I don't think it matters what Klopp wants or not. Since Salah is in the sweetest spot for negotiations it will all depend on whether or not he wants to stay in Liverpool and continue his career on the highest level or whether he wants the cash. Because Liverpool would then have to let him go without a transfer fee and they will never do that. The amount of money that was offered is too high to be refused by Liverpool. They will need the money to build their future team and Klopp will be involved and responsible., He knows how important it is to have the money necessary to invest in great talent and Mbappe would obviously be the premium candidat.

I can only repeat what I said before, I respect all of his achievements and I of course understand what you mean when you scoring is scoring. But I am not on the same page with you when we leave it just at that: scoring is scoring. It really is not. You have a prominent example where you can see that it is possible to suffer from important goals in their career. Look at Mario Gotze who scored the goal in the World Cup final against Argentina. Because of that goal he was always measured by that standard he himself set. His career took a bad turn and he could never prove the level people have attached to him because of that goal. In all fairness, this counts the same way for Ronaldo. I respect his performance in the SPL, but I admire him for his performances against the best opponents in the world.

I sometimes get the feeling that people here talk as if he was about to break the goal scoring record in the Champions League again. It's ridiculous. Ronaldo is delivering the show he is being paid for. The celebration with his subsequent rutting call. That is what he is paid 200 million per year for and he is delivering. He doesn't care whether he wins the SPL title, he wants the goal scorer award and then he can tell everybody to fuck off.

I have read a few articles which are quite interesting as they are discussing whether Xabi Alonso will become the next Pep Guardiola. I am not a friend of these person to person comparisons because at the end of the day nobody can become somebody else. I get the idea why they want to compare the two coaches, but it doesn't make that much sense as I think Alonso is a different personality to begin with. They are not the same. I am not sure how tactical Alonso is and whether he goes into such a deep detail as Guardiola does.

But one thing is for sure, if Alonso can win the Bundesliga and then adds the Europa League title to his collection as a coach at such a young age, that would by any means be a crazy head start for the Spaniard. Since I like him, I wish him the best for this ambitious goal.

Ok would you be willing to take a 10:1 bet that Chelsea won't be relegated into the Championship? If you win, you get 10 mBTC. If I win, I get 1mBTC. I say they won't be relegated under any circumstances. Let me know if that is a bet you would like to accept and we will get someone reputable to quote our conversation and then we can settle it at the end of the season.

Crystal Palance vs. Everton ended in a draw, which is quite unsatisfactory for both as the game must now be repeated and both of them really don't need any additional games for nothing.

My lord I hope you are wrong that the derby will be that boring! I want the good old times back when the derby unravelled and there were at least 4 goals and 8 yellow cards!

But yes you are most likely right that this derby will be rather quiet with a lot of focus being put on the defense and if one of the teams scores, it will be even more boring. Lazio isn't playing very aggressively and both prefer to wait for one of their few chances to hit the back of the net and then defend only.

I think you phrased this quite well because what does luck even mean when it comes to the drawings. Of course it would be easier to play against Eindhoven when you could also have played against Real Madrid, but ultimately there is no free lunch in any of these rounds and especially in the quarterfinals, I think every team that made it there must be taken seriously under any circumstances.

A least amount of differentiation is required I think. Putting every title into the same category is wrong I think. I still agree that no title should be disregarded altogether. It is something that nobody can take away from you once you have won it and that is why I am also against rotating so heavily that in the end there is the third row playing while all the top players are getting a rest or are sitting on the bench. We see that frequently from the top teams, but I can understand it because new competitions have been introduced nonstop and some of them I didn't even know they exist. It means more and more games, which automatically will reduce the game quality across all competitions. That is a big problem. We should have less competitions with higher intensity.

Yes I mean the Bernabeu is literally where he belongs. They fit together very well, the club and him. He is a gentleman and a great coach, a great personality and Real Madrid is the most recognized club in the world. So there is no disagreement about that. I wonder what he would do in 2026 if everything is looking great and going well. I believe someone like him will have a hard time to once and for all say goodbye to soccer. it is really his life although he is one of the calmest coaches I have ever seen. The most you can see from him is when he is showing his fist out of joy. But he isn't screaming or escalating. Great coach and I hope we'll see him a few more years.

Atletico Madrid was not a tough opponent for them... Let me digest that sentence for a moment please...

Maybe you should ask the Girona players whether they think that the game against Atletico Madrid was easy. I don't know what kind of answer you expect, but I think they will tell you that it was a damn piece of hard work and nothing else. They will tell you that they had to bleed hard and give everything they could to win it. You won't find a single player who would tell you that the game was easy peasy.

Everything you said is true, but you are forgetting a few important details to get a full picture of what is going on. Mo Salah will get an offer from Saudi Arabia that exceeds everything he has ever seen on a contract paper in his life. The same will be written down in the offer that some Saudi club will send to Liverpool. Salah's contract will soon expire. Then both parties have to make a choice. Liverpool might try to raise his salary or pay the same as he has been earning in recent years. That means they will keep him if they can, but he is now getting older and isn't really the future. However, they could also make 200 million or something if they sell him, which is quite a bit of money. Then again, Salah will either want to sign a well paid long term contract with Liverpool or he will go to Saudi Arabia and become one of the richest people in soccer. This is not as easy as you put it. Like "Klopp needs him". Sure he needs him, but money is important and age is important, too. Add the rumor to this mix that Liverpool has an eye on what Mbappe is doing. I am curious to see where this is going.

