Canadians abroad: October 20-26, 2006

[George]

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

Tam sure can jump pretty high for someone of his height. From the place where he is on the field for the goal it seems like he is playing as an offensive midfielder which may indeed be his natural position but may not be good for us if he comes back to the MNT.

I think Tam is mostly playing CD. He definitely played the position vs. Olympiakos, and he seems to be playing it in the clips that I have seen from other games. He does, however, push-up a great deal.

[George]

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

Tam sure can jump pretty high for someone of his height. From the place where he is on the field for the goal it seems like he is playing as an offensive midfielder which may indeed be his natural position but may not be good for us if he comes back to the MNT.

I think Tam is mostly playing CD. He definitely played the position vs. Olympiakos, and he seems to be playing it in the clips that I have seen from other games. He does, however, push-up a great deal.

[Ceres]

quote:Originally posted by ken

By the way is the Ailton that ceres mentioned the same Ailton that used to play with Werder Bremen?

No.... It's another highly rated (21-yo) Brazilian. FCK paid €3 million to get him, but unfortunately his team did not want to let him go before the Champions League deadline, no matter that FCK were trying to offer a € million or two more to get him in time. They can use him next year though, but it wont help them in this CL group stage.

quote:Originally posted by El HombreAnd Ceres, I didn't mean to get your back up, but every time I've watched FCK they've been disappointing. I realize they are missing Gronkjaer but none of Silberbauer, Norregaard, Gravgaard and Hangeland seemed to be able to put two passes together. I trust your judgement as you see them more often, but I haven't been completely sold on them yet.

Grønkjaer is by far the best paid player in the Danish league as well as the absolute Star player at FCK. It's not by chance that he has won 60 caps for Denmark so far and used to play for Chelsea. Though he suffered from being homesick and never really managed to settle in England, Spain or Germany, but he has looked absolutely brilliant for FCK this season, perhaps better than ever, but then unfortunately got injured right before the away match against Ajax.

I agree about Hangeland. He's a very very tall and strong defender, who win everything in the air, but is no good at passing the ball. Michael Gravgaard (known as "Copenhagen Air Force") on the other hand is an absolutely brilliant central defender, very clever playing and sure to be a regular starter for The Danish NT. He also used to be a top-class striker, so he's absolutely lethal in attack, which he has shown both in the Danish league as well as in the Europa Cups and on the Danish NT (11 caps, 4 goals) where he clearly is looking better than Daniel Agger (Liverpool) at the moment. Still, Gravgaard is not expected to participate all that much in attack in CL (except at set pieces) and surely not in any short-passing in midfield. That is mainly upto the FCK right back Lars Jacobsen.

Nørregaard (the replacement for Atiba in central midfield) really dont belong as a regular starter in CL, but on the bench. As for Silberbauer, then he is known to be a highly inconsistent player, at times looking brilliant in midfield while other times he cant seem to string two passes together, no matter how good or poor the opponent is. He did score a very important away goal against Ajax, but also in that match he was very up and down.

.

[Ceres]

quote:Originally posted by ken

By the way is the Ailton that ceres mentioned the same Ailton that used to play with Werder Bremen?

No.... It's another highly rated (21-yo) Brazilian. FCK paid €3 million to get him, but unfortunately his team did not want to let him go before the Champions League deadline, no matter that FCK were trying to offer a € million or two more to get him in time. They can use him next year though, but it wont help them in this CL group stage.

quote:Originally posted by El HombreAnd Ceres, I didn't mean to get your back up, but every time I've watched FCK they've been disappointing. I realize they are missing Gronkjaer but none of Silberbauer, Norregaard, Gravgaard and Hangeland seemed to be able to put two passes together. I trust your judgement as you see them more often, but I haven't been completely sold on them yet.

Grønkjaer is by far the best paid player in the Danish league as well as the absolute Star player at FCK. It's not by chance that he has won 60 caps for Denmark so far and used to play for Chelsea. Though he suffered from being homesick and never really managed to settle in England, Spain or Germany, but he has looked absolutely brilliant for FCK this season, perhaps better than ever, but then unfortunately got injured right before the away match against Ajax.

I agree about Hangeland. He's a very very tall and strong defender, who win everything in the air, but is no good at passing the ball. Michael Gravgaard (known as "Copenhagen Air Force") on the other hand is an absolutely brilliant central defender, very clever playing and sure to be a regular starter for The Danish NT. He also used to be a top-class striker, so he's absolutely lethal in attack, which he has shown both in the Danish league as well as in the Europa Cups and on the Danish NT (11 caps, 4 goals) where he clearly is looking better than Daniel Agger (Liverpool) at the moment. Still, Gravgaard is not expected to participate all that much in attack in CL (except at set pieces) and surely not in any short-passing in midfield. That is mainly upto the FCK right back Lars Jacobsen.

Nørregaard (the replacement for Atiba in central midfield) really dont belong as a regular starter in CL, but on the bench. As for Silberbauer, then he is known to be a highly inconsistent player, at times looking brilliant in midfield while other times he cant seem to string two passes together, no matter how good or poor the opponent is. He did score a very important away goal against Ajax, but also in that match he was very up and down.

