Look how Manchester United is declining. Popularity may still be there and when you ask people about Barcelona, they might still know most of the players, but I am sure that popularity has also decreased. I am not talking about the hardcore fans because they will always be backing their favorite club, no matter what happens. But I think that popularity can go down as well when a club becomes irrelevant over time. It depends on what Barcelona will achieve in the Champions League. Manchester United is not the same name as it was 15 years ago. A Champions League game against Manchester United was the biggest game ever. Now it is far from that. And with that decline they get bigger problems to recruit the best talent.

This would get us into really complicated and deep discussions if we want to find out and conclude whether addictions can go away. I think this is a rare case that someone would say the addiction is gone and whatever the person was addicted to is not attractive anymore. You are not wrong because I know people who used to be smokers and then quit and they are completely against smoking as if they have been the biggest opponents of smoking ever since they are alive. It could be some sort of self-protection, but I would swear some of them don't touch a cigarette ever again because they truly find it disgusting. But in most cases I think someone would say "well, I would like to gamble a bit or smoke a bit, but I better not do it because otherwise...".

Barcelona has been the crowd puller for a long time besides Real Madrid and that is the main reason why they got away with a lot of bad stuff they have done in the past. But that time might one day be over. Apart from those issues though I think that Barcelona is not this club that every player dreams of when they are young thinking about clubs they want to play for when they grow older. The holy Barcelona from years ago is not the same anymore. Real Madrid is once again the number one club in La Liga. This and their financial situation will make it very hard for them to sign one of these super talents like Haaland or young Mbappe. Money and prestige both declined for Barcelona.

Now we know how this competition will go on and I think PSG was also a deserved winner in this group. I am unsure about Dortmund as I am not convinced of their game, but they won the group and now we will see how they will play in the next round, but I don't expect too much from them. PSG could have sent a warning to the soccer world if they won the game against Dortmund big time, but now they could again come to an end rather sooner than later when they are up against a team like Real Madrid. The names in the PSG team are great, but names haven't won any competition ever. But they are to blame as they had the chance to win the group if they won the game against Dortmund.

You have been wrong here As I said there was nothing at stake for Liverpool and still something at stake for Union Saint-Gilloise and they did what they had to in order to retain the chance to progress to the next round. But since the other game ended with a win for Toulouse, Union Saint-Gilloise efforts were wnot crowned with success. But for the future I think it should be paid attention to what is on the line for the clubs and it is not an exception that the favorite on paper loses the game because there is nothing to fight for.

Since now some teams from the Champions League have also joined the Europa League, I am looking forward to the drawing for the round of 16.

Well I think that Real Madrid is completely calm and they are ok with the situation because why should they not. There is one team now that is doing exceptionally well, but ask the question what is more likely? That Real Madrid maintains their level or that Girona maintains their level? And I think that is where the key for Real Madrid is to win the La Liga title at the end of the season. In my opinion it is more likely that Real Madrid will be very stable at this level throughout the season whereas Girona might experience some weaker games and lose points. What Girona has done is unbelievable and yet they only managed to win 2 more points than Real Madrid. That demonstrates how tough it is to stay ahead.

It is obvious that they are much weaker than the year they became champions. I thought they would be better this year, but they were very weak. They were disappointed because they could not perform as expected in UCL. The possibility of championship in the league is very difficult, but they will try to be in the top ranks to take part in the UCL, that is for sure.
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Better this year? It could hardly get any better this year for Napoli. If you consider the first 30 games of last season, Napoli was extremely close to perfection. There wasn't much they could have done better and they played weaker when they knew they won the title already and when they got knocked out from the Champions League. But all those games last season until matchday 30 or so were incredible. I did not expect them to play on the same level this season and I think that was one reason why Spaletti left. He knew that he can't do better than that. But it is true that Napoli is quite a bit weaker and I didn't expect that either. I thought they were at least more stable.

Where exactly have I been wrong? I said that he was a lucky guy having this superior team back at the time and I think that's true. Any coach having a superior team is lucky. It doesn't guarantee winning the Champions League and that is why it is still a great achievement by Luis Enrique, but I would never put Enrique on the same level as Guardiola or Klopp. PSG had a few weak Champions League games that convinced me they will not win the competition. They had some good games, but also some bad games, which is too much instability to win the title.

Talking about who deserves it and who doesn't when we have a scoreboard called "table" is quite useless. I think whatever team is at the top after the first 19 games also deserves to be there. 19 games is enough to tell whether a team deserved it to be at the top or whether there was a lot of luck involved. I think saying this after 5 games or so is useless as there is a lot of variance in luck across all teams, but yes 19 games can give us a deserved leader.

I don't see a reason why Arsenal would deserve it more than any other team. Is it because of empathy due to their loss last season against Manchester City in the fight for the title? Or do they play the best soccer in your opinion? Aston Villa plays impressive soccer, maybe they deserve it more according to you.

Messi will never go to Saudi Arabia, he would be nuts to do that unless they offer him half a billion per season. But he forewent a lot of money I assume when he got an offer from Saudi Arabia in summer. He opted to go to the United States and that was the perfect decision for him. No reason to spend time in the desert when he can have the luxury Miami life and still earn a lot of money. I also think that the rivalry between Messi and Ronaldo came to an end with Messi winning the World Cup and the award for the world's best player. I think there is no further discussion needed as to who the best player ist. 

