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Soccer Sunday: Your Running Commentary

DeFoeGerrard (ISIPhotos.com)

Tottenham is doing well in UEFA Champions League play, but if Spurs are going to move back into the top four of the English Premier League, they will need to beat Liverpool today to stay close to the pack.

Liverpool has a more modest goal, which is to pull even with Tottenham, which the Reds can do with a win at White Hart Lane.

In Italy, Inter Milan kick the day off in the morning against Parma needing a victory to try and close the gap on AC Milan. Lazio will also be looking to close the gap, and a win against Catania could pull the Roman club to within a point of the leaders.

If last week's MLS Cup final left you yearning for some more playoff action, look no further than the Mexican League, which will have both semifinal series decided tonight. Santos Laguna faces Club America while Monterrey takes on UNAM Pumas.

If you will be watching today's soccer action, please feel free to share your thoughts, opinions and some play-by-play in the comments section below.

Enjoy the action (Today's TV schedule is after the jump):

TODAY'S SOCCER ON TV

6:30am– Fox Soccer Plus- Inter Milan vs. Parma

8:30am– Fox Soccer Plus- Newcastle United vs. Chelsea

9am– Fox Soccer Channel- Lazio vs. Catania

9am– ESPN3.com- Udinese vs. Napoli

10:30am– Fox Soccer Plus- Norwich City vs. Ipswich Town (Delayed)

11am– Fox Soccer Channel- Tottenham vs. Liverpool

11am– DirecTV- Sporting Gijon vs. Real Sociedad

11am– DirecTV- Mallorca vs. Malaga

11am– FoxSoccer.tv- Auxerre vs. Toulouse

11am– FoxSoccer.tv- Caen vs. Sochaux

11:30am– GolTV- Cologne vs. Wolfsburg

1pm– DirecTV- Athletic Bilba vs. Osasuna

2:45pm– Fox Soccer Channel- Palermo vs. AS Roma

3pm– GolTV- Valencia vs. Almeria

3pm– Fox Soccer Plus- Lyon vs. Paris St. Germain

7pm– Telefutura- Santos Laguna vs. Club America

9pm– Telemundo- Monterrey vs. UNAM Pumas

Comments

  1. I don’t care enough about Spurs to continue arguing this. Whether you take this as me having no other argument I don’t really care, to be honest.

    If you’re a Spurs fan, enjoy the great results, and honestly I’d rather have them finish 4th than Man City.

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  2. I’m not sure how one can ever discount the possibility of any team scoring one late goal. 1-0 is never an insurmountable lead for any team. Barcelona could have a 1-0 lead on Hollywood FC and it wouldn’t be safe til the final whistle blew. So the idea that the Nani goal was insignificant because you perceive Spurs to be a team that can only come back shortly after conceding a goal is ridiculous.

    I don’t know where you get your evidence that Spurs’ comebacks all occurred very shortly after conceding goals. In UCL qualifying, Spurs were down 3-0 midway through the first half but got the crucial second away goal in the 83rd. Against Wolves, Spurs were down one at half, and equalized in the 77th and went ahead in the 87th. Against Villa, Spurs went down in the 17th minute, but scored in the 45th and 75th to win. Against Inter in Milan, Spurs were down 4-0 by the 35th. Bale hit back with two goals in the 90th minute. And then, of course, Spurs had dramatic late winners against Arsenal last week and Liverpool today.

    Against all of those games, the only ones where Spurs hit back shortly after conceding were against Fulham and against Everton. Even before last week, the balance of the evidence was clearly against the idea that Spurs couldn’t come back late. So even if there were any logic to the nonsensical idea that a team can be only good at coming back shortly after conceding, but not later, and that a 1-0 lead is safe against such a team, the evidence isn’t there in this case.

    (And you can call Gomes an idiot all you want. But he clearly asked the ref for clarification as the play was developing as to what the call was, and the ref pointed to the ground. After the match, he claimed that he was playing advantage. The signal for playing advantage is not pointing at the ground. The ref screwed up, no matter which way you look at it.)

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  3. We were talking about the likelihood of them scoring one or two goals against Manchester United, specifically about how important that disputed goal of Nani’s was.

    My point, again, was that those comebacks tended to happen very shortly after conceding the goals, and I didn’t think they were likely to score whether or not Nani’s goal was allowed.

    Great comeback today considering they overcame missing a penalty, great comeback against Arsenal.

    If they play a game next week where they are down 1-0 and Gomes decides to be an idiot again and the ref doesn’t disallow the goal, recent evidence would probably tell me to have a rethink on what would happen in that specific instance, depending on how well they were playing in this hypothetical match.

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  4. Ha. So how many times do they need to come back to satisfy you, exactly? 15? 20?

    Surprised you’re still clinging to this argument despite all evidence to the contrary. Takes some balls, at least.

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  5. Well, glad to see we’re all being civil here.

    Good for Spurs, Great results the last couple of weeks. I still stand by what I said about Spurs and late game comebacks back when they lost 2-0 to Man U.

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  6. Ives-Could you possibly write a piece or a running soccer commentary for the U-20’s game against Mexico? I know the match has already started but I’d really like to hear about how the kids performed.

    (SBI-I would if we could see the match. We’ll post a result later today.)

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  7. Oh come on. I agree that the ESPN-bashers, like the one you are responding to above, can be ridiculously over the top. But must we take things to the opposite ridiculous extreme? ESPN is THE reason soccer has become more popular? That ESPN kool-aid must be tasty, but I think I’ll pass.

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  8. Yeah, I’ve been doing that and there was a play by play on BigSoccer.com too. I just didn’t know if there were local stations showing it or anything.

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  9. Some know-nothing was arguing with me on SBI a few weeks ago that, despite all their come from behind points (and near points, like the match in Milan), Spurs hadn’t done anything that impressive late in games to be considered a team that was really dangerous coming from behind. After Arsenal last week and Liverpool this week, I wonder where that guy is now.

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  10. No it doesn’t. Or, it does, but not for this reason. Those goals weren’t very impressive. Mostly a result of the defense being invisible (when it wasn’t actually assisting him).

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  11. I know I’m probably one of only a handful of people who want to watch it, but does anyone know of any streams of the US U20 vs. Mexico game today? I know it’s not on TV anywhere.

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  12. Last