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[JamesW]

John Toner has scored 4 goals for The New Saints. They are top in the Welsh league.

[Grizzly]

quote:Originally posted by El Hombre

He's made all the right decisions so far leading up to FCK (glad he didn't go to Saturn like some here would've liked) and hopefully his next move will be as fruitful.

I guess this is aimed at me so I will get into the debate. In general I agree with you and Loyola that it is more important to play in a good league in which you are getting high level competitive games week in and week out than in the occassional high level game in Euro play while playing in a relatively weak league. However, he has developed well so far at Kopenhagen so I am satisfied with that although like the others I did see that much of the team was not at his level even though this might have been a bit better if a few missing players were present. My problem with him playing with Kopenhagen is that I think the development phase of his career is pretty much over and he has to start playing regularly at a good level. Kopenhagen is a good team but the Danish league is not, currently ranked 21st in Europe and with a very uneven table, ie. only a few clubs competitive with FCK. In a typical year FCK loses only 4 to 6 games out of 33. I think it is time for him to move to a better league.

When Saturn was a possibility he was in Sweden where in my opinion he did stay too long. Saturn is a midtable club in the 9th ranked league in Europe and their roster is of a similar level to Wigan or FCK, maybe slightly inferior but not by a lot, they have some very good players including Illiasu Shilla who was very impressive for Ghana in the WC and courted by several EPL teams. With Saturn he would have missed out on European play but would be playing in a much stronger league than Denmark (at the top CSKA is a step above FCK and at the bottom teams like Dynamo in a relegation spot still have players like Derlei and Smertin, ie. way above teams like Vejle and Silkeborg). I still think he would be in a better situation playing there than in FCK from the soccer point of view however, from the promotion/scouting point of view it is definitely better to play Champions League. I think the question of whether he made the right choice here is still open. If he transfers in the near future to one of the top 5 leagues than he probably made the right choice. If he is still playing in Denmark 2 years from now he would have been better off with Saturn.

Wigan I think is a good option though maybe not the best one. The EPL is currently ranked 3rd in UEFA and despite the ranking may possibly be the top league (I would rank it 2nd behind Spain). At some point one has to take a chance to see if one can play at this level. In general, the Canadian players who haven't succeeded in England are those who still need to develop which doesn't seem to be the speciality of English clubs. I think Hutch is at the point where he is beyond the development stage and just needs to play at a high level. Stalteri and DeGuzman both made the leap to top clubs in top leagues and it hasn't really panned out. Probably they would have been better to go to smaller clubs in the same league and Wigan fits this bill for Hutch. However, he would be going to a similar level of team as FCK, ie. vast improvement in league play but no improvement in teammates. (Wigan by the way in their last game against ManU lost 3-1 so pretty similar to FCK). This is why I would prefer him to go to one of the better clubs in Germany or France which would still be a vast improvement in league play but also an improvement in the team level without being so competitive that he gets lost in the shuffle like DeGuz and Stalteri. Yet you have to go to the team that wants you and is willing to pay the transfer. Given this I would be pretty happy with a transfer to Wigan as I think it is better than staying at FCK.

[Daniel]

2 seconds apart!

Sigma

Leicester

United Kingdom

3746 Posts

Posted - 10/25/2006 : 16:55:06

Stalteri plays 90 minutes for Tottenham tonight as they win 5-0 away to MK Dons in the Carling Cup.

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ken

moncton

Canada

61 Posts

Posted - 10/25/2006 : 16:55:08

Stalteri plays 90 in a 5-0 win over MK Dons in a Carling Cup match, better than not playing at all.

Edited by - ken on 10/25/2006 16:55:48

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[Ceres]

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

Kopenhagen is a good team but the Danish league is not, currently ranked 21st in Europe and with a very uneven table, ie. only a few clubs competitive with FCK. In a typical year FCK loses only 4 to 6 games out of 33. I think it is time for him to move to a better league.

Well, you cant really rely more on the European Country Ranking than e.g. the World NT ranking since it has it's big flaws as well. The Danish league as such is e.g. better than the Scottish PL both if you look at the actual quality of play and if you compare how the smaller to average Danish and Scottish teams perform in the Europa Cups. Still the ranking very much favor leagues with one or two teams that usually qualify for the EC every season, getting a better seeding and easier opponents to collect points and bonus points for the league ranking (Like Rangers and Celtic do for Scotland).

Ther is also the fact that the Danish league is very much regarded to be a 'developmental league' for the top leagues of Europe, meaning that many of the Danish league players are sold to the top 5-6 biggest leagues in Europe in every transfer window, while almost no one moves from e.g. the Scottish league to the bigger leagues (as you will notice by looking at the Scottish NT squad). This ofcause make the Danish league teams a bit more inconsistent in the Europa cup's, when they keep losing quite alot of players, but it is on the other hand also a proof that the amount of talent and the quality of players is better than most ppl may think by looking at the league ranking, otherwise it would not be possible to attrack this much attention and sell this many players to the top leagues in Europe year after year. (Brøndby alone have sold more that €20 million worth of players the last year or so). It's also the main reason why the Danish NT is always fairly highy ranked, because of many Danish players earning their living at the top 6 leagues in Europe.

