Naldo's not a bad choice on a free and he only got a 2 year contract. Schalke's two best centerbacks are Höwedes and Nastasic. If they can stay fit and rotate with Naldo, they should be fine and won't miss Matip. Matip is good, but in my opinion not irreplaceable. He has become a bit hyped because he was the only centerback at Schalke who was constantly available even though Höwedes and Papa (up till 2014)/Nastasic (since 2014) always looked stronger than him when they were healthy.
Bundesliga 2015/2016
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In the latest episode of the United Hour Podcast, Nik (@Rood) is joined by CEO Duncan Drasdo and Financial Director Andy Green from the Manchester United Supporters Trust for a special episode on all things behind the scenes at Old Trafford including a brief history of MUST and their aims today, views on INEOS and Sir Jim Ratcliffe so far, and the Old Trafford regeneration.
Italian clubs love a loan deal, they do it all the time. Usually with an option to buy the player which means they kinda already own the player, they just delayed the payment for a year or two by loaning him first. Pretty sure Roma will buy Rüdiger for the 9m option they have this summer. There are already rumours that they will sell him on to a different club for a lot more than that and make a nice profit. I wouldn't be surprised if Rüdiger plays in England next season and Roma made significantly more money than Stuttgart.
Good point, could be a decent option in that case. Very risky though as Nastasic has been out basically all season hasn't he?
FYI, clauses that would forbid a player to play against his "real club" in a european competition are illegal.
Yeah, ruptured his achilles tendon in the first game of the season. He's back in training though and should be fit for the next season.
Seems a lot of players in the Italian teams youth structures are loaned in kids from smaller clubs like a trial run to see if they have potential.
@Sly
Maybe you remember that we were trying to get Mané last winter. Sporting blocked the transfer in the end and demanded a much higher fee. It looks like he still hasn't played much of a role in your first team in the last few months, most of the time he's not even on the bench.
Can you maybe give me an explanation what has happened to him, has he just been underwhelming this season?
I was wondering because I would like to see him in Hamburg and I think maybe in the summer we approach you again. A winger will be our number 1 transfer target this window. I guess his value must've decreased further and we could just buy him outright as we do have money to spend now. Or would you say it's not worth targeting him? Thanks
Maybe you remember that we were trying to get Mané last winter. Sporting blocked the transfer in the end and demanded a much higher fee. It looks like he still hasn't played much of a role in your first team in the last few months, most of the time he's not even on the bench.
Can you maybe give me an explanation what has happened to him, has he just been underwhelming this season?
I was wondering because I would like to see him in Hamburg and I think maybe in the summer we approach you again. A winger will be our number 1 transfer target this window. I guess his value must've decreased further and we could just buy him outright as we do have money to spend now. Or would you say it's not worth targeting him? Thanks
@Sly
Maybe you remember that we were trying to get Mané last winter. Sporting blocked the transfer in the end and demanded a much higher fee. It looks like he still hasn't played much of a role in your first team in the last few months, most of the time he's not even on the bench.
Can you maybe give me an explanation what has happened to him, has he just been underwhelming this season?
I was wondering because I would like to see him in Hamburg and I think maybe in the summer we approach you again. A winger will be our number 1 transfer target this window. I guess his value must've decreased further and we could just buy him outright as we do have money to spend now. Or would you say it's not worth targeting him? Thanks
I think our manager doesn't like him. He gave him some chances after the club vetoed his loan transfer, he played decently scored some goals and got some assists but then Jorge Jesus just stopped calling him. He prefers to use Bryan Ruiz, Bruno César, Gelson Martins and Matheus Pereira. I think his time at Sporting is over since we will recall Iuri Medeiros who was in super form this year in his loan and keep betting on young talent like Gelson Martins and Matheus Pereira. Carlos Mané will probably go on loan with option to buy. No rumours about any club at this time though.
Thanks for your insight. Yeah I kind of figured that your manager has a lot of players to chose from. Let's see what happens, but I think we really should be looking at him again. He would be a starter here as we don't have any left sided player as of now so I think it would be a good fit. Unless some English club comes in.
Tonight is the first of the two relegation matches between 16th of the Bundesliga Frankfurt against 3rd of 2nd league Nuremberg.
The captain of Frankfurt was diagnosed a tumor this week after a positive doping test showed high levels of growth hormone HCG. As that can not just be the result of doping but of illness, too, they sent him to the doctor for further examination where the tumor was found. The police was already searching home and hotel room of him because of the doping accusation...
