Club Football Season 2010-2011, La Liga, EPL, Serie A, Champions League

This past weekend Manchester United beat Chelsea 3-1 in the FA Community Shield, the annual kick off to the upcoming Premiere League season and with UEFA Champions League play offs fixing to get underway next week as teams scramble to make it to the group stages I felt it's time to do a club football thread here on JTF! Discuss any league you want, let's get the futbol talk going!

Forced mi amor to watch the Real Madrid vs LA Galaxy friendly this past Saturday night. First half was LA Galaxy owning up on my beloved Los Merengues, though Drenthe made sure to DE JONG KICK a Galaxy player in the chest. Galaxy scored 2 goals in the 1st half, the first the messiest most fumbled about goal one can imagine and the 2nd a PK by Landon Donovan. The 2nd half was all Los Blancos owning up on Galaxy like nothing. Two goals by Gonzalo Higuain, the 2nd one was BOSS, and then a 3rd goal for Los Blancos by Xabi Alonso with a WONDERFUL long distance version of the Raulina! All in all a fun game, though I hope Los Blancos play bettter than that when their season starts. I hope Mourinho can lead us to the promised land of the 10th European Cup/Champions League. I have gotten to see them win it 3 times in my life so far, but we NEED that 10th one! Please dont' let us down this season Los Blancos! Win La Liga and PLEASE win the Copa del Rey because it's breaks my heart everytime we underachieve there. We haven't had it since 1993, so PLEASE win the Copa del Rey!!

Caught bits and pieces of the Community Shield game, was a scrappier game than the scoreline suggests. Looking forward to the new Premiere leage season though. I always root for Liverpool when it comes to British teams cos they kind of caught my eye in the 80's with their several European Cup wins, but I dont' like their chances, especially since it's coming out they may face ADMINISTRATION in a few months if they can't work out their debt issues. I dug Manchester City ALOT last season, they had the most entertaining games consistently last season, so I will be keeping an eye on them. And of course it's good to have Newcastle United back, hope they can stay up. Also will be fun to see how Blackpool do.

Serie A, I'm predicting it's going to be a tight, tough season. Will be close stuff, would not be surprised if Roma improve and end Inter's stranglehold on the Scudetto. Of course any team can come up and surprise here.

Well just random thoughts to get things going. Let the chit chat football/soccer talk fly!

I am trying to settle on a Bundesliga team to adopt, since that's the league I've elected to follow. Bayern Munich is out, because I just don't do Yankees-like franchises that win all the time.

Suggestions?

Wish I could help you, but I'm in the same boat, trying to find a team to back in the English leagues. All my old buddies in Ireland supported either Man U. or Liverpool, but I would rather stay away from those just to be different. My Braddock siblings are huge Sheffield United fans. Are they worth supporting, or do they suck? I'd appreciate any and all suggestions as well.

The Bundesliga questions are probably best answered by Tommy. I haven't had a bunch of exposure to German club football through the years outside of European cup competitions, right now I'm following Schalke in Bundesliga but that is only because my favorite player of all time is now playing there. Though, I will say I want Raul to do well but not so much that I want the team to do well, if that makes sense. I have sort of had a soft spot for Werder Bremen in the past decade or so, and that is just from European competitions but no se'.

When it comes to picking teams to support I am not sure what to tell you. My family has alot of history around the city of Madrid and my mother raised me with almost mythological stories about Real Madrid and thus, I was raised a Madridsta through and through. There were a few teams I latched onto at times, not ever supplanting Los Blancos mind you, but that I followed in their own leagues. I guess my advice is if a club hasn't been passed down to you through family somehow, either trace your family roots and see what clubs are in those parts of the world and see if you feel any connection to them, or just WATCH and see which team appeals to you. This weekend coming up is a great weekend to start cos the Premiere League starts, so, yeah, just watch and see what appeals to you if nothing else. It could be a team's jersey, a specific player, a playing style, etc. Just watch and see if it jumps at you.