2nd) The European Country Ranking is a 5-year ranking, which makes it even more difficult for an inconsistent 'developmental league' like the Danish to make a mark in the long run, but if you e.g. only look at the UEFA Country Coefficient ranking one year at a time, you will find that the Danish league (ranked 8th at the moment) is doing quite nicely in Europe so far this season (also better than e.g. the Scottish league in 14th place) :

http://www.xs4all.nl/~kassiesa/bert/uefa/data/method3/ccoef2007.html

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

When Saturn was a possibility he was in Sweden where in my opinion he did stay too long. Saturn is a midtable club in the 9th ranked league in Europe and their roster is of a similar level to Wigan or FCK, maybe slightly inferior but not by a lot, they have some very good players including Illiasu Shilla who was very impressive for Ghana in the WC and courted by several EPL teams. With Saturn he would have missed out on European play but would be playing in a much stronger league than Denmark (at the top CSKA is a step above FCK and at the bottom teams like Dynamo in a relegation spot still have players like Derlei and Smertin, ie. way above teams like Vejle and Silkeborg). I still think he would be in a better situation playing there than in FCK from the soccer point of view however, from the promotion/scouting point of view it is definitely better to play Champions League. I think the question of whether he made the right choice here is still open. If he transfers in the near future to one of the top 5 leagues than he probably made the right choice. If he is still playing in Denmark 2 years from now he would have been better off with Saturn.

I think your greatly underestimating the fact that though the Russian league as such no doubt is better than the Danish league, then the Danish league is considered to be much more of a 'developmental league' for the big leagues in Europe in compare with the Russian. Ther are no Danish players in Russia and this is not by chance, since they know they would be totally forgotten by the Danish media and NT coach if they moved to Russia. They would also be out of sight for the top European leagues, so if a Danish player is good enough to attract attention from abroad he chose to stay at home, playing in the Danish Superliga in hope of getting a contract with a Dutch or German team, rather than moving to Russia and be forgotten..

Ofcause ther is some focus on the Russian teams playing Champions League, but a (at that time) fairly unkown Canadian player like Atiba would have been totally forgotten if he had moved to a club like Saturn. Unless ofcause you think the Russian league would be a great final step for Atiba ?, otherwise it would have been a great mistake...

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[Ceres]

Superliga, round 13, October 25:

OB Odense v FC København, 0-0 (0-0)

Attendance: 10,672

Match facts and lineups :

http://www.bolddk.com/statistik/kampdata.php?gameid=159073

http://www.netsuperligaen.dk/kampref.php?ID=2934

FCK managed to hold OB Odense to a draw in a rather even match. Both teams seemed happy to keep the result at 0-0 by mainly looking solid in defense, so they did not allow eachother to create all that much in attack, though Atiba did produce a fairly good shot on target for FCK, as you can see in the highlights...

Highlights :

http://www.dr.dk/extention/playWindowsMedianyheder.aframe?id=235896&ListType=nyheder&trace=off

or

http://www.dr.dk/player/Player.asp?subsite=nyheder&WMPVer=9.0.0.2980&id=235896&name=&video=#

---

[b]Danish Superliga 2006/07 (14 of 33 rounds):[/b]

[b]   Club             G   W D L   Gf-Ga   P[/b] 

1  FC København     13  9 3 1   24-8   30

2  FC Midtjylland   14  8 3 3   29-17  27

3  AaB Ålborg       14  8 2 4   20-14  26

4  OB Odense        14  7 5 2   18-12  26  

5  FC Nordsjælland  14  7 2 5   29-18  23

6  Brøndby IF       14  5 6 3   20-14  21  

7  Esbjerg fB       14  5 4 5   26-25  19

8  Randers FC       13  4 3 6   16-19  15   

9  AC Horsens       14  2 7 5   10-16  13

10 Viborg FF        14  4 1 9   14-30  13 

-----------------------------------------

11 Silkeborg IF     14  2 2 10  13-28   8 

12 Vejle BK         14  2 2 10  17-35   8 

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[SCF08]

Jonathan de Guzman just scored a sensational game winning free-kick for Feyenoord in the 85th minute. Final result was 2-1. I'll post a video of it probably tomorrow. A must watch..!

[Curtis Armada]

Nice Goal

http://www.fr1908-online.nl/video/guzmanvrijetrap.wmv

quote:Originally posted by SCF08

Jonathan de Guzman just scored a sensational game winning free-kick for Feyenoord in the 85th minute. Final result was 2-1. I'll post a video of it probably tomorrow. A must watch..!

[jonovision]

quote:Originally posted by Curtis Armada

Nice Goal

http://www.fr1908-online.nl/video/guzmanvrijetrap.wmv

According to the voice on the clip, JDG2 entered as a substitute in the 2nd half.