Napoli should neither underestimate nor overestimate any team and try to get back to their level from last season. Though I don't think that they can come close to Inter Milan as their performance is exceptional this season. They have been good last season, but this season is going to be a new height for them. Juventus Turin is scoring reliably and they have improved quite a lot over the last few weeks. My opinion is that in a best case Napoli can compete for the third position, but anything above that is unrealistic at this time. This is too much of an up and down for them and they are by far not as dangerous as they have been during the first half of last season.

No way that Barcelona is so close to Real Madrid. Those times are over and Barcelona has turned into a pretty sloppy team recently. Odds of 4.9 might sound a bit high as there is also the gap between them and Real Madrid, but I wouldn't bet on Barcelona becoming the La Liga champions this season. 1.50 on the other hand is pretty low for Real Madrid and not really worth it. Girona is the surprise team here obviously and therefore comes with the most uncertainty. But for Girona fans a bet on them winning La Liga could be fun.

It might be time for ten Hag to let Manchester United go? I think you should put this sentence upside down and say that it is time for Manchester United to let ten Hag go. As if ten Hag had the power and support to decide when to leave the club. Manchester United is messed up because of him, but he won't throw the towel as this would deny him a big fat lump sum at the end. He will keep going until Manchester United pulls the trigger, sacks him and then makes him rich as a big thank you for the mess he is going to leave behind. Every single time I see on the bench or the sideline, I wonder what kind of error the Manchester United owners have in their heads to keep this guy.

That sounds quite naive to me Liverpool is already qualified for the next round and they can't be displaced from the first position as they are ahead with 4 points. Union Saint-Gilloise is still in the competition for the next round, but they have to beat Liverpool and then there is a slight chance they can still make it into the next round.

That's why I think this game won't be an easy walkover for Liverpool at all. I am sure that Klopp won't want to risk any of his players to get an injury and miss Premier League games.

The group is insanely close with both games being tied 1-1. PSG is still ahead with 8 points, but one goal for Newcastle and they are in the next round if PSG doesn't win the game. But it's still all possible if Dortmund scores another goal and Milan sometimes has a chance, if they get lucky and score one more there will be pressure on those teams everywhere. This is how I like it! Whoever makes it into the next round, it will be a damn close finish and a damn huge disappointment for the teams that don't. But PSG can't play holding back and hoping to end the game with 1 point, they need to win it or they have to fear a last second knockout if Newcastle scores.

But let's be straight here, for how long has it been a topic that Barcelona is broke? For how long has it been a topic that many clubs are deeply indebted? Sometimes I feel like they are operating like governments, they are able to raise the bar whenever they want and get themselves out of trouble however they want. If all these debts were as bad as it is often portrayed in the media, why was there never a club going fully broke and being relegated to the second league or sanctioned or whatever penalty would have to apply then? I am talking about the big clubs here because as we have seen they are willing to punish a club like Everton for some things and Juventus Turin was also pretty lightly penalized, but what about the big clubs? I doubt that Barcelona will ever go broke because they can refinance debt with tricks and legal loopholes.

Thanks for sharing your experience and this is something important that I was talking about in an earlier post already.

To start with, I'd say that everyone has at some point been addicted to something. Now you could say addicted to sports like excessive running, to collecting something, to playing computer games when we were younger ( I think I was definitely addicted to some computer games for a short while), and many other things.

But the issue is that crossing the red line once doesn't leave the red line where it always was. Usually it shifts the boundaries someone has set for themselves. If someone borrows $100 to gamble with, how much will the person borrow next time? It is like the entry drug when people get from alcohol to weed to ecstasy and on and on. The same can happen with borrowing money until someone fully exhausted any degree of freedom and can't pay back.

Sevilla I think could be expected. Whoever thought that they would advance to the next round was hoping for a miracle and nothing else. The last season Sevilla tricked people into thinking that they are actually much better than they appeared to be in La Liga due to their win in the Europa League, but I think there were many obvious problems that Sevilla couldn't cope with. It worked for them in the Europa League for unknown reasons, but I never was of the opinion that they will soon do much better. Buying Ramos was a desperate move to get some big name into their team, but apart from that there was nothing to look forward to.

It is now Napoli's turn to ensure to not fall behind too far. It is not looking good for them already and maybe they should adjust some of their goals and then wait and see if they can get into the position to go for the top again, but for now they should focus on securing one of the first four ranks to qualify for the next Champions League season. There is still a lot to play for and nothing is lost, but I think it is not realistic at the moment to hope that they can compete for the Scudetto. That is not going to happen.

Yes to me it seems because of players who left or got injured the whole squad got out of balance. They are still strong and among the best teams in the world, but there is a performance gap if you consider both seasons. Guardiola's teams have always been dominated by the midfielders, but having the best midfield in the world is exceptional, having it several years in a row is unbelievable and rebuilding it when players leave or get injured is impossible. They can be happy about Alvarez' development because he is making up for some of the imbalance that emerged because of De Bruyne's injury as he is working a lot while being mostly driven by his offensive efforts.