to have a bandwagon :0)
Because I can assure you from 30+ years of supporting them in the States, there ain't many of us
 
You, VDC and Tom Hanks, right?
And my son ... and the 200 or so members of the North American Lions we met in Orlando at Summer Series in 2024. And the one guy who used to sit ten rows or so behind us at Canes games who busted out a Dion Dublin shirt on the weekends during the season back in the 00s. I almost forgot about that guy.
 
One of my neighbors I ran into at the hardware store was wearing a Villa kit and I talked to him about them for a bit. I also ran into a Villa fan at a AEW event at the Boston Garden. That's pretty much all I've ever come across.
 
One of my neighbors I ran into at the hardware store was wearing a Villa kit and I talked to him about them for a bit. I also ran into a Villa fan at a AEW event at the Boston Garden. That's pretty much all I've ever come across.
If they come back for another Summer Series and play in the Northeast, you should absolutely get there if you can. We had an absolute blast with the American Villans and the traveling support. Well worth drive.
 
I think I legitimately thought about it last summer since there were plenty of tickets available in New York I believe, because it was a rainy Wednesday. This is also why I didn't do it cause I didn't feel like traveling four hours to NYC on a rainy Wednesday.
 
Crystal Palace makes a 16th minute goal by Eze stand up and wins the FA Cup 1-0 over Man City and punch their ticket to Europe. It’s Palace’s first major trophy. Dean Henderson had 6 saves in a MOM performance, including saving a 36th minute penalty and the followup header from Haaland.
 
Back
Top