Is it played professionally in special shoes? There’s your answer.
Last season without fans shows the importance of a home crowd. The home win percentage in league last year was 46% over the entire season this year its at 73% already.
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Can do lots of weird and wonderful things in special shoes while being professional. Doesn’t mean it’s sport.
Ballet?
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Completely agree @Limiescouse. Really well said. I mentioned a similar thought in the match thread when it went 2-2. I wasn’t absolving our boys for the mistakes, but it was also important to not lose sight of how good Atletico are over there. They are a well drilled side, with much ‘guile’ (if you like), and have quality everywhere in the lineup.
Of course we lost our focus which didn’t make things easier but it was always going to be a fight with that side and their manager, especially at their place.
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Start me not on ballet, jnr is (ahem) in the royal ballet and the cost of the FUCKING SHOES….
Ahem
And jnr puts heart and soul into ever step. Is it a sport? No, but it doesn’t claim to be.
Translation
After 90 minutes of shithousery, showing no respect to my opponent and gesticulating to the crowd to suck my dick. I don’t really want to shake my opponents hand. The way I see it, i doubt he wants to shake my hand either.
It would be an empty gesture.
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Yeah it was our 3rd goal following a through ball by Andy Robertson. Crazy interpretation of offside rule and it really should be interpreted differently and given offside.
The Watford defender ended up touching the ball because Mo was offside and in the line of play.
Whereas last night Matip was unable to touch/clear the ball due the Atletico forward who was in the way and offside.
A subtle difference maybe 
Either way, both should be interpreted as offside
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I haven’t read the thread so apologies if it’s already been answered but why wasn’t the foul on Jota for the penalty not also a red card?
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Way too indirect a ball to deem that a goal scoring opportunity.
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I think that is a big stretch. You can probably argue that if Lemar was not there Matip would have got back on the line to clear, or get closer to Griezmann, unless Lemar’s presence physiclly prevented him from doing either of those, and it pretty clearly didnt, its not a factor in the decision.
Not that it has anything to do with the post match against Atletico, but United are down 0-2 to Atalanta inside 30 minutes at their toilet bowl.
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Me, Crouch and Lescott think his presence prevented Matip clearing it…we won anyway sure!
One definite positive…there’ll be plenty more goals off the back of these decisions, plus the extra goals being given via the “thicker lines” VAR use now.
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Wasn’t there a goal ruled out few weeks ago for offside attacker been in sight line of goalkeeper.
Yes. Its a fairly standard interpretation. Lemar was close but its pretty difficult to argue he was in Alison’s eyeline.
It’d be quite easy to be really critical of that performance last night, but the truth is that’s one of the hardest grounds to go to in world football. They hadn’t lost at home in Europe for 4 years. 1 loss in their last 40 home games apparently…
We lost our heads after going two up but we must expect to have tricky nights like this in Europe, especially when playing in such a hostile atmosphere. Between 18-20, when we were at our best, we played some absolute stinkers in the group stages against much worse sides.
The defensive vulnerability is still evident, but hopefully that’ll be something that gradually improves over the season. We have Van Dijk and Henderson playing at a level way below their best, that won’t last forever.
For Atletico, Thomas Lemar is someone who often gets ridiculed or put forward as a flop because his ‘numbers’ are rubbish, but he was outstanding last night. Very impressive performance.
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It’s been one of the most underreported stories of the past 12 months I think. It’s not just that his numbers were bad, but that he was not playing well in any sense. He was seen as yet another failed attempt by Simeone to add some attacking flair to the side that ended up with an expensive creative player sitting on the bench while they ground out ugly wins. And I think the fuss over his failed move to us made that failure even more high profile. Yet at some point last season he reinvented himself as a CM and became a mainstay of a title winning side, to the degree that were content to let home grown son Saul leave. On the back of that performance the other night you see why.
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In fairness give my nan the time and space Lemar had last night and she would have cut through us like butter as well.
She’s been dead since '95.
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Still buzzing over winning at their place, as it is such a hard ground to go to. Very good team, probably the best in Spain, who also employ all the dark arts under a very cynical manager.
Have it!
Our attack and movement is firing well. I think there’s more to come from the midfield. And there’s a lot more to come from the defense, which is a little leaky for our level, not terrible, but as we go forward will get more and more watertight.
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