2023-2024 EPL Season

[hatterson]

Everyone here was already bashing Arsenal fans for being excited when we were sitting on 50 points at the mid-way point of last season. Now Spurs are doing the same thing after 8 games and everyone is still bashing Arsenal fans lol. Just little brother mentality from the other London clubs.

Also, imagine thinking Arsenal hasn't been relevant for two decades. Already waiting for the "no European trophies, Chelsea better, we have so much money, blah.." response while your team has been mid table after spending $1B over 18 months.

Arsenal *hasn't* been relevant for nearly 2 decades as it relates to elite European competitions or the top of the PL. The same as United haven't been relevant like that for a decade.

 

[spintheblackcircle]

They’ve BY FAR had the easiest schedule in the league

Nope.

Everton

i remember Oliver Skipp watch

Not here

“I never liked Winks, don’t rate Skipp at all either. It’s the British Spurs fans that love them, I don’t think international fans really rated him or Skipp.Skipp is such a zero”

 

[KJS14]

Arsenal *hasn't* been relevant for nearly 2 decades as it relates to elite European competitions or the top of the PL. The same as United haven't been relevant like that for a decade.

Well if by @Wee Baby Seamus own standards that we're relevant again after last season's 2nd place finish, then what about the other few times they've finished 2nd over those two decades?

I wouldn't use that as my barometer for relevance. You could tell me Arsenal wasn't relevant for the last 5 years or so with the last Wenger season, Emery, and first Arteta seasons. But otherwise are we just saying ~5-8 teams are relevant in all of Europe?

 

[Savant]

Nope.

Everton



Not here

“I never liked Winks, don’t rate Skipp at all either. It’s the British Spurs fans that love them, I don’t think international fans really rated him or Skipp.Skipp is such a zero”

What metric are you using? I was going by opponent PPG

Premier League relative performance

English Premier League stats

www.soccerstats.com

Are you saying that Oliver Skipp watch did not occur on here?

 

[Jussi]

Are you saying that Oliver Skipp watch did not occur on here?

Maybe he skipped it?

 

[Savant]

Maybe he skipped it?

I didn’t imagine it, right?

 

[hatterson]

I didn’t imagine it, right?

There was definitely a lot of Skipp tire pumping on here. Although I don't recall who was participating in it.

 

[spintheblackcircle]

What metric are you using? I was going by opponent PPG

Premier League relative performance

English Premier League stats

www.soccerstats.com

English Premier League Strength of Schedule

The Strength of Schedule table presents for each team the winning percentages for three different grouping of its opponents. These groupings include all opponents, opponents of games played, and opponents of unplayed games.

www.playoffstatus.com

Everton
Spurs
Chelsea
Fulham
Luton

Liverpool with the hardest thus far

 

[S E P H]

Both cringey AF. Arsenal = try hard. Tottenham = pick me

What's the real cringe is making a 1K+ thread all with cheese and whine.

No, we are just rational.

Spurs top of table in U-21 and U-18's as well

Rational blokes would've realised how easy Spurs schedule has been. Every single S*urs fan on this site has bypassed this major talking about going to useless stuff like my predictions when the transfer window was still open or Arsenal or VAR or Crypool FC or Ange or CL spot or whatever else. I posted two sections of their schedule which will see if they are a real team or not.

Arsenal *hasn't* been relevant for nearly 2 decades as it relates to elite European competitions or the top of the PL. The same as United haven't been relevant like that for a decade.

Arsenal is either praised when doing good or bashed constantly in both forms. We are Popular AF FC. We are Kim Kardashian of the EPL, best booty in the western hemisphere.

 

[Paulie Gualtieri]

There was definitely a lot of Skipp tire pumping on here. Although I don't recall who was participating in it.

He had a great six months before his big injury in 21-22. I've made it pretty clear that my stance has changed on him since then. Hopefully he'll still turn out to be a reliable squad player.

Rational blokes would've realised how easy Spurs schedule has been. Every single S*urs fan on this site has bypassed this major talking about going to useless stuff like my predictions when the transfer window was still open or Arsenal or VAR or Crypool FC or Ange or CL spot or whatever else. I posted two sections of their schedule which will see if they are a real team or not.

As I said, even if the schedule has been easy, winning consistently against supposed lesser opposition isn't. They've done that so far at least.

I usually only bring up Arsenal when debating you lot or occasionally watching their games. Can't say I've talked much about VAR or Liverpool. Mostly posted about Ange when he has provided updates on the squad in terms of injuries and such.

As for wanting to make the CL I don't see why you possibly take offense to that. This was supposed to be a rough season. The start of a rebuild. But with how the season is going so far, taking other teams like Chelsea and United into consideration too, I'm hopeful that Champions League football is achievable. But things can change on a dime, who knows.

 

[spintheblackcircle]

Tottenham appoint Aston Villa’s Johan Lange as their new technical director

Johan Lange will replace Fabio Paratici as the club’s key figure in recruitment when he takes over the role on 1 November

www.theguardian.com

New technical director at Spurs, brought in Ollie Watkins, Matty Cash and Emiliano Martinez at Villa.

 

[maclean]

You're really solidifying yourself as the negative Nancy of this board.

Perhaps he has some complex plan to bring Spurs and Arsenal fans together

It won't work of course but it's sweet of him to try

 

[Paulie Gualtieri]

Premier League verdicts: Top five predictions, first sacking, unpopular opinions, best XIs

As we enter its second international break, our writers assess the first two months of the 2023-24 Premier League season

theathletic.com

 

[Savant]

Premier League verdicts: Top five predictions, first sacking, unpopular opinions, best XIs

As we enter its second international break, our writers assess the first two months of the 2023-24 Premier League season

theathletic.com

Did I miss something? There’s a top five now?