The captain of Frankfurt was diagnosed a tumor this week after a positive doping test showed high levels of growth hormone HCG. As that can not just be the result of doping but of illness, too, they sent him to the doctor for further examination where the tumor was found. The police was already searching home and hotel room of him because of the doping accusation...
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What's impressive about him is that he wants to play tonight. Love that spirit, I hope he can fully recover.
For me the fact that there has been a police search has a negative touch to it now that they found out that it was not doping but illness...
Either the police search happened before they knew the real reason or it was simply miscommunication. I doubt the police searched his home after they knew that the reason for the positive test wasn't doping. If he was guilty of doping, many would praise how quickly the police reacted to make sure that no evidence gets destroyed.
It does raise the question again how much intrusion into their private life athletes have to accept because of doping tests of course. Should police searches only happen after it was definitely confirmed and as long as athletes are only suspected of doping they should be given the benefit of the doubt? Don't think that would work. The police search just looks really bad in this case, but probably is necessary in many similar cases.
In the end the whole thing is positive for Marco Russ because the doping test helped finding the cancer earlier than it would have been found otherwise. It might save his life.
Man, I feel bad for Marco Russ. First the news about his cancer and now he's scored an own goal against Nurnberg in the relegation playoff.
Frankfurt won the 2nd leg 1-0 in Nürnberg and stays in the Bundesliga. It's a shame considering how great a season Nürnberg played in the 2nd Bundesliga.
Anyone else really really hates the relegation playoffs? The idea behind it doesn't make any sense to me. It's no surprise that the Bundesliga teams dominate it quite easily (6 out of 8 stayed in the league). Even after having a bad season and with their confidence fecked, they still have so much more individual quality due to the higher budget, it's not a fair fight. At least not between Bundesliga and 2nd Bundesliga teams. Just scrap it and sent 3 teams down directly every year.
The relegation/promotion system should be about giving smaller clubs a shot in the bigger league as a reward for doing well. Give them at least one year in the Bundesliga with the higher income and the better possibilities to attract players and find out if they deserve to stay up or not. If they can do a better job in the Bundesliga than the 16th placed team did. With the playoffs we now have a system that demands from the 3rd placed 2. Bundesliga team to build a better side than the 16th placed 1. Bundesliga team. That's just stupid considering the disadvantages you have in the 2. Bundesliga.
Anyone else really really hates the relegation playoffs? The idea behind it doesn't make any sense to me. It's no surprise that the Bundesliga teams dominate it quite easily (6 out of 8 stayed in the league). Even after having a bad season and with their confidence fecked, they still have so much more individual quality due to the higher budget, it's not a fair fight. At least not between Bundesliga and 2nd Bundesliga teams. Just scrap it and sent 3 teams down directly every year.
The relegation/promotion system should be about giving smaller clubs a shot in the bigger league as a reward for doing well. Give them at least one year in the Bundesliga with the higher income and the better possibilities to attract players and find out if they deserve to stay up or not. If they can do a better job in the Bundesliga than the 16th placed team did. With the playoffs we now have a system that demands from the 3rd placed 2. Bundesliga team to build a better side than the 16th placed 1. Bundesliga team. That's just stupid considering the disadvantages you have in the 2. Bundesliga.
I don't know, I'm okay with it even though I wanted Frankfurt to go down, would have been too funny if Darmstadt stayed up and Frankfurt went down.
Of course you have a point that it's a bit of an unfair competition but honestly it's not like Frankfurt dominated the two games and quite a few of the Bundesliga relegation candidates just scraped it staying in. I think the sample is still way to low to draw any real conclusion if the quality difference between relegation candidates from the 1. Bundesliga and promotion candidates from the 2. Bundesliga is too big to overcome in general.
Of course you have a point that it's a bit of an unfair competition but honestly it's not like Frankfurt dominated the two games and quite a few of the Bundesliga relegation candidates just scraped it staying in. I think the sample is still way to low to draw any real conclusion if the quality difference between relegation candidates from the 1. Bundesliga and promotion candidates from the 2. Bundesliga is too big to overcome in general.
If the 2. Bundesliga teams win the next 4 in a row, it's still only a 50% quota when it should be 100%.
Why should it be 100%? Almost every competition has a certain range of places where direct qualification for another competition is achieved and some places where you need to go through additional games to qualify. I don't think 3 promotion places should be granted just like that. Hell there are other leagues where only winning the competition will get you promoted so I don't think there is a god given right for those 3 places that need to granted no matter what.
