12/18/24
March 09, 2004
It's a busy football day, too! Live text commentary for us poor sods at work, or without access to a telly (or FoxSportsWorld here in the US). The Guardian's hilarious humans cover Man U vs Porto and Chelsea v Stuttgart in the Champions League, while the Beeb's robots cover today's solitary EPL match: Middlesborough v Spurs. Since I have fantasy points riding on the last game that's the one I'll be watch ... erm ... reading most.
posted by worldcup2002 to soccer at 01:17 PM - 15 comments
Go Porto! Maybe this will be the day I have an e-mail mentioned in the report.
posted by trox at 02:02 PM on March 09, 2004
It'd be great to follow the Boro game on the BBC site whilst watching the Man U game on tv. Unfortunately none of the Beeb's robots appear to be working tonight. Perhaps they need oiling.
posted by squealy at 02:15 PM on March 09, 2004
Man U just scored. Oh, and go Juninho and Defoe!
posted by squealy at 02:18 PM on March 09, 2004
Since I'm stuck in my own office and I usually listen to music in the afternoon, I decided to plunk down the $4.95 monthly for the UEFA Action Pass. I don't mean to sound like a pitchman, but getting live audio and being able to watch any match from this season's campaign is pretty damn good when all you catch on TV is one match per match week. Every so often you can get a snapshot of play from the Stamford Bridge webcam, which is where I'll be in just over 2 weeks! Woohoo!
posted by chules at 02:30 PM on March 09, 2004
squealy, Soccernet has a much more lively robot-run Gamecast (Flash required) on the Boro v Spurs game. Try it.
posted by worldcup2002 at 03:10 PM on March 09, 2004
Rock on Porto! From the minute by minute coverage, this sounds like it was a great game to watch. I'm definitely going to the pub to watch tomorrow's game.
posted by trox at 03:40 PM on March 09, 2004
Looks like United are out. Leading 1-0 until the 90th minute, when Howard gives it away in goal. 1-1 today makes it 2-3 overall. I wonder if Ferguson will shake hands with the Porto manager today. The first nail in Ferguson's coffin? Coming up: An FA Cup semi-final against Arsenal and before that, a Manchester derby (and a third-place EPL hole to dig out of).
posted by worldcup2002 at 03:41 PM on March 09, 2004
I hate United, but they were robbed tonight. Scholes scored a perfectly good goal before half time (which would have taken it to extra time, I know, but at 2-0 I don't think Porto would have got back into it). From the minute by minute coverage, this sounds like it was a great game to watch. It wasn't it was awful. It looked like two Houllier teams playing against each other. Punt up field, striker dive on floor. Free kick wasted. Repeat.
posted by dng at 03:47 PM on March 09, 2004
Pretty dull champions league scores, tonight. And United and Juventus out. Thats quite a surprise.
posted by dng at 03:51 PM on March 09, 2004
I watched this travesty and want to know where UEFA gets these crap referees. Scholes goal disallowed, Ronaldo nearly booked for simulation (ha!) when had to be carried off in a stretcher and when Porto's Alberto was drawing MU fouls for dive after dive in the first half. True, MU did not have a great game--seemed like they were missing half the usual starting XI--but Ivanov took this game out from under them. Porto do not deserve to go on.
posted by billsaysthis at 04:59 PM on March 09, 2004
when Howard gives it away in goal. Further, WC, Howard did no such thing. He made a strong diving save on McCarthy's free kick and had absolutely zero defensive help for the rebound. Where were his center backs???
posted by billsaysthis at 05:00 PM on March 09, 2004
I though Howard fucked up a bit. He should have tipped that fucker over the bar for a corner, really.
posted by dng at 05:11 PM on March 09, 2004
I'm with dng, he should have either tipped it over the bar or maybe even caught it. He was still on his feet. Having said that O'Shea should have been awake for the rebound, but he wasn't, because he's shit. And Man U are out of Europe and if Arsenal beat them in the FA Cup it's another blank season for them. Ha!
posted by squealy at 06:11 PM on March 09, 2004
Arsenal still have the second leg tomorrow against Celta Vigo (can any of you tell me what that name translates to in English?) to go but I'm thinking they have a chance to repeat ManU's 1999 treble... Guys, I will defer on the Howard miss but I watched that a few extra times on TiVo and it looked like he did a reasonable job and the defenders f'ed up.
posted by billsaysthis at 07:11 PM on March 09, 2004
Go Juninho! (I'll be happy if he even starts the game.) Go Keane! Score, score, score!