The Copa Libertodoras final is next week!

Many leagues in Latin America and Asia are currently playing also.

Oh yeah and USL 1 and USL-2 are playing also if anyone cares.

Is this how we pass six weeks without football?

FSC is such a cheap outfit. I’m surprised they have taken on the expense of sending a studio team to MLS matches. I doubt they can also manage to keep the Prem rights much longer.

Honestly, if FSC has a contract with MLS, why is the MLS coverage so much better on GOL TV’s American Soccer show and its nightly GOL TV news? Why doesn’t FSC take advantage of showing MLS matches and buy some CONCACAF qualifiers involving nations other than the US? Again, GOL TV did that.

Gaffer, time for another FSC v GOL TV thread here. You guys know where I come down.

I don’t think the English hate the Germans because of WW2, it’s because of two penalty shoot out defeats (1990 and 96). Same goes for Argentina; it’s not the Falklands, it’s the Hand of God.

Sanjay: “Whether the English writers admit it or not, there are at least 5 or maybe 6 players on the German national team who would walk into the English team. I’m talking about the likes of Ballack, Podolski, Schweinsteiger, Klose, Lahm, maybe Frings as well.”

Not Frings, and probably not Klose. Podolski, Schweini and Lahm have been great (and great counterexamples to the stereotype of the German footballer). Ballack seemed to disappear against Turkey. I just don’t see who these English writers are that are supposedly saying otherwise.

Phil: “This fantastic tournament has looked even better in HD. ESPN has two HD channels already, yet FSC and Setanta admit they are years away from getting to that level.”

It’s gonna suck hard if this is the last we see of HD until 2010. It has been simply awesome.

Regarding the other crap – I enjoy watching soccer. A football team is often seen as a personification of the town, city, region, or country it represents, and is considered to possess some of the characteristics associated with that region. This element can add so much to the experience of watching two teams play.

In the case of the Germans, they are regarded as a nation as being efficient, somewhat humourless etc. In 2006, the football team adopted a style with much more flair and dash, and that itself seemed to represent a new birth of the German nation, as they threw off their inhibitions about celebrating themselves. I think that rebirth both on and off the pitch was welcomed in the English press, at least the bits that I read (I imagine The Sun may have had other feelings towards a resurgent united Germany).

So anyway, I still don’t buy this ‘English media biased against the Germans’ line. To actually prove one way or the other you would have to compare reports in many outlets across many nations to prove that the English press consistently had a lower opinion of the German team than any other country’s media. And maybe you’ve done that, but I suspect you’re basing your views on purely anecdotal evidence.