[Daniel]

quote:Originally posted by Curtis Armada

Nice Goal

http://www.fr1908-online.nl/video/guzmanvrijetrap.wmv

He's gonna break our hearts [V].

[Grizzly]

quote:Originally posted by Daniel

He's gonna break our hearts [V].

He not gone yet though. I am still hoping that if we were to hire a respected international coach (though I am not sure how likely this will be) and the DeGuzman family sees that things are going more professional with the national team that we might still have a chance.

[Ceres]

quote:Originally posted by ken

I'd be very suprised to see Hutchinson go to Wigan for a number of reasons. From what we've been told FCK is not a club that signs players with the hope of quickly moving them on; they paid a good price to get him and would have to get a lot more to move him this quickly; Wigan does not strike me as the type of team to pay a lot for what is- in english terms- an unknown player, I would think they would pay for an older name as Bolton does.

It not by chance FCK is known as the "Scandinavian Chelsea", since they are not a typical Scandinavian team at all. FCK are among the very rich teams of Europe and produce turnovers that would even make some of the big German Bundesliga teams envy.. So in other words they can afford to buy the players they want in the Bundesliga or the EPL, like they e.g. did with Grønkjaer and the Swedish NT captain Tobias Linderoth. They also have no debts and produce an avrage net profit of around €5 million every year, so unlike other scandinavian teams, FCK are in no need of selling any players at all and only do so if they get an offer that is way too good to resist.

How big an offer Wigan would need to make to get Hutchinson is difficult to say. FCK I belive paid €1.1 million + sign-on fee (probably around €300k) when they got him from Helsingborgs IF. Normally FCK then would (as minimum) ask for atleast around twice what they paid themself, though it ofcause also depend on how much FCK value his performance and how much they think they would need to pay to get a proper replacement.

To give a few e.g. then Alvaro Santos was signed from Helsingborgs IF for around €1.8 million 3 years ago and was sold this summer for €3 million to Sochaux. But then Santos never really became the big success they had hoped he would be, so he was actually on sale, when they were trying to get his replacement Ailton.

Tobias Linderoth on the other hand was signed for around £750k when he was 25 (and the backup for Gravesen at Everton), now he's 27 and FCK refused a €2.5 million offer from Galatasary this summer, saying that they would not sell him for less than around €5.5 million .. Atiba is still young and progressing quite well, so I doubt they will let him go for less than €4 million, if an English club is going to make a bid.

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[Grizzly]

quote:Originally posted by Ceres

Well, you cant really rely more on the European Country Ranking than e.g. the World NT ranking since it has it's big flaws as well.

The League rankings has its flaws but is still more accurate than the FIFA rankings because most of the points are earned against decent opposition. The flaw is that it compares the top clubs of leagues not the league as a whole so a poor league with a couple of good teams has an advantage over a league with a more solid table. In fact, I completely agree with your next statement:

quote:the ranking very much favor leagues with one or two teams that usually qualify for the EC every season, getting a better seeding and easier opponents to collect points and bonus points for the league ranking

Yet this is exactly the type of league that Denmark is. What I in fact don't like with the Danish league is that it has two teams who finish 1st and 2nd every year, FCK and Brondby and a lot of other vastly inferior teams. So basically the Danish league is ranked low in a system that is designed to favour leagues like Denmark. Plus as a winter league Denmark has a further advantage over Russia and more importantly the rival Scandanavian leagues. Occasionally one or two clubs from a country have a good run and it gets overranked (I don't think anyone believes Romania has the 7th best league) yet when I look at the countries ranked ahead of Denmark I don't see any country that I think definitely has a league inferior to Denmark. There are a few who probably are of a similar level (Switzerland, Serbia, Norway) but Denmark is not out of place at 21. As with all ranking systems, even when they are flawed there is still a lot of truth to them (Canada may be continually ranked too low in the FIFA rankings but we are far from a top 20 nation). In this case the ranking flaw actually benefits Denmark and they are still low because Kopenhagen and Brondby have performed poorly in recent years. Basically we are arguing here about whether Denmark is the 21st or 15th best team in Europe when neither signify a particularly good league.

quote:The Danish league as such is e.g. better than the Scottish PL both if you look at the actual quality of play and if you compare how the smaller to average Danish and Scottish teams perform in the Europa Cups. Still (Like Rangers and Celtic do for Scotland).

This I totally disagree with. I do think Scotland is ranked too high (11th) but I think its smaller clubs are clearly superior to the small Danish clubs. What Europa Cups are you talking about? Intertoto? I can't think of a much worse way to compare leagues as many teams don't take such tournaments very seriously and often play subs or reserve teams. I've been to a few Intertoto matches and have seen this myself. These lower level UEFA cup tournaments are basically friendlies until the last few rounds and I would certainly not put any faith in the results. I do think a more accurate way of comparing leagues would indeed be a tournament of mid-table and lower table teams but one would have to give the teams a motivation to play for and ensure that they play their top players.

