World Football Thread XIX: Capello to the Rescue!

[Maquiladora]

Drunki refi

[Cort Haus]

"Andrei was delighted to pay back the manager who gave him his shot at the big time"

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Krill
Drunk, stoned, or thrown his back?

Stoned people do not generally do that.

[Krill]

I missed the "and/" from teh and/or in that sentance.

[Locutus]

Aw, f*cking hell...

Arsenal face McClaren's FC Twente
Steve McClaren and Arsene Wenger
McClaren will return to England to do battle with Wenger

Arsenal were handed an intriguing tie against former England boss Steve McClaren's FC Twente in the Champions League third qualifying round.

McClaren was appointed by the Dutch side in June this year, taking his first job since he was sacked by England in November 2007.

Liverpool have been drawn against Belgium's Standard Liege.

And Rangers will play the winner of the second-round match between Aalborg and Modrica if they can overcome Kaunas.

Rangers drew 0-0 at Ibrox in the first leg of their second round qualifier against the Lithuanian side on Wednesday and will play the return leg next week.

McClaren has pitted his wits against Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger before, when he was in charge of Middlesbrough.


606: DEBATE
So McClaren against Wenger, what a battle!

Davgroos
But it is unlikely he will relish returning to England for a match that Arsenal will be strong favourites to win.

"I think of all the teams we could have had, that is the toughest - or one of the toughest.

"I expected one of the English teams - fate deals you certain cards and it has dealt us this card. On one hand it is very, very tough - we know that - but on the other very exciting," he told Sky Sports.

McClaren may not be the only coach returning to his native country as former Arsenal boss Bruce Rioch could be taking Danish champions Aalborg to Rangers.

Former Scotland captain Rioch's side have a 5-0 first-leg lead over Modrica so should make it through to the third qualifying round.

Liverpool, who were beaten by Chelsea in the semi-finals last year, will fancy their chances of getting past Standard Liege.

The Reds will play their first leg away from home - as will Arsenal and Rangers, too, provided the Glasgow side make it through.

Elsewhere in the draw, highly-fancied Barcelona will play either Beitar Jerusalem or Wisla Krakow and Italian giants Juventus face Tampere United or Artmedia Bratislava.

UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
Third qualifying round draw:

Anorthosis/Rapid Vienna v Olympiakos
Vitoria Guimaraes v IFK Gothenburg/Basel
Shakhtar Donetsk v Domzale/Dinamo Zagreb
Schalke 04 v Atletico Madrid
Aalborg/Modrica v RANGERS/Kaunas
Barcelona v Beitar Jerusalem/Wisla Krakow
Levski Sofia v Anderlecht/BATE
Standard Liege v LIVERPOOL
Inter Baku/Partizan v Fenerbahce/MTK Budapest
FC Twente v ARSENAL
Spartak Moscow v Drogheda/Dinamo Kiev
Juventus v Tampere/Artmedia
SK Brann/Ventspils v Marseille
Fiorentina v Slavia Prague
Galatasaray v Steaua Bucharest
Panathinaikos/Dinamo Tbilisi v Sheriff Tiraspol/Sparta Prague

[Maquiladora]

Originally posted by Locutus
Aw, f*cking hell...

How is old red nose doing so far?

[Maquiladora]

BTW for anyone that cares, the Fantasy Premier League has started again. I don't know the code to join the Apolyton league though, I was automatically rejoined.

http://fantasy.premierleague.com/

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Locutus
Aw, f*cking hell...

That'll be interesting....

[Cort Haus]

Originally posted by Maquiladora
How is old red nose doing so far?

Still in charge of Man U, last time I looked.

[Maquiladora]

Originally posted by Cort Haus

Still in charge of Man U, last time I looked.

I should have said the wally with the brolly.

[Locutus]

Originally posted by Maquiladora
How is old red nose doing so far?

Well, as we haven't played any real games yet it's kinda early to tell. Until this weekend Twente had won all its games (Saturday we had a goalless draw against Arminia Bielefeld), but as they were all friendlies that hardly counts for much. McClaren's first test will be the games against Arsenal, which are of course win-win for him: if we lose that's only to be expected, but if we somehow beat them he's an instant legend.

Off the pitch his presence has already helped quite a bit though: 3 players whose contract was about to expire signed an extension within a week of his appointment, and since then we (so far) haven't lost anyone to bigger clubs despite a lot of interest in all our star players (we saw 2 key players leave for Schalke and Feyenoord respectively in the two months before McClaren's appointment). We even picked up an additional defender (Rajkovic, on loan from Chelsea). I don't know that you can credit McClaren with all of that, but I am sure that his presence had some impact on this, and for a club like Twente these things are massive: one great season usually means losing all your best players to bigger clubs, leaving you to have to rebuild from scratch the next year. This is a big part of why we went after a high-profile guy like McClaren, who can make a difference in this area.

[*End Is Forever*]

Originally posted by Maquiladora
BTW for anyone that cares, the Fantasy Premier League has started again. I don't know the code to join the Apolyton league though, I was automatically rejoined.

http://fantasy.premierleague.com/

I did start a thread, you just weren't paying attention...

[Tuberski]

MORONS!!!!!

ACK!

[Cort Haus]

Locutus, I have my ticket for the Arsenal v Twente game. Are you going to either of the games?

[Maquiladora]

Originally posted by *End Is Forever*

I did start a thread, you just weren't paying attention...

Oh yeah, sorry It's hard to notice among all those silly US sport's threads.