Premier League 2020/2021

Who will win the Premier League?

  • Total voters
    53
M

Morten

Senior Member
serghei said:
This is a cyclic argument imo. It's obvious that as time passes and opponents get to play you again and again and again they will get to practice more and more and will get better at blocking you. I'm not disputing that. It's obvious some evolution happens on the side of the opponent. But it's not the main reason why great teams (wouldn't call City a great team but still) decline. The main reason why they decline is that they just can't keep up doing the same routine at the highest level. That stress and that peak can only be handled for 3-5 years.

If 2009 or 2011 Barca would play today, a fresh team, they would dominate any team and would be favorite for every trophy. After 3-4 years they would again start to lose steam and would be losing more and more to sides they would have beaten in the past.
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Especially 2011, they would dominate like the old times, basically unbeatable, park the bus and prey you score a setpiece, it was all you really could do.
Though, CL is CL, you can have the best team in the world by a distance, but silly/crazy things just happens in that tournament.
 
BBZ8800

BBZ8800

Senior Member
serghei said:
This is a cyclic argument imo. It's obvious that as time passes and opponents get to play you again and again and again they will get to practice more and more and will get better at blocking you. I'm not disputing that. It's obvious some evolution happens on the side of the opponent. But it's not the main reason why great teams (wouldn't call City a great team but still) decline. The main reason why they decline is that they just can't keep up doing the same routine at the highest level. That stress and that peak can only be handled for 3-5 years.

If 2009 or 2011 Barca would play today, a fresh team, they would dominate any team and would be favorite for every trophy. After 3-4 years they would again start to lose steam and would be losing more and more to sides they would have beaten in the past.
Click to expand...

Ok, we have two factors:
1. opponents learning how to play against you and getting better and better each new season
2. your players getting tired physically and mentally after a few years

BUT, that means even if Pep's players wouldn't tire, they would still be less and less dominant in each new season.

The same applies for Xavi-Iniesta-Messi.
Even if they would have been robots who don't age and don't get tired, their magic would have stopped after a few years if they would play EXACTLY THE SAME TRICKS from 2011 over and over.

Again, my feeling is that people here still neglect that part.
They believe that if you execute a style from 2011 with a perfect coach and perfect players, results will come.

10 years have passed.
Even a style from 2011 is outdated today and it needs some major upgrades.
 
fergus90

fergus90

Senior Member
Another weekend full of pathetic VAR decisions in the Premier League. Needs to be seriously re-evaluated it's spoiling football.
 
KingLeo10

KingLeo10

Senior Member
BBZ8800 said:
Ok, we have two factors:
1. opponents learning how to play against you and getting better and better each new season
2. your players getting tired physically and mentally after a few years

BUT, that means even if Pep's players wouldn't tire, they would still be less and less dominant in each new season.

The same applies for Xavi-Iniesta-Messi.
Even if they would have been robots who don't age and don't get tired, their magic would have stopped after a few years if they would play EXACTLY THE SAME TRICKS from 2011 over and over.

Again, my feeling is that people here still neglect that part.
They believe that if you execute a style from 2011 with a perfect coach and perfect players, results will come.

10 years have passed.
Even a style from 2011 is outdated today and it needs some major upgrades.
Click to expand...

The latter part of this argument implies football teams ONLY get better and better over time. Because you're saying 2011 or 2009 Barca at its peak would need major upgrades to compete in modern football.

The conclusion is that Liverpool 2019 and Bayern 2020 are the top 2 greatest/best sides of all time.

Is that the conclusion you're willing to make?

But then you're also the guy who says modern attacker goal tallies are inflated and they aren't as good as the prime Serie A/EPL strikers of the 90s/00s. That's an inconsistency.
 
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J

JamDav1982

Senior Member
BBZ8800 said:
Ok, we have two factors:
1. opponents learning how to play against you and getting better and better each new season
2. your players getting tired physically and mentally after a few years

BUT, that means even if Pep's players wouldn't tire, they would still be less and less dominant in each new season.

The same applies for Xavi-Iniesta-Messi.
Even if they would have been robots who don't age and don't get tired, their magic would have stopped after a few years if they would play EXACTLY THE SAME TRICKS from 2011 over and over.

Again, my feeling is that people here still neglect that part.
They believe that if you execute a style from 2011 with a perfect coach and perfect players, results will come.

