Great Leader Sprucenuce wrote:As a fan of a smaller club i don't.

You spend all year to qualify for said competition only to give it up for a competition you probably won't win anyway? it's absolutely pathetic.

They don't though. They spend all year trying to win Serie A. CL is mostly a big payday for them.

They are not trying to just participate in these competitions, they are trying to win the league. Anything else will be seen as a failure at the end of the season.

Not trying to participate in the best competition in club football

Honestly the more this goes on the more pathetic i consider it.

Great Leader Sprucenuce wrote:Not trying to participate in the best competition in club football

Honestly the more this goes on the more pathetic i consider it.

Amen.

Yeah, I can't actually agree with most of those points but I guess it is something that is very much a reality for Napoli so me agreeing or empathising is inconsequential. Hopefully ADL actually quits that sort of mentality one day, does not actually help with growth.

I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with their approach because it doesn't actually matter, I'm just explaining their situation.

I don't find it pathetic though, I understand it. Their attempts at giving everything to win the league I find more respectable than Roma's eternal "just competing".

It's about reality as well as cold hard logic and probability. Napoli are not going to win the CL. Don't think there's a single person on this board that give them a legit chance of doing so why should they dedicate 100% of their resources towards it when they are not deep enough to give it a proper run and have a very real chance of ending Juve's hegemony in Serie A? Getting out of the group is likely their objective and anything beyond that is probably a bonus. Winning the whole damn thing is absolutely not in their plans nor is it on the cards for them.

To ignore that and blindly go after a CL title they have zero chance of winning simply doesn't make sense.

It's like the realists and romantics have switched places

It's not about that.

I just don't like the mentality this is breeding, i felt the same way about Spurs last year when they similarly basically didn't give a *bleep* about the CL.

Not respecting the EL is one thing but there's just something that irks me about the idea of you spend 38 games to actually get there ( whether that was the motivation is irrelevant) and when it comes to it you consider it the lesser of importance.

Why even bother in the first place and like i said it's the biggest and best competition in European football which literally decides the best of the best, there's something about the idea of a team considering it a hindrance that i do not like.

But this is exactly why it is really important for Serie A to have teams like Inter and Milan back in the mix again over teams like Napoli, or Udinese. Teams like this were the root of Serie A losing its legitimacy and its four spots. England, prior to this season's resurgence was almost going down a similar path because of representatives like Leicester and even missing out on Chelsea, or United one year, or Liverpool.

I'm sure there are a lot of people who think that some of us are saying Napoli don't care to try to save face for Serie A, Italy, or to excuse their poorer results but really, its not the case. They started a lessened line up from the beginning of the Champions League. They played their full strength only against Nice in the playoff (the irony). They still played strong line ups but fell short of City, losing Ghoulam in the process (the irony again), but their concentration isn't divided for a team of their quality. Its fixated on Serie A but they've still played hard in the Champions League, you only have to watch a game to realize that. Last season they made the Round of 16, this season they could do the same potentially or get bounced to the EL and do the same, so there are not large differences.

It is a team that does desperately want to win Serie A, even if it means they sell off half their team afterwards. It would be a great success for them and understandably so. But I said it cheekily on the page before, they want to be champions but not play in the Champions League. That's why it is up to Juventus to stop this tyranny and bring glory to the peninsula (@tom).

Agreed Luca. Napoli became relevant when there were ownership and financial issues with the Milano clubs, together with Juventus's calciopoli issues. ADL is wealthy, but not football wealthy. He can't possibly compete with Pallotta, the Chinese or Fiat. He can't even compete with Lotito financially. This is Napoli's one chance to win a Scudetto, which will not come back for a long time.

breva wrote:Agreed Luca. Napoli became relevant when there were ownership and financial issues with the Milano clubs, together with Juventus's calciopoli issues. ADL is wealthy, but not football wealthy. He can't possibly compete with Pallotta, the Chinese or Fiat. He can't even compete with Lotito financially. This is Napoli's one chance to win a Scudetto, which will not come back for a long time.

Tbh ADL can compete with all these owners you mention except Agnelli because he is much better at it than they are. When ADL bought Napoli in Serie C Milan was winning champions leagues, Roma and Lazio were the same as they are, and Inter was getting ready to pounce on post-calciopoli Serie A.

Milan's chinese league of shadows, Pallotta and Lotito have little to do vs ADL. Only Sunning might with their money, but then again there is FFP and they haven't done many relevant things besides getting Spalletti.

rincon wrote:

breva wrote:Agreed Luca. Napoli became relevant when there were ownership and financial issues with the Milano clubs, together with Juventus's calciopoli issues. ADL is wealthy, but not football wealthy. He can't possibly compete with Pallotta, the Chinese or Fiat. He can't even compete with Lotito financially. This is Napoli's one chance to win a Scudetto, which will not come back for a long time.