 

[ItsFineImFine]

Another f***ing long unnecessary international break. England v Australia....what a stupid waste of time.

Did I miss something? There’s a top five now?

There's a top 7 once Chelsea get their shit together.

 

[Savant]

Another f***ing long unnecessary international break. England v Australia....what a stupid waste of time.

There's a top 7 once Chelsea get their shit together.

I mean there is an argument for like a top eight honestly;

I want to know why The Athletic is predicting “Top 5” instead of Top 4. That’s weird to me

 

[bluesfan94]

I mean there is an argument for like a top eight honestly;

I want to know why The Athletic is predicting “Top 5” instead of Top 4. That’s weird to me

Aren't there five spots in the new CL format or am I making that up?

 

[hatterson]

Aren't the five spots in the new CL format or am I making that up?

Depends on league coefficient, so undetermined yet, but very likely given how well English teams have historically done in the lower tournaments and that there's usually been an English team or two making late CL runs.

 

[Savant]

Aren't there five spots in the new CL format or am I making that up?

I don’t know the rules any more

Depends on league coefficient, so undetermined yet, but very likely given how well English teams have historically done in the lower tournaments and that there's usually been an English team or two making late CL runs.

Can’t be losing to Galatasaray and Lens if you want to keep that coefficient up

 

[LOGiK]

Did I miss something? There’s a top five now?

Isn't Champions League expanding?

 

[S E P H]

Isn't Champions League expanding?

It is and they're getting rid of the groups. Clubs will still be drawn together in a four-team division where each other plays the other once at home and on the road, but the top 16 or whatever it is in points all make it through to the next stage. So instead of looking at groups and knowing the top 2 will go through, you could have 3 teams make it if they're all in the top 16 overall standings.

I am in my FM career where the new rules are implemented and to me it sort of sucks. The last spots will be determined by coefficient rankings/points or some rubbish like that and it depends entirely on the league I believe. In my FM career and if the rules are correct in it, the last CL place spot was up for grabs between the EPL and Serie A and it was Newcastle that grabbed it due to having more coefficient points.

 

[hatterson]

It is and they're getting rid of the groups. Clubs will still be drawn together in a four-team division where each other plays the other once at home and on the road, but the top 16 or whatever it is in points all make it through to the next stage. So instead of looking at groups and knowing the top 2 will go through, you could have 3 teams make it if they're all in the top 16 overall standings.

I am in my FM career where the new rules are implemented and to me it sort of sucks. The last spots will be determined by coefficient rankings/points or some rubbish like that and it depends entirely on the league I believe. In my FM career and if the rules are correct in it, the last CL place spot was up for grabs between the EPL and Serie A and it was Newcastle that grabbed it due to having more coefficient points.

2 of the additional spots are based on overall league performance the previous year. So this year the relative performance of leagues in the CL, EL, and ECL will determine who gets the spots. If it was in place this year apparently it would have been England and Netherlands.

Those would just got to the highest placed team in the league that doesn’t already have a spot.

1 spot goes to the 3rd place team in the 5th best league and 1 additional spot opens up for the Champions path.

The 1-36 group is ranked 1-36, top 8 move to R16. 9-24 get paired and play a two legged playoff to also move onto R16.

25+ are eliminated. No dropping to the Europa League.

 

[maclean]

I hadn't paid any attention to the rule changes but on first reading that sounds dumb. So it just favours the big leagues even more now?

 

[hatterson]

I hadn't paid any attention to the rule changes but on first reading that sounds dumb. So it just favours the big leagues even more now?

Theoretically more chances for teams from the big leagues to get in. Also removes the idea of a group of death and means you only have to get 24th out of 32 teams to move onto the elimination rounds.

The biggest reason for doing it is obviously money. 8 group stage games instead of 6 means more games to show on TV and not splitting pot 1 up into 8 different groups means you’ll get more Barca/City or PSG/Bayern matchups randomly in the group stage.

There will still be 4 pots (of 9) at the start. CL holders are in pot 1, but other than that it’s strictly ordered based on club coefficient.

Each club is drawn against 2 teams from each pot, one home, one away, to make 8 games. Generally you can’t get drawn against a team from your own league in this stage, but it’s theoretically possible if there’s situations where a league has 5 teams and they end in the same pot.

So every year Bayern, PSG, City, Real, Barca, etc will play two games against other “top 9” teams and the top teams (who also have the largest TV audiences generally) will only have to finish in the top 24 in order to move to the knockout stages and get 2 more games.

 

[JPBolts]

Tottenham appoint Aston Villa’s Johan Lange as their new technical director

Johan Lange will replace Fabio Paratici as the club’s key figure in recruitment when he takes over the role on 1 November

www.theguardian.com

New technical director at Spurs, brought in Ollie Watkins, Matty Cash and Emiliano Martinez at Villa.

He’s an interesting case. I (and most Villa fans) have no clue exactly what input he has had at all. Ollie Watkins was a Dean Smith signing, Emiliano Martinez was a Neil Cutler (Smith’s GK coach) signing. In fact, I’ve heard that Jhon Durán is the only signing that was directly influenced by Johan Lange. He is known for a very statistical based approach, but again I don’t really know what went on behind the scenes.

I figured he would be on his way out after bringing in Monchi