You say Internazionale, I say Internacional -- it's still the 2011 World Club Cup, who really cares?

This is exactly the type of tournament that belongs in a super rich desert oil state.

Tout Puissant Mazembe Englebert ftw

Go go Petroleum Resources Kutubu Hekari United Football Club

This is exactly the type of tournament that belongs in a super rich desert oil state.

― fwiw: lol iirc sb'd u tbqh (dan m), Tuesday, 7 December 2010 15:34 (2 hours ago)

yeah

they take it more srsly in south america, as you'd imagine

Am I the only person who thinks this could actually be pretty good if they did it properly? Sixteen clubs, forget geographic diversity, knock-out only over a week, bugger-all recovery time between games, hold it in a proper city every two years = frenzy of football imo.

Sixteen clubs, forget geographic diversity = cl second round + boca juniors

I admit to being slightly interested in the performances of American int'ls Herc Gomez and Jose Torres w/ Pachuca, esp if Torres can play himself into some kind of European move.

btw boca has been lousy the past couple yrs

Sixteen clubs, forget geographic diversity = cl second round + boca juniors

sorry, is this meant to be a disadvantage? Anyway, the South Americans taking it seriously would level things up

8 europeans, 5 south americans, 1 each from africa, north america and asia + oceania, something like that

keep geographic diversity - europa league champions should be involved too tho and other continental equivs

FT Al Wahda 3 - 0 Hekari United

Oh has this started? I had no idea. Is any of it on telly?

Fox Soccer Channel in USA

Listings for Sky in the UK say no matches until the 14th i.e. Inter & Inter enter

prob gonna check out a stream of Pachuca v Mazembe tomorrow

IMO the Pachuca of a year ago, when they won CONCACAF, could have won this tournament. They were that good and with Inter Milan playing as lousy as they are now, you never know. Now though, not so much.

I've a feeling rafa has structured the whole season around this tournament

very clever of him

I miss the tradition of this tournament being held in Japan - there's only one place where the final belongs and its in Yokohama. And the best player on the pitch wins a shiny new Toyota Celica.

Anyway, a bit disappointed by the Hekari United tilt tbqh.

Mazembe's gk has a topknot apparently? Just found a stream of this.

the mazembe horns, they're hypnotic

TP Mazembe Englebert TP Mazembe Englebert TP Mazembe Englebert TP Mazembe Englebert TP Mazembe Englebert TP Mazembe Englebert TP Mazembe Englebert TP Mazembe Englebert holding internacional 0-0 at the half

Holy shit they won 2-0?

To immortalize their first league title, the leaders decided then to add the qualifier of "Tout Puissant" (all powerful) to ENGLEBERT.

Internacional had almost twice as many shots as Mazembe and 56% pos - ruff!

Great stuff! Final should be fun - meaningless game, unglamorous opposition, remote venue, middle of winter - really not the sort of scenario benitez excels in.

Man I am going to be rooting for Mazembe so hard.

I fear that joyless Inter will make it cruel viewing

'care' might be strong, but i'm curious to see monterrey against a korean team.
it's on tonight for me (11 pm pst), middle of the night or tomorrow morning for all y'all

They had no trouble with the Asian champions, now it's Chelsea. Chupete Suazo is out, too: http://www.goal.com/en-us/news/114/mexico/2012/12/10/3593081/humberto-suazo-to-miss-the-remainder-of-the-club-world-cup?source=breakingnews. Still interested enough that I might try to catch this.

Fuck, have the day off work and completely forgot about this and watched last night's Celtics/Mavs game instead which went into double OT and my recording cut off before the end anyway!!

Apparently Luiz was playing in midfield, as in he was selected there, not just ending up there just cos.

yeah i hope rafa keeps him there for a while

mikel is alright but i don't rate ramires that highly in deep midfield, when i heard luiz was cm i assumed ramires would play in his old benfica/brazil right side carrilero role

but he is on the bench....

still think rafa will want at least one defensive winger

According to a guy in work the winners of the tournament get to have a special wee badge on their shirts for ever, so I really hope we win it now

Luiz>>

Was sort of pleased for the Corinthians fans, it seemed really important to them. Most Chelsea fans couldn't give a monkey's

David Luiz's positional sense isn't good enough to be a proper DM but if they want someone to rampage around a bit he should be okay in that role.