Tbh ADL can compete with all these owners you mention except Agnelli because he is much better at it than they are. When ADL bought Napoli in Serie C Milan was winning champions leagues, Roma and Lazio were the same as they are, and Inter was getting ready to pounce on post-calciopoli Serie A.

Milan's chinese league of shadows, Pallotta and Lotito have little to do vs ADL. Only Sunning might with their money, but then again there is FFP and they haven't done many relevant things besides getting Spalletti.

The Raptor Group owned by James Pallotta is an investment company with access to capital that ADL can only dream of. Lotito and ADL have similar means, but Lazio is in Rome. Suning is an ATM and with sponsorships alla PSG, they will be able to pump money into the club notwithstanding FFP. ADL and Napoli are not at the same level financially.

Financially, I consider Napoli in a better position than us primarily because they haven't had to be forced into selling their stars unless it's for a stupidly high fee like Cavani and Higuain went for. We've, on the other hand, been forced into selling key pieces to our squad each summer and then low-balling other clubs for their surplus players that we then polish off and turn into better players, only for the cycle to continue.

There's also the very real possibility that Pallotta may sell the club if the stadium doesn't get built.

Until we get a stadium and a kit sponsor (I'll point out that Napoli have no fewer than 4, I believe) and stop having to sell major stars every summer, Pallotta's money doesn't mean a whole lot right now.

A team that wants to win Serie A does not want to focus on CL because they feel they are "not competent" to have a deep run in the competition.. it speaks volumes about Serie A and Italian football.

Just noticed that Napoli are only 2 points ahead at the top spot. It will only take a few bad games until their fans wish that they would have rather focused on CL/EL.

McLewis wrote:Financially, I consider Napoli in a better position than us primarily because they haven't had to be forced into selling their stars unless it's for a stupidly high fee like Cavani and Higuain went for. We've, on the other hand, been forced into selling key pieces to our squad each summer and then low-balling other clubs for their surplus players that we then polish off and turn into better players, only for the cycle to continue.

There's also the very real possibility that Pallotta may sell the club if the stadium doesn't get built.

Until we get a stadium and a kit sponsor (I'll point out that Napoli have no fewer than 4, I believe) and stop having to sell major stars every summer, Pallotta's money doesn't mean a whole lot right now.

Roma hasn't been "forced" to sell its stars for lack of funds. It has to do with Pallotta's desire to strictly adhere to the FFP rules. The owner's of PSG and others are more "flexible" or "creative" in this respect.

breva wrote:

McLewis wrote:Financially, I consider Napoli in a better position than us primarily because they haven't had to be forced into selling their stars unless it's for a stupidly high fee like Cavani and Higuain went for. We've, on the other hand, been forced into selling key pieces to our squad each summer and then low-balling other clubs for their surplus players that we then polish off and turn into better players, only for the cycle to continue.

There's also the very real possibility that Pallotta may sell the club if the stadium doesn't get built.

Until we get a stadium and a kit sponsor (I'll point out that Napoli have no fewer than 4, I believe) and stop having to sell major stars every summer, Pallotta's money doesn't mean a whole lot right now.

Roma hasn't been "forced" to sell its stars for lack of funds. It has to do with Pallotta's desire to strictly adhere to the FFP rules. The owner's of PSG and others are more "flexible" or "creative" in this respect.

A matter of semantics. When the choice is between keeping players, but risk missing out the CL due to FFP violation or selling those players, but having to scrounge, scrape and lowball everyone in sight to replace said player, these are not things Roma do because they want to. They do it because they must.

I see where you're coming from, but from a Romanista's perspective, we see this as a compulsory position every summer because unlike PSG, we don't have the financial blackhole that is Qatari money behind us to risk being creative or flexible in an effort to skirt FFP regulations. That's a luxury Roma simply don't have and so yes, we see that manifested as being forced to sell star players each year. Does that make Pallotta a square for playing by the rules? Sure. Do we understand it? Yes. Do we like what it does to our squad every summer and our continuity in all comps? Hell no.

I don't know much about Napoli's financial setup, but I don't recall them having to sacrifice a key player every season to appease FFP so they don't seem to have these same problems,yet we're somehow financially better off than they are. I don't understand that line of thought.

breva wrote:

Robespierre wrote:Stop with this "they don't care " stuff lol
I don't get where it was born. Probably it is the perception of dominant team in Serie A but the UCL is another thing.
If Napoli don't get qualified is just why they bottled it against Shaktar on first leg.
Scudetto is their main target but they have snubbed nothing . Nothing.
6-2 aggregate against City is just the rreal difference of level compared to City.