Usually the additional games to qualify are between 'equals' though. Let's look for example at the championship playoffs in England. The top two teams get promoted directly and 3rd to 6th play for the remaining promotion spot in playoffs. Or for example EL/CL qualification between teams that qualified for it in a similar way in their own leagues.
It brings us back to what relegation/promotion is supposed to be. Are we looking for the best 18 teams of 15/16 ? In that case, shouldn't all 3 relegation/promotion places be determined in playoffs because we don't know if Leipzig is more deserving than Stuttgart either. Or are we rewarding the best 3 teams in the lower league by giving them a shot in the higher league and see how they do? I think it should be the latter.
If we don't want to give it to 3 teams, then make it 2 relegation/promotion spots. Either way, reward the performances over a full season, don't turn it into a playoff tie with one team always being the clear underdog, because the other comes out of the higher league and therefore from a massive position of financial strength. That makes no sense, at least it doesn't to me.
I think the promotion playoffs in England are stupid as well by the way, the top 3 should go up, but at least it's teams from the same league fighting for the spot.
If anything yesterday showed that relegation playoffs are a good thing. Nürnberg was absolutely terrible over two legs. @Balu A team that supposedly played a great season as a you say should've easily dealt with Frankurt yesterday. They were in a good position going into this game, got an away goal and played at home in front of their fans.
But straight from the kickoff you could see that they were playing for the 0-0. Did they have a single good opportunity against this fragile Frankfurt side? I don't remember to be honest. Their only goal came from a set-piece, and that was an own goal from Russ. Why did they not at least try to counter attack? Whenever they won the ball there were, at the most, 2 players sprinting forward. Why?
It's not like Eintracht was a tough challenge. They are a very limited team as well. In their "all or nothing" match against Bremen they applied the same tactics as Nürnberg yesterday. And were rightfully punished for that a few weeks ago. Still they 100% outplayed 1. FCN in both legs. Personally I would've liked to see Nürnberg in the Bundesliga again but they fecked it up themselves: First they absolutely bottled it in the League in recent weeks where they gave up a great position, and now in the play off... Idk, that was one of the worst performances I've ever seen (And I've seen a lot), in such an important match! Only got themselves to blame right now.
But straight from the kickoff you could see that they were playing for the 0-0. Did they have a single good opportunity against this fragile Frankfurt side? I don't remember to be honest. Their only goal came from a set-piece, and that was an own goal from Russ. Why did they not at least try to counter attack? Whenever they won the ball there were, at the most, 2 players sprinting forward. Why?
It's not like Eintracht was a tough challenge. They are a very limited team as well. In their "all or nothing" match against Bremen they applied the same tactics as Nürnberg yesterday. And were rightfully punished for that a few weeks ago. Still they 100% outplayed 1. FCN in both legs. Personally I would've liked to see Nürnberg in the Bundesliga again but they fecked it up themselves: First they absolutely bottled it in the League in recent weeks where they gave up a great position, and now in the play off... Idk, that was one of the worst performances I've ever seen (And I've seen a lot
), in such an important match! Only got themselves to blame right now.But that ignores where both teams come from? It shouldn't be necessary for a 2. Bundesliga team with significantly lower ressources (less tv money, less attractive to players because they play in a lower league,less attractive to sponsors and so on) to match a Bundesliga side. They should get the chance to improve their team by playing in the Bundesliga and build a team there that does better than Frankfurt did. If they build an equally bad team, they'll go down again. Nürnberg went into the playoffs as the massive, massive underdog. It's not comparable to the Frankfurt-Bremen match a few weeks ago where both had somewhat equal opportunities to build a team and both had 34 games to collect enough points.
What we have right now is simply a big safety net for the Bundesliga clubs. You have to feck up a full league season badly enough to finish 16th and then feck up a knockout tie against a significantly smaller club to go down. It's stupid.
Oh and I can't stand Nürnberg. Wouldn't mind if they went up, because the games against them are usually great because of the long rivalry between the clubs and the fan groups, but I'm happy enough to see them stay down as well. I just hate the relegation playoffs.
Uneven odds in football are always a thing no matter who plays against whom. If we go by that I want Darmstadt to get 3 points now from the two games against Bayern because it's uneven footing, they don't stand a chance against a team like yours. Sure it's not the same thing but you get what I mean, we always deal with uneven situations in football of bigger teams playing against smaller teams so why should relegation/promotion playoffs be excluded from that? Or how about teams in the EL qualifier, those teams that Dortmund played there also weren't on even footing with them and that goes for almost all PL/LA Liga/Bundesliga/Serie A etc teams playing against teams from small leagues with teams that have a fraction of the budget those teams have.