10 years have passed.
Even a style from 2011 is outdated today and it needs some major upgrades.
Click to expand...

It is the exact opposite of what you are claiming. It is not players tired mentally it is new players that are not as good as ones they replaced.
 
serghei

serghei

Senior Member
BBZ8800 said:
Ok, we have two factors:
1. opponents learning how to play against you and getting better and better each new season
2. your players getting tired physically and mentally after a few years

BUT, that means even if Pep's players wouldn't tire, they would still be less and less dominant in each new season.
Click to expand...

Yes, up to a point. Practice makes perfect but it doesn't compensate a difference in skill. A proper example would be Nadal on clay. It doesn't mean that if X player plays more against Nadal on clay he'd miraculously improve so much as to beat Nadal. If Nadal keeps his form he will continue to beat you and dominate you until he can't effectively use his skills.

Repetition of practice alone won't trump skill.


BBZ8800 said:
The same applies for Xavi-Iniesta-Messi.
Even if they would have been robots who don't age and don't get tired, their magic would have stopped after a few years if they would play EXACTLY THE SAME TRICKS from 2011 over and over.

Again, my feeling is that people here still neglect that part.
They believe that if you execute a style from 2011 with a perfect coach and perfect players, results will come.
Click to expand...

This is where you are wrong imo. There were no tricks. Pep's Barcelona played what current Liverpool successfully play right now (4-3-3, heavy reliance of pressing as means of defending, heavy reliance on fitness, lots of running, great passing combinations, many many similarities), only with better players on nearly every position.

Pep's Barca had no gimmicks. Teams knew how to stop us early. Note Chelsea 2009. Rubin Kazan in 2010 and so on. It's just that we were so good that it was incredibly hard to do it, and almost always doing it would involve a huge degree of luck (think Atletico vs Liverpool last season)

If you pass amazingly well, work very hard every match, and have superior players than whatever team you come up against, you will usually win. Having such huge qualities gives you the luxury of being in charge. Being in charge means that, if you don't fuck up, you will probably win.

You make the mistake imo of looking at this as some sort of a technical evolution of things, as with computers. This doesn't work with humans.
 
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J

JamDav1982

Senior Member
Pep changed things at Barca. Went 343 and it did not work and he finished off back at 433.

He has also played 343 at Bayern and at City at times and last two defeats in CL have come with him opting to play in more conservative style.

To say he is still playing 2011 football and failing is ignorant and his issue has been players and choosing tactics that have failed.. often away from his 'pure' 433 passing game.
 
Birdy

Birdy

Senior Member
JamDav1982 said:
Pep changed things at Barca. Went 343 and it did not work and he finished off back at 433.

He has also played 343 at Bayern and at City at times and last two defeats in CL have come with him opting to play in more conservative style.

To say he is still playing 2011 football and failing is ignorant and his issue has been players and choosing tactics that have failed.. often away from his 'pure' 433 passing game.
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This!
Only people looking at very surface level of the game say that Pep has not changed.

At Bayern he used 3 or 4 formation every year, and his last year he was playing something close to 2-3-5
 
Birdy

Birdy

Senior Member
serghei said:
This is where you are wrong imo. There were no tricks. Pep's Barcelona played what current Liverpool successfully play right now (4-3-3, heavy reliance of pressing as means of defending, heavy reliance on fitness, lots of running, great passing combinations, many many similarities), only with better players on nearly every position.

Pep's Barca had no gimmicks. Teams knew how to stop us early. Note Chelsea 2009. Rubin Kazan in 2010 and so on. It's just that we were so good that it was incredibly hard to do it, and almost always doing it would involve a huge degree of luck (think Atletico vs Liverpool last season)

If you pass amazingly well, work very hard every match, and have superior players than whatever team you come up against, you will usually win. Having such huge qualities gives you the luxury of being in charge. Being in charge means that, if you don't fuck up, you will probably win.

You make the mistake imo of looking at this as some sort of a technical evolution of things, as with computers. This doesn't work with humans.
Click to expand...

Of course, no one figured Pep's Barca out. It's stupid to claim that, especially on a season that Messi as CF broke all records.
In 2012 CL could have been won.
The League was lost because Mou built a great team.
Had Pep stayed, he would have won again in 13, see how easily Tito did that.
 
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