If CL were top priority Sarri would have played the first team complete.  The players all want to win and try their best, it's not a question of not trying.  But like Juventus against Samp, Allegri did not put out their best team, they rested players for the match against Barca.

Sarri has always put his best team also in Champions League, stop to feed urban legends.
Simply they are just Napoli, I don't understand because overrate them beyond their good level

Robespierre wrote:

breva wrote:

Robespierre wrote:Stop with this "they don't care " stuff lol
I don't get where it was born. Probably it is the perception of dominant team in Serie A but the UCL is another thing.
If Napoli don't get qualified is just why they bottled it against Shaktar on first leg.
Scudetto is their main target but they have snubbed nothing . Nothing.
6-2 aggregate against City is just the rreal difference of level compared to City.

If CL were top priority Sarri would have played the first team complete.  The players all want to win and try their best, it's not a question of not trying.  But like Juventus against Samp, Allegri did not put out their best team, they rested players for the match against Barca.

Sarri has always put his best team also in Champions League, stop to feed urban legends.

No he hasn't. You can dislike the approach as much as you want but a 2 second look at the line ups tells you you are wrong.

A single point at home would be enough for Shakhtar, but sometimes that's pretty difficult against Manchester City.

Have a hard time seeing city win in Ukraine with nothing to play for, I imagine they'll rest a bunch of players for the United game.

rincon wrote:Have a hard time seeing city win in Ukraine with nothing to play for, I imagine they'll rest a bunch of players for the United game.

Hmm, but their depth is pretty good and can still field a formidable team. But Shakhtar is no push-over, specially at their home (BTW, are they playing in their stadium on in some adopted stadium).

Donetsk got wrecked by war. They train in Kiev and play in Kharkiv, the Metalist stadium.

Robespierre wrote:

breva wrote:

Robespierre wrote:Stop with this "they don't care " stuff lol
I don't get where it was born. Probably it is the perception of dominant team in Serie A but the UCL is another thing.
If Napoli don't get qualified is just why they bottled it against Shaktar on first leg.
Scudetto is their main target but they have snubbed nothing . Nothing.
6-2 aggregate against City is just the rreal difference of level compared to City.

If CL were top priority Sarri would have played the first team complete.  The players all want to win and try their best, it's not a question of not trying.  But like Juventus against Samp, Allegri did not put out their best team, they rested players for the match against Barca.

Sarri has always put his best team also in Champions League, stop to feed urban legends.
Simply they are just Napoli, I don't understand because overrate them beyond their good level

Sarri was under orders from ADL, albeit veiled, to rest his best players against Manchester City, and he did.

"De Laurentiis consiglia neppure troppo velatamente Sarri in vista del big match di Champions contro il Manchester City: "Io credo che in questa partita si dovrebbero far riposare un po’ quei giocatori che hanno un minutaggio più alto, per preservarli: la gara con l’Inter è alle porte ed è altrettanto importante".

In view of the Champions League big match against Manchester City, De Laurentiis advises Sarri in a not too veiled manner " I believe that in this game you should rest those players who have been playing more minutes, to conserve them: the competition with the 'Inter is coming and it's just as important


http://www.goal.com/it/notizie/de-laurentiis-detta-la-linea-napoli-turnover-col-city-milik/12vre7bpts5n61dw6gpzm5zbsn

Only kids Pep will play tonight is Foden, he will start a strong team instead of one filed with youth players. Not sure what he owes Sarri or Napoli to not rest all the starters tonight. Wouldn't be surprised if he bring on Sterling/Walker if we're chasing the game, thankfully KdB is suspended or he would have been featured

-----------Bravo (Ederson)
Danilo**--Adarabioyo--Mangala--Delph** ()
--------------------Toure
------------Bernardo--Gundogan
-----Foden-------Aguero------Sane

** Delph and Walker each get 45 mins.


What I would like, bold indicate Academy players.

-----------------Daniel Grimshaw (Brazo)
Davenport--Adarabioyo--Mangala--Danilo
--------------------Toure
------------Bernardo--Gundogan
-----Foden-------Aguero------Diaz

rincon wrote:Donetsk got wrecked by war. They train in Kiev and play in Kharkiv, the Metalist stadium.

That's why I asked.

EL if taken seriously, could be interesting this year.

Arsenal, Atlético, Napoli, Dortmund, Lazio, Lyon etc. Only United is missing to give it a nice blend but we could see some interesting match ups potentially