Wasn't the main reason anyways that usually the team that would come third was in a high likely hood to go down right the next season anyways so they decided to only give two promotion spots and make the third one some kind of bonus promotion place that would only grant promotion if your team proved to be up for the uneven battle?
Whatever the reason for the change may be I don't see it as an unfair system, it's just that essentially there are now only 2 promotion spots from the 2. Bundesliga and one bonus promotion spot. I also have to admit that this was most likely a change to keep the status quo for those teams already established in the Bundesliga by lowering the risk of relegation, which the HSV is still probably really happy about, but there always has to be threshold somewhere. I mean why only grant 3 teams promotion if we want to make the contest a bit more even, let's make it 5 up and 5 down, or how about we switch the lower half of 1. Bundesliga with the upper half of the 2. Bundesliga? The point is that you have to draw a line somewhere and I don't see that there is something special about 3 up and 3 down which would make it the fairest system.
I never said it is. I just said the relegation/promotion playoffs are stupid.
Okay, I think I'm starting to get your point. So you don't feel it's unfair to only have two promotion spots but you would rather that the 2. and 3. placed team of the 2. Bundesliga play against each other for that second promotion spot?
No. Decide how many teams should be promoted/relegated and be done with it after the league is over. If it's true that the 3rd place 2. Bundesliga team rarely stayed up in the Bundesliga, then reduce it to two if you want to change something. That's it. I don't think those two relegation playoff matches between Frankfurt and Nürnberg told us anything about their actual strength, the quality they showed over the full season or how well or badly they would do in the Bundesliga next season.
Why not just be done with relegation battles?
If the 3rd placed team beats the 2nd placed team to get promoted, what'd be the point of the entire season?
Just promote 3 clubs.. or 2 clubs, whatever.
Well I see. I agree that 3rd vs 2nd would be stupid, that's why I was asking, because they basically battled it out over the last 34 games and the second placed team was the better one and deserves the promotion more.
But for the playoff, why not grant that bonus opportunity? I mean it's a compromise between having two or three promotion places. My hometown club Darmstadt for example only secured a promotion to the 2. Bundesliga due this bonus opportunity, so yeah maybe I'm a bit biased here, but it was such a great feeling winning this playoff against all odds, the feeling of prevailing in two all or nothing games, it felt almost like winning a cup. I mean isn't that what football is all about these David vs. Goliath matches? David doesn't win it too often but if they do it feels even more special.
Well, you could turn everything into playoffs and make it a more thrilling competition. Some leagues have playoffs to determine the league winner at the end of the season for example. The winner will tell you that it's great, the losers will tell you that it would have been much more rewarding to get promoted based on what they've done over the full year. The 3. Liga to 2. Bundesliga playoffs are often won by the lower league club and Würzburg are in a great position to do it again tonight. Maybe the gap in quality between the Bundesliga and the 2. Bundesliga is bigger and a different number of teams should get promoted/relegated. Maybe there should be more money coming down from the top to decrease the gap between 1. and 2. Bundesliga. The latter is unlikely to happen considering what's happening in the negotiations for the new tv deals, so it's likely that the relegation playoffs will become even more pointless over the next few years. At one point we'll see a change in the system again, if the outcome is the same every year.
You can't do that with 24 clubs.
I did not really see Frankfurt as massive favorites, opinions were very split on it overall iirc. Didn't see the numbers from the bookies but they ran a poll on Kicker for instance and it ended at around 52% in favor of Frankfurt with more than 30.000 respondants.
So why exactly would I as a Bundesliga watcher want a team with "significantly lower ressources" in the first division? I really don't care about underdogs or anything like that. I want the best teams in Germany playing in the top flight. I get your argument but really aside from it being a cool story it makes for a less attractive League.
And I don't really get your point with the opportunities for clubs in general. That is football today. Is it unfair that Leverkusen receives 20 Million each year from Bayer while Darmstadt is not able to spend more than 2 Million on players? Or that Bayern is so far ahead of everyone else that there is basically no competition for them in Germany?
You could say the same about Nürnberg who received a lot of money for the likes of Drmic and Kiyotake after they got relegated, they certainly had an advantage over most other clubs in the 2nd division... yet they ended up in the lower half of the table while Ingolstadt, SVD and almost Karlsruhe made the step up.