I think teams don't really play to get 1 point, at least they don't do that very often. This doesn't mean they are aware that 1 point would be a good result already, but you usually never start out like that. Now against Real Sociedad it wasn't that Alaves was fine with that 1 point, it was more about Real Sociedad still doing a good job in their home stadium to try everything possible to turn this game around. They put good pressure on Alaves and didn't want to grant them the space and time to enfold their own game and they did that while being one man down, which is a good performance in my opinion. But the late goal was the reward for their hard work being one man down.

Ronaldo will win the top scorer trophy this title, I have no doubts about that. He is taking all the penalties and that alone could get him close to that trophy as one third of his goals is scored by penalty. But I don't know whether people really care when Ronaldo is the top scorer in the Saudi Professional League. I admire him for the records he has set in the Champions League, that's the reason I look up to him and have respect for him. I don't care whether he scores 20 goals or 40 goals in the SPL.

AC Milan had 21 points after 8 games in Serie A. But then they significantly dropped in performance and nothing really changed within their team as far as I remember. I think they didn't have any severe injuries or did they? But their performance was out of balance, the strikers didn't strike anymore as they did at the beginning of the season.

I still think they have a word to say when it comes to the Europa League title, but given what their current shape is I would not count them as a top favorite. That doesn't mean they are an underdog, but more in the upper 20% of the competition.

Lol the first part of your post is ok, it is true that Chelsea has no reason to believe they could have a chance to qualify for any of the European competitions. But why should Chelsea be concerned about getting relegated? Like, what are the indicators as of now in the table that you see as being a threat for Chelsea to be relegated by the end of the season? I think every single post should have a least amount of substance and effort put into it. That's why I would kindly ask you to provide the substance for the idea that Chelsea should put the whole focus on not being relegated.

True story and I have a divided opinion on that. On the one hand I can understand every Napoli fan and everyone else who is pro Napoli that expectations rise when the team plays sensational soccer and wins the title in such a convincing manner that it seemed as if Napoli was the new superpower in the Serie A. On the other hand we have seen these outliers from time to time and more often than not the teams were not able to live up to the newly risen expectations simply because the foundation wasn't there. It was more a case of over delivery when they won the title than living up to their standards.

There was a small window of opportunity for them when they played the Champions League final against Bayern Munich and lost it 0-1. In that game PSG had their chances and they could have won the game with a higher level of efficiency, but Bayern Munich was the team that turned one of their two shots on target into a goal. It was a close game and nobody would have complained if PSG won the final back then.

But the real problem now is that I think PSG is much weaker than they were back then. That's why I highly doubt they can make it into the final again and then win the final. However, if they get some lucky draws now, I don't know maybe they can advance a few rounds. But if they are playing against Manchester City or Bayern Munich or Real Madrid, I can't see how they would be able to beat them.

It's the same in other leagues as well, for example in Germany. When you look at PSG and Bayern Munich, they can't win the domestic league title, they can only lose it. If they win it, it is standard and was an obligation, which I think is true to a certain degree as it would be a shame if they didn't win it with their budgets. But if they lose it, they are the biggest losers ever.

But when investors decide to push clubs like PSG, actually they know what they are doing and getting into. I find it boring to take a billion dollars and then go to an inferior league and push one single club. I know Bayern Munich doesn't have investors like that, but once there is an imbalance within a league, it hardly ever gets resolved down the road and it decreases the appeal of the league to the audiences.

I am quite sure that this is his plan. He wants to appreciate the time with the club he thinks is the best in the world and he is so closely connected to and I believe when grandmasters like him come closer to the end of their career, maybe they regret some of their words when a few years ago they let everyone know that they would retire early and not sit on the bench as a grandpa. But Ancelotti loves the game and he isn't just there yet to lean back and only coach a national team every one in a while. He knows that closing this Real Madrid chapter means a big step towards retirement for him.

I somehow saw it coming and I also thought that Lukaku might be the one who scores the first goal. I was pretty sure that if they were able to score the first one with some time left, they would still win the game and that is what they did. That's actually when I like to watch Roma games because if there is something to fight for (and not something to defend because they had to win), then Roma can play great stuff. That's why normally I prefer games when Roma concedes the first goal. If it is the other way around, the games usually become boring like hell.

If you look at it that way then Harry Kane somehow wasted several years of his career at a club that was simply not good enough to compete for the Premier League title or the Champions League. But they did have their chance when they played the Champions League final against Liverpool and I remember that Tottenham was the better team in that game in many parts of the game. But guess what, it was Harry Kane who wasn't in shape. He didn't find the right spaces or the right timings, but that can happen to the best players.

Now he has found what he was looking for with his teammates at Bayern. They understood him quickly and he signaled that he is willing to put in the work to help the team. They pay it back with assisting him and the result is impressive.