Edit: OH and about Sheffield United, I can't say I know too much about them. I know most of their big accomplishments were really, really, really long ago. Like 1890's through 1920's. Which doesn't mean anything btw, a team's trophy list shouldn't be a deciding factor for supporting or not supporting a club. They play in the Championship, the division just under the Premiere League in England, and they came in 8th last season. You can watch the Championship division on Fox Soccer Plus if you have it (I don't and thus can't, but I do have Fox Soccer Channel). They are one of 20 gazillion teams with red/white striped jerseys in Europe. I am more familiar with Sheffield Wednesday as they had a cooler sounding name to me through the years. Here is a video on youtube claiming to be their top 10 goals:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9qmxhYN4Hgk
Goal number 6 is AWESOME, the set up anyways. Can't say I've ever seen that before. Hope that helps.

Hop on to the Man City bandwagon before it gets too crowded. They're spending money and improving, and maybe they'll earn a Champions League spot this year.

Nick is right about Man City, that bandwagon is going to get super crowded. In the EPL I am going to support Tottenham Hotspur, saw a few of their games last year and I like the way they play. They are good enough to play with the top teams yet not a dominant team like Chelsea or Man U.

In the Bundesliga I follow Bayern Munich, but if I think FC Koln would be fun just because they have a goat in their logo, so yeah... that's cool.

And of course ROMA! In Serie A. ROMA!

I'm a Chicago Fire fan by default. So glad they got Brian McBride. But there just isn't enough MLS coverage, even with DISH Network. And the English league system fascinates me, so I'd really like to find a league there that I could watch consistently. A lot of people are saying Man City is rapidly building up its fanbase. Others still are saying Americans should gravitate toward Fulham, due to its history of signing American players. But suffice it to say, I'm still looking. I remember watching an Arsenal game last year that was very entertaining. And from what I've read, Liverpool is a great team with a better fanbase. Tottenham Hotspur is also getting quite a lot of recommendations. Two teams I know for sure that I want to stay away from though, are Man United and Chelsea.

Caught the 2nd half and PK shootout of the Real Madrid vs Bayern Munich friendly today. Was a scrappy affair that 2nd half that saw Bayern looking better in all honesty. But mucho gracias San Iker! He stopped TWO PK's in the PK shootout which got Los Merengues the win and a big ass trophy. The thing is seriously huge! Of course pre-season friendly trophies mean nothing, but yeah.. Good times!

And tomorrow starts the EPL! Tottenham vs Man City in the morning on ESPN2 I think, lotsa' games on FSC all weekend, should be good times!

On a side note, is anyone planning to get FIFA 11? I still have 09, and really like it, but been thinking a lot about getting 11. The addition of precision passing is kinda' a deterrant though...

I'm still at FIFA '09.
If they've polished/perfected the "Be a Pro" mode enough, I'll consider getting the '11.
... if precision passing is optional.

Amen on the "optional" precision passing. Forcing it would just take the fun out of the game for me.

Tottenham vs Man City was fun, though Spurs should've won it by several instead of a 0-0 draw. Manchester City should throw lots of kudos and thanks to Joe Hart today! He saved them! Also, the new Tottenham home jerseys are AWESOME! I hadn't seen those, very very cool! Aston Villa destroyed West Ham! Poor Wes Ham United fans. Can't wait to see clips of Blackpool beating Wigan in their Premiere league debut, that should be boss! Season is starting off interesting!

I wanted to see Spurs vs City pretty bad, but went to bed too late last night, and couldn't drag my ass out of bed at 6:30 in the morning. Wish there were reruns or somewhere I could download it. Saw Chelsea butcher West Brom though, as well as the nil-nil draw between Bolton and Fulham (zzzzzzzzzzz). Hopefully I can be up tomorrow in time for Liverpool v. Arsenal.

On FSC and sometimes other Fox Sports localized networks they run the Premiere League Review show where you get all the clips of all the games from this weekend. On FSC it'll be on around 7pm central/8pm eastern. Just in case anyone wants to see the whole weekend summarized in one hour. Monday it's Manchester United vs Newcastle United on ESPN2 I think..

There was also a "Super Sunday Plus" show after Liverpool v. Arsenal today (very good game) that recapped the whole weekend's worth of games - as well as covered the New York v. LA MLS game from last night.