Really in these two games anything is possible, nerves play an important role as well. But Nürnberg bottled it, had no urgency and no desire to win their most important game of the season. As @NoLogo said Darmstadt made it happen 2 years a go.
Maybe a compromise would be to have 20 teams with 3 being relegated as in England.
I don't think you got my point at all. Not sure how I can explain it better .
I don't even want a compromise. I just think the relegation playoffs are stupid. Make it 2 relegation spots, if you want to make sure that more big teams stay up. I don't care. But don't let 2 games decide what should have been decided over a full league season.
.I don't even want a compromise. I just think the relegation playoffs are stupid. Make it 2 relegation spots, if you want to make sure that more big teams stay up. I don't care. But don't let 2 games decide what should have been decided over a full league season.
I don't think you got my point at all. Not sure how I can explain it better
I don't even want a compromise. I just think the relegation playoffs are stupid. Make it 2 relegation spots, if you want to make sure that more big teams stay up. I don't care. But don't let 2 games decide what should have been decided over a full league season.
I know where you're coming from.
However, the playoff system means more tv money to the club's for the two additional games. And since these two games are finals after the end of the season, they should attract a huge audience (I don't have numbers).
Additionally, it increases the probability of highly meaningful games in the later stages of the regular season, since more meaningfully different places are played out. Currently, there is a huge difference between becoming 15th and 16th as well as between 16th and 17th. Without playoffs one of those differences would be meaningless. Since, meaningful games attract more attention this should increase revenue again.
There is even an argument to increase the playoff system further.
What a surprise that the Hamburg fan is defending the system
They should implement the English playoff system. That's fair and attractive at the same time.
They should implement the English playoff system. That's fair and attractive at the same time.
Dortmund have signed 18-year-old winger Emre Mor from Nordsjælland and are interested in Schürrle, according to Bild.
Just saw that Hoffenheim has sold Volland too. They're going down next season, aren't they? Too bad really, they had a good side just a season ago.
Also, really looking forward to seeing Freiburg back in the bundesliga for next season. They have great home fans. I wonder what reaction RB Leipzig will get in their first season up, I know a lot of German fans dislike their owner status.
Also, really looking forward to seeing Freiburg back in the bundesliga for next season. They have great home fans. I wonder what reaction RB Leipzig will get in their first season up, I know a lot of German fans dislike their owner status.
What a surprise that the Hamburg fan is defending the system
They should implement the English playoff system. That's fair and attractive at the same time.
Really it has nothing to do with the fact that HSV benefited from the system.
Also as evidenced in the last few seasons more than half of the clubs are battling relegation in the League. Most of the teams down there play on a very similar level, last year we only played the relegation playoff because we had a worse goal difference than Hertha. I think it can be very harsh to cut 1/6 of the teams in the League each year... As I said the implementation of the system doesn't make sense with only 18 teams anyway.
Why would they get relegated? They played a really solid rest of the season under Nagelsmann. I don't think that they will keep up that level but there's no way they will go down with their squad and the money they have available to spend. Just permanently signed Kramaric too now.
Darmstadt is 100% going down and then there's other teams like Bremen, Frankfurt, Berlin, Ingolstadt and Augsburg who will struggle. Hamburg and Cologne were also just lurking above the relegation zone all season, though I don't expect them to finish below 12th. Mainz has a lot of rebuilding to do also, but they always manage to do well.
Might've been a slight overreaction because I just saw that they had sold Volland. I really hoped they could hold on to him. Was frustrated. Regardless of their march/april form though, they had a terrible season and they started losing again towards the end. I hope you're right that they'll have a better season next year, they have a lot of exciting players like Schär, Süle, Rudy etc.
I can see Darmstadt going down. I was about to write that Ingolstadt would be okay, but I just saw they lost both Da Costa and Hübner, so I guess it would depend on whether or not their defence will be as good. Also I think Freiburg will struggle just as much as Frankfurt, Darmstadt and Ingolstadt will. They always join the relegation battle whenever they are up. Not sure about RB Leipzig. I've watched some 2. bundesliga this season because I like Freiburg a little, and none of the promoted sides have looke that convincing, but Leipzig should probably have the backing to pick up some decent signings.
Both rumours have already been denied by officials (Mor's agent and Allofs, I believe).
But it was really time for Volland to move on and go the next step - and play international club football. If he wants to have the chance to play in the German national team he has to.