For the most part, soccer bores me. I respect the skill, love the passion of the fans and will say that a Juventus/Lazio game I saw in Rome in the late 90's was one of the most memorable sporting events of my life (behind 2006 Rose Bowl. Hook em'). Here are some questions that I'll ask for casual soccer "fans".
1. Man U and Chelsea are playing for the Championship? Isn't this like the Red Sox and Yankees playing for the World Series? Shouldn't those teams be on opposite sides of the bracket?
2. I'm reading articles about how Chelsea might have more to play for since Man U just won the Premier League. How unstable is this? Two championships decided within a couple of weeks? Which is more prestigious? Does the Premier League qualify you for the Champions League? And if so, are they qualified for next years Premier League even though this years hasn't finished? Has next years started already? Is the Champions league the same as the UEFA Cup? And then there's the Euro 2008 which I understand is for countries, like the World Cup, but also isn't the Olympics this year. And players miss games for the league they are paid to play in to play for their country in other games? Isn't there just too much to keep track of?
3. Let me get this straight...the quarter-finals and semi-finals of the Premier League have 2 games series, but the championship is only 1 game. Does this make sense? No. In theory, series are played to find the best team over time and lessen the chance for an inferior team to win. Why do that in the previous rounds, but not in the championship.
Normally I would be planning on watching today's event because I like drinking, especially on weekday afternoons, but I've been invited to play golf and I'd much rather do that. Go Pele!
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8 comments:
All valid questions. Here are my not so valid answers.
1 - Dont know the answer to this question.
2 - Soccer leagues and championships are KINDA like golf, kinda. Just like you have the Fed-Ex Cup, Ryder Cup, Majors, Invitationals, Money list, and "Regular tournaments", you have Champions League, Premier League, Euro Cup, and UEFA Cup. The Premier League is the regular season and there is no playoffs. The winner of the regular season wins the League. The Champions League is like a golf invitational. The top 4 teams in each top league in Europe qualifies for the Champions League. The UEFA Cup is like the US Open. Any team in England can apply to play. If FC Batface wanted to take part in the UEFA Cup, good luck. Euro Cup is just like the Ryder Cup and is played every 4 years. Hope some of that is true and somewhat helpful.
3 - No clue
You could just put on your iPod earphones and ignore the whole thing.
Correction. The UEFA Cup is NOT like the US Open. Its something different. I think.
Despite a skullcrushing hangover from a 17 hour bender surrounding the game, I'll try to answer in 3 parts.
1. Man U and Chelsea are playing for the Championship? Isn't this like the Red Sox and Yankees playing for the World Series? Shouldn't those teams be on opposite sides of the bracket?
The European Champions league is a tournament run during the regular seasons of each league in most European countries. The teams that qualify (more on that later) are thrown into a hat and randomly assigned to one of 8 groups. There are rules to prevent teams from the same country from being in the same groups. After a round robin in the groups, the top two from each move forward. At that point, the winner of one group will play the 2nd place in another group in a 2 game (home and away) series. These matchups are again drawn from a hat, with rules preventing common nation teams from playing. The next round (8 teams) is again random draw, 2 game series, with a bracket established at that time (so the semi's and finals are not random draw). In those rounds, there are no rules regarding opponents.
The rules to keep teams from one country apart are designed to keep the tournament truly international in the early stages, and to prevent the strong nations (Italy, Spain, England) from knocking themselves out and allowing small Turkish clubs to skate by. TV revenue doesn't hurt either.
Ok, SoS is kinda close on #2. And yes, there's a lot to keep track of, unless you support a shite team like Liverpool, in which your routing interest is eliminated from all but one tournament by January each year.
I'll start with English soccer. There are at least 5 divisions, with the Premiership being the top one. Think Majors-AAA-AA-A-rookie. The Premiership has twenty teams, so each team plays home and away with the other 19. After 38 games, best record wins, with goal-difference being the tie breaker. League runs August-May.
The final standings control who goes to the Champions League. Top 4 finishers qualify for next year's European Champions League. 5-7 qualify for the UEFA Cup (the "runners-up" tournament). There can be wild-card entries based on many minor rules not worth discussing.
During the season, there are also two "All England" tournaments that include teams from every division. The FA Cup and the Carling Cup throw all the teams from each division, and some non-league teams, into a hat and they have a standard single-elimination tournament. These games proceed on designated weekends throughout the August-May season. If you are eliminated, you get a weekend off. Toward the end of the season, they just preempt and reschedule league games for the few teams that remain. The Carling Cup is not prestigious at all. The FA Cup has some history behind it, but most of the top teams send out their reserve players, and often get toppled by lower division sides.
As for the National team games, UEFA and FIFA have designated weekends and midweeks that are for national team games, and all of the member nations simply don't schedule games then. No conflicts. The teams are obligated to release players, if healthy, to the national sides. Olympics, Euro 2008 and World Cups are held in the summer and do not conflict.
It is only our MLS and several African nations that don't schedule their league and tournaments to coincide with this schedule.
Thus, there's a lot going on if your team is any good, as you can have 5 games in the last 16 days of the season deciding your fate in 4 different competitions. Unless your a scouse.
And #3. It only makes sense from a financial standpoint. The Champions League final is awarded like the Superbowl to a site that in all likelihood will have no ties to either of the teams playing, unless you play it at Old Trafford. So, it's a one-and-done thing for marketing/tv. The other rounds attempt to eliminate the home field advantage by playing two legs. But even that fails because of tie-breaker rules regarding away-goals scored,which is a different problem altogether.
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