I do agree with your assertion that Denmark is a development league but so are most of the other leagues below the top 10 so I am not sure how this negatively effects Denmark's ranking. The 5 year ranking is a good thing and is meant to minimize anomalies. Yes Denmark has performed better than Scotland this year. Outperform Scotland 5 years in a row and you will both be and deserve to be ranked higher than them.

quote:Ther are no Danish players in Russia and this is not by chance, since they know they would be totally forgotten by the Danish media and NT coach if they moved to Russia. They would also be out of sight for the top European leagues, so if a Danish player is good enough to attract attention from abroad he chose to stay at home, playing in the Danish Superliga in hope of getting a contract with a Dutch or German team, rather than moving to Russia and be forgotten..

There are no Danish players in Russia but this has more to do with tradition, location and player agent connections than the reasons you state. If your players would be ignored by national team selectors for playing in Russia you have a bad coaching staff. Norway and Finland both have national team players playing in Russia and they are still selected. There are far superior European soccer nations than Denmark who have large numbers of players in Russia in particular the Czech Republic. For a variety of reasons not a lot of western European players have played in Russia but this is starting to change as Lokomotiv recently signed Scottish national team player Garry O'Connor and of course there are the Dynamo Moscow Portugese players (all of whom have disappointed).

There is some advantage to Denmark as far as visibility and scouting go but again as the Russian league continues to improve it is getting more and more heavily scouted. This is not the times of the Soviet Union, Bundesliga and EPL teams for example are aware of who is performing well in Russia, players are not forgotten there. Lokomotiv loaned Bikey to Reading in the EPL this year for example while several players transferred from Russia to La Liga. While Saturn would only have an outside chance of qualifying for CL or UEFA don't forget that while FCK usually qualifies for one of these tournaments it also usually gets eliminated in the early rounds with this year being the first time they have gotten to the group stage of CL which is where players start to get noticed.

To bring this back to Hutchinson, I think it is time for him to play in a real league not a development league. He is 23 and is really getting beyond the age of being a developing player. I don't think FCK is a bad club even though I also found their performance so far disappointing. They do have some quality players like Gronkjaer and Allback but these players are also older and finishing out their careers. The question is whether Hutchinson is going to develop into a star player who can play for a top club in a top league or is going to remain a good player on a good club in a poor league. From a soccer standpoint the few Champions League games are not significant enough to make up for not playing high level soccer week in and week out, especially as there is a strong possibility that FCK won't make the CL group stage next year. He also has nowhere to move within Denmark because he is already at the best team. Were he to star with Saturn he would probably find himself playing for Lokomotiv, Spartak, Zenit or CSKA fairly soon and in Wigan he would have similar opportunities.

I actually find it a negative that FCK has a lot of money and may be unwilling to sell him. He is playing in a development league but not on a development team. FCK is in conceived as a Euro Cup team more than a Danish league team. My hope is not that Russia would be his endstation but rather that a top club in a top league would be the endstation. I just think that if he is going to get stuck somewhere playing out his contract, Saturn would have been the better option than FCK. If the exposure he is getting at FCK allows him to transfer in the near future than he probably made the best choice to go to FCK.

To be fair to FCK, I don't think he is in a horrible situation there but I do think it would be beneficial for his soccer career to move on shortly. The debate about Saturn or Russia is really moot because there is almost no chance of him moving there now. I would definitely prefer him to be at Wigan than FCK although as I said earlier my first choice would be to move to a good Bundesliga or French team. As much as he is already a good player I would really like to see him develop into a star EPL or Bundesliga player. Canada needs a player like this, we have several players who play at this level but none of them are exceptional players at that level of play. Hopefully Atiba will make the career moves that will allow him to reach this level and I don't think staying 2 more years at FCK is the best way to achieve this.

[Ceres]

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

The differece is that the ranking only favors the leagues if the 1 or 2 top teams are always on top and highly superior every season and have been so in many years (like Celtic, Rangers.. or Rosenborg from Norway) to secure the good seeding = easy opponents (+ Bonus points in CL), which ofcause leads to an even better seeding and more points to the country ranking..

Unfortunately for Denmark FCK is a very young and rather inexperienced club and have not looked this rich and strong all that many years, so they still got a low seeding that very much disfavor them in the Europa cup every season (also this season), while Brøndby at times are selling so many players (usually in the winter break right before the Europa Cups) that it makes them much too inconsistent in Europe to keep a top ranking over a 5-year period (just look at this season, it's not very likely they even qualify for Europe next season).

??... The low Country ranking means that Danish teams are forced to play Europa Cup qualifiers, which always are placed when the Danish teams are about to finish their vacation and hardly have played their first game of the season, while all their opponents in the Norther Zone of the Europa Cups (except for the Welsh and Scotish teams) are in top shape and well into mid or last stage of their season. So I fail to see how this would be a Danish advantage over e.g. Swedish or Norwegian players who are clearly in much better shape for their first rounds of the Europa cups..

