Bring back the (erstwhile) European Cup

Real Madrid (as champs), Arsenal, Juventus, Valencia, Ajax, Dortmund, Liberec, Partizan.

Not bad, I think ?

Lest we forget, Manyoo came third in England and Real third in Spain, and Milan fourth in Italy, 16 points behind the champions Juve !

I didn't think the Man U game was the best ever, I can't think of many more skillful performances than Real Madrid's though, perhaps I don't watch them enough but it was captivating.

perhaps think we will all be happier when they do get a "proper" European league off the ground - the "big" teams can all fcuk off and join it and not have to worry about qualification / relegation at all, whereas at the moment what we have is a rather too obvious halfway house by which UEFA temporarily bought off the G14.

But that's the same anywhere. Old Trafford might be full for the likes of Bayer Leverkusen or Basel, but it will never mean as much as playing Liverpool or city, or even Chelsea or West Ham.

From a sporting point of view Darren's mostly right - it was a purer competition in the old days. (Not always as interesting to watch, or as competitive for the bigger teams, but that's not the point.) There's no way it'll ever go back to that, though. Hopefully there'll be less pointless games next year when they do away with the second group stage.

With the notable exception of Rangers, I would much prefer to see Celtic playing anyone outside of Scotland, but on merit not on pulling power. Our domestic league sucks big-style up here, and until there is some decent competition, then it will be a two-horse race with one or other or both of the Old Firm qualifying for the Champions League, then failing dismally at it (Celtic are only in the UEFA Cup by defaulting down to it after a miserable qualifier again Basle).

BTW, does anyone else think that that shouldn't happen? You qualify for the Champions League, you fail to get anywhere, cheerio, thanks for trying, see you next year. Or is it right to say sorry it's too tough for you, here's an easier tournament to have a go at?

I've got nothing against Celtic, ailsa, but I find that hard to believe. Are 90,000 Barcelona supporters really going to turn out to see you in a Champions League group game? (Good luck in the UEFA Cup Final, though.)

Maybe if we get any good then this can be put to the test.

Though, Jackie played well today snuffing Lovenkrands out, in the 4-4-2. 3-5-2 could be suicide against Porto.)

Ha (revive this on 22nd May and laugh at me!)

The ref. will invariably think 'big strikers = dirty strikers'.

*crosses fingers*

I liked the Cup Winners Cup ded lots. It was 'pure' - cup winners, playing to win a cup. Lovely. And because the FA Cup is a bigger competition here, we (English teams) had a cracking record in it as our Cup winners tended to be on the whole 'better' teams than the winners of other country's cup competitions.

Champions League is a major problem - affects the whole of UK football - we need redistributive mechanisms in the UK game - ie, the premiershite needs to give the lower leagues more, but their retort is that they need the money to keep up in Europe - unless things get better there, then it bodes ill. See thread on UEFA licensing to continue that aspect.

Nice to see Celtic win today yes, Amoruso is some chump.

Cozen, interesting that you should suggest "Who are you, Jean-Pierre Papin?", as friends have commented more than a few times on my own startling resemblance to said former Marseille and Milan frontman.

Ronan and Dave - to my mind, the CWC was always the 'second' competition when I was growing up, but in reality it was much as you said - a lot of countries just don't take their cups very seriously, and towards the end there were a lot of beaten finalists or second divisioners taking part. The fact that the likes of Vicenza and Mallorca reached the semis in its dying years says a lot. Nonetheless, I liked it, and being a Spurs fan it was a source of regular European runs when I were a lad.

Martin - I do agree with your point about the collapse of the Eastern Bloc leading to a natural haemorraging of talent to the west and the fall of the 'Dinamo' clubs (the professionals of Kyiv excepted), but I think it's clear that UEFA has long had an agenda to make sure that those pesky non-TV audience-inducing nations fall as early as possible. Why else would they make them all play each other in the early stages for the privilege of, at best a two-leg play-off against a monolith that they have no real chance against (ZTE v Man U, for example), and at worst the same but against the likes of Parma, Newcastle etc who aren't good enough to challenge for their own league.

Martin - the seeding became a problem when it was used to decide who got the biggest number of teams in the Runner-Up Cup and who got straight into the first stages, and who had to play Barry Town each year. This was less an issue in the olden days when it was a knockout, as it was an easier competition to win in some respects (fewer games, lady luck's mercurial magic thus having greater impact). The competition favours teams with larger resources which means getting the seeding raised is a mighty task indeed; it becomes self-reinforcing. UEFA knew exactly that this would happen, as it was supposed to do this - remember, the reason for the expansion of the tournament was because AC Milan (AKA Berlusconi) got pissed off that his team were shite in the mid-late 90s and didn't get to the party and so wanted a competition that would have fewer trips to godforsaken parts of Eastern Europe, less unpredictable knockout stages and more big clubs with big players and big stadiums and doubtless Anthiny Hopkins on standby to do the intros. They got the 'Media Partners' front organisation to threaten a breakaway on these terms, and UEFA caved in, fearful of their golden-egg laying goose being slain. The raison d'etre is the marginalisation of the Eastern bloc and smaller countries and the maximisation of revenue from the 'big four' and the seeding co-efficient is the spurious rational mechanism that makes this so - compare the size of the respective countries TV deals and the operation of the co-efficient.

im surprised the manager of red stars 91 team never moved to western europe

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ljupko_Petrovi%C4%87

he looks like hank hills dad