Well, lets forget about FCK, Brøndby, Rangers and Celtic for a moment to have a look at what the other Danish and Scottish teams have shown in Europe the past two years. This season OB Odense from Denmark beat Hibernian from Scotland in the very last round of the UEFA Intertoto cup, to qualify for the UEFA Cup. Both teams were fielding their best team available and Odense clearly looked more superior in the games than the results actually reveal (despite having lost a key midfielder and all their forwards to foreign clubs and retirement in the winter break). Odense then progressed to the UEFA cup group stage by first eliminating Llanelli FC (Wales 6-1 in all) and then the German Bundesliga leaders Herta Berlin (2-2 away and 1-0 at home), while Hearts from Scotland were eliminated by Sparta Praha (0-2 at home and 0-0 away). Besides this the inexperienced Scottish side Gretna were trashed 1-7 in all by an Irish side, while the also inexperienced and newly promoted Danish Cup winners Randers progressed to the 1st round of the UEFA Cup by first eliminating ÍA Akranes from Iceland and then Kaunas from Lithuania.

Last season looks no better for the Scottish teams when Dundee United were eliminated by MyPa-47 from Finland in the 2nd Qualifying Round of the UEFA cup, while Hibernian were eliminated (1-5 in all) by Dnipro Dnipropetrovsk from Ukraine in the 1st round. As for the Danish teams, then Esbjerg beat Flora Tallinn (Estonia) 7-2 in all then to lost to Norwegian Tromsø in a Penalty shootout after having lost 0-1 at home but won 1-0 away. FC Midtjylland beat B36 Torshavn from the Faroes then to get eliminated by CSKA Moscow (6-2 in all).. All-in-all, the two Scottish teams produced 3 draws, while the two Danish teams produced 3 victories and a draw.

You can then ofcause argue the strenght of their opponents, but I would rate the UEFA cup champions CSKA Moscow to be a much better team than Dnipropetrovsk, while MyPa-47 from Finland is clearly of a much lesser quality than Norwegian Tromsø and probably no better than Flora Tallinn who this season managed to eliminate Lyn Oslo from Norway.

[mjoni]

I don't think we need to worry about Atiba, he's still developing in Denmark at the moment. He seems comfortable, but needs to score more so that he develops the confidence to dominate. Once he's mastered that, he'll be getting better offers than Wigan.

Also, let's not forget that there's more out there than just the EPL. Some have thought that Atiba would fit it in Italy. A top German or French side could be a good fit too.

[Ceres]

quote:Originally posted by mjoni

I don't think we need to worry about Atiba, he's still developing in Denmark at the moment. He seems comfortable, but needs to score more so that he develops the confidence to dominate. Once he's mastered that, he'll be getting better offers than Wigan.

Also, let's not forget that there's more out there than just the EPL. Some have thought that Atiba would fit it in Italy. A top German or French side could be a good fit too.

I agree, ther is no need to worry about Atiba, if he keeps developing he will keep attracting more attention and keep getting offers. It's really no problem when playing in Denmark where ther are big Danish/foreign agents and scouts all over the place. It's not only when FCK play CL he will get noticed. Also smaller Danish teams like e.g. FC Nordsjælland have sold several players the past year or so to the Dutch league without even qualifying for the Europa cups and OB Odense who won Superliga Bronze medals last season and then almost lost half their lineup in the summer break just before the Europa Cup kicked off are now again being heavily scouted while playing Uefa cup and 99% sure to lose their best player in the winter break.

FCK is a much bigger club than Odense and attract more attention from aborad, the difference ofcause being that FCK are not in the business of selling players, so they are able to demand bigger transfer fees, but they will still let Atiba go if the price is right. But as written, then Atiba need to look more sharp and score more goals, to attract better offers than Wigan. Though it could be a problem that he got an unknown agent :

http://www.transfermarkt.de/berater/spieler_des_beraters.php4?berater=677

The big Agents on the Danish market are:

Euro Connections (Ivan Marco benes, who live in Denmark) :

http://www.transfermarkt.de/berater/spieler_des_beraters.php4?berater=300

ProActive Management (Karsten Aabrink, John Sivebaek who are both Danish and Paul Stretford from England) :

http://www.transfermarkt.de/berater/spieler_des_beraters.php4?berater=225

and then to a lesser extend Vincenzo Morabito (A highly rated Italian Agent who speaks Danish). It can be difficult to make transfer deals in Denmark if you dont get some kind of a deal with ProActive or Euro Connections.

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[Ceres]

quote:Originally posted by mjoni

I don't think we need to worry about Atiba, he's still developing in Denmark at the moment. He seems comfortable, but needs to score more so that he develops the confidence to dominate. Once he's mastered that, he'll be getting better offers than Wigan.

Also, let's not forget that there's more out there than just the EPL. Some have thought that Atiba would fit it in Italy. A top German or French side could be a good fit too.

I agree, ther is no need to worry about Atiba, if he keeps developing he will keep attracting more attention and keep getting offers. It's really no problem when playing in Denmark where ther are big Danish/foreign agents and scouts all over the place. It's not only when FCK play CL he will get noticed. Also smaller Danish teams like e.g. FC Nordsjælland have sold several players the past year or so to the Dutch league without even qualifying for the Europa cups and OB Odense who won Superliga Bronze medals last season and then almost lost half their lineup in the summer break just before the Europa Cup kicked off are now again being heavily scouted while playing Uefa cup and 99% sure to lose their best player in the winter break.

FCK is a much bigger club than Odense and attract more attention from aborad, the difference ofcause being that FCK are not in the business of selling players, so they are able to demand bigger transfer fees, but they will still let Atiba go if the price is right. But as written, then Atiba need to look more sharp and score more goals, to attract better offers than Wigan. Though it could be a problem that he got an unknown agent :

http://www.transfermarkt.de/berater/spieler_des_beraters.php4?berater=677

The big Agents on the Danish market are:

Euro Connections (Ivan Marco benes, who live in Denmark) :

http://www.transfermarkt.de/berater/spieler_des_beraters.php4?berater=300

ProActive Management (Karsten Aabrink, John Sivebaek who are both Danish and Paul Stretford from England) :

http://www.transfermarkt.de/berater/spieler_des_beraters.php4?berater=225

and then to a lesser extend Vincenzo Morabito (A highly rated Italian Agent who speaks Danish). It can be difficult to make transfer deals in Denmark if you dont get some kind of a deal with ProActive or Euro Connections.

.

[Guest Ed]

Ryan Gyaki was injured on Wednesday in a Reserves B game for Sheffield United, coming off only 12 minutes into the game. Hope it is nothing serious.

[Guest Ed]

Ryan Gyaki was injured on Wednesday in a Reserves B game for Sheffield United, coming off only 12 minutes into the game. Hope it is nothing serious.

[Grizzly]

Ceres, once again you are full of excuses for Denmark's low ranking. The system does indeed compare the best teams in the leagues not the league as a whole but since the problem with Denmark's league is that the quality drops off dramatically as one goes down the table, once again I state that the calculation method is in Denmark's favour. If your teams can't win early round qualification games they don't deserve to advance in the tournament or pick up points. The system is simple, if you win you pick up points and are ranked higher. If you deserve more spots or an earlier entry into a competition you will get it on merit.

As far as Scotland goes, I imagine that the Midtjylland and Odensee can compete with teams like Hearts and Hibs, it is the lower half of the table in which I think Scotland is superior. I think the quality drops more as one goes down the table in Denmark than it does in Scotland. Maybe Scotland is ranked a few places to high and Denmark a few places too low but the fact remains that apart from a couple of teams these are both not very good or competitive leagues. The Scottish league is really a moot point anyway because I am not advocating that Atiba should transfer to Scotland, would be unhappy if he did and think there is almost no chance of this happening anyway.

Maybe it is true your coaching staff tells Danish players not to play in Russia because they won't get called up. However, if they consider Holland a major league worthy of playing in and not Russia then this is basically ignorance on their part. The Russian league has a very similar level of play to Holland and again is probably a bit stronger at the lower half of the table. The UEFA rankings of the leagues 1 to 5 and 6 to 10 seem about right to me from my own viewing of these leagues with one exception. Yes in both the 1 to 5 group and the 6 to 10 group one could debate a bit who should be where within this group but I would say the first level of leagues would contain Spain, Italy, England, France and Germany and the second level would be Portugal, Holland, Russia and Belgium. Romania seems to be too high based on two years of excellent results from several teams though I will admit to not being an expert on Romanian soccer so maybe the league is stronger than I am giving it credit for. Now Holland does have some advantages over Russia in that I rate their youth development as better and it is more heavily scouted in part because like Denmark, a scouting trip is only a short drive for many scouts. You however make it sound like there are no scouts at all in Russia and that it is a complete soccer backwater. If a Danish national team player is playing in Russia I can't see any reason why he should be ignored by the coach. I can understand the coach being mad if he turned down offers from Germany and Spain to play in Russia but if he chose Russia over Portugal, Belgium or Holland I don't think there should be any problem.

The crux of my argument is that in my opinion a player should play in the best league possible as long as it is not above his ability. I think once a player is beyond the early development stage (which Atiba is at 23) he should play in the league where he will get the highest level of competition week in and week out while still being a starter. If he gets transfered soon because FCK played in the CL this year then his career is progressing as it should. If he plays the next two years in Denmark I think this will reduce somewhat his potential, he may still become a very good player but I think he could have achieved more had he upped his level earlier. I would indeed be much happier if he were at a mid-table club in Holland like Rob Friend, a situation which I think is quite similar to if he transfered to Saturn. At Heerenveen like Saturn he probably wouldn't get CL experience but I think he would be playing at a higher level week in and week out. He would also be able to move to a better club with CL potential within the same league.

I don't mean to slight the Danish league or development system either. We have many players in various Scandanavian leagues and they seem to be developing well there. I just think that Atiba is a special player and needs to be playing at a higher level regularly. The problem with many European leagues is that they are in small countries with one or two large cities and one or two clubs with large fan bases and corporate sponsors and the rest of the clubs cannot compete. I am against the super league that the big European teams are pushing. Yet I think it would be good if some of the smaller countries could join their leagues, for example, a Scandanavian league with the national championships determined by Cup competitions. I think in this scenario that teams like FCK would be playing in leagues more suited to their club level and players needing to leave the club to play against better competition would be less of an issue. I think it is not so much that Atiba should leave FCK but rather he should leave the Danish league. Were FCK playing in a better league things would be fine in my opinion.

[Ceres]

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

Ceres, once again you are full of excuses for Denmark's low ranking. The system does indeed compare the best teams in the leagues not the league as a whole but since the problem with Denmark's league is that the quality drops off dramatically as one goes down the table, once again I state that the calculation method is in Denmark's favour. If your teams can't win early round qualification games they don't deserve to advance in the tournament or pick up points. The system is simple, if you win you pick up points and are ranked higher. If you deserve more spots or an earlier entry into a competition you will get it on merit.

It's unfortunately not quite so. The ranking only favors big teams that not only dominate their own leagues, but also are so rich that they are able too keep a squad consistency and quality of their team at a level so they regularly do well every season in the Europa cups. This favors the very rich clubs like e.g. Celtic, Rangers, Rosenborg... and granted now also FCK.

The problem is that FCK as a rich top team is not yet old enough to have been able to break the curse of their poor seeding over a 5-year period. Perhaps in 2 to 3 years from now FCK will be in the same favorable position as Rosenborg, Rangers and Celtic, who either automatically qualify and get free bonus points or atleast get seeded for the 3rd Qualifying Round for the CL. But as long as your not seeded, you will keep facing opponents like Ajax or Liverpool in the qualifying round for the CL, or Hertha Berlin in the UEFA Cup, while teams like Rangers are earning their points and keep their ranking high by e.g. having to beat a team from Cyprus or Israel.

Before FCK became this rich, all Danish average and top teams in the past were losing their best players right before the Europa cups kickes off every season. Perhaps once in a blue moon a team like Brøndby have been able to keep their team fairly intact a whole season, which then also makes them look fairly strong in the Europa cups, but ther is no way a danish top team were able to keep their best players over a 2-year period or keep any kind of consistency over a 5-year period. In fact it's no wonder that Brøndby did fairly well last season but then looking like a major disaster in Europe this season, when they have sold €20 million worth of players, while at the same time suffering alot of injuries in their squad.

OB Odense have done well in both the UEFA Intertoto and UEFA Cup this season, but it's more of a miracle that they have been able to get some good players to replace the 4 key players they lost just before this Europa cup season kicked off. Normally it takes time to replace this many key players and make it work, but Odense have been very lucky to get some players that fit right in from the very start and also got the quality to be the right replacements.

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

As far as Scotland goes, I imagine that the Midtjylland and Odensee can compete with teams like Hearts and Hibs, it is the lower half of the table in which I think Scotland is superior. I think the quality drops more as one goes down the table in Denmark than it does in Scotland.

I was having a look in the stats to find the last time a Scottsh team besides Celtic and Rangers managed to beat a Danish team in the Europa Cups... I had to go back to 1971/72, long before professional football was introduced in Denmark, when Dundee FC beat the 100% amateurs from AB Copenhagen. I'm quite sure that Vejle are a level better than Finnish MyPa-47 who managed to eliminate Dundee United in the UEFA cup last season and I'm sure Vejle also are a level better than the Irish team that trashed Scottish Gretna 7-1 in-all in the UEFA cup this season.

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

Maybe it is true your coaching staff tells Danish players not to play in Russia because they won't get called up. However, if they consider Holland a major league worthy of playing in and not Russia then this is basically ignorance on their part. The Russian league has a very similar level of play to Holland and again is probably a bit stronger at the lower half of the table.

The problem with Russia is not the strenght of the league, but a bad reputation of problems with corruption and players not getting their money in time (or at all) and then the fact, you point out yourself, that it's not really as much on the radar of Agents and scouts from the bigger clubs of Europe as if you were playing in the Dutch or Danish league for that matter. Ther is a reason why the russian NT is always lower in the ranking and doing poorer than the danish NT, despite Russia being a much bigger country.

quote:Originally posted by Grizzly

I think it is not so much that Atiba should leave FCK but rather he should leave the Danish league. Were FCK playing in a better league things would be fine in my opinion.

Why be in such a hurry to leave a league that is known to develop more players to the top leagues of Europe than e.g. the Russian league ?. If the level of the Danish league really was as low as you think, then it would not be able to produce this much talent and the danish NT would never be higher ranked or qualify more often for the big Euro and WC finals than the likes of Austria, Scotland or Russia for that matter.

Other internationals at FCK, like the Swedish NT captain Linderoth, Allbäck and danish Jesper Grønkjaer are quite happy playing in the danish league and players like Gravgaard and Lars Jacobsen who have developed to become regular starters for the danish NT while playing in the danish league for FCK are in no hurry to leave. Also the FCK bench sitter Razak Pimpong was found good enough to play for Ghana at the WC-06 finals, so I dont see why Atiba should be in a hurry to leave. He's only 23, has much to learn and need to be a regular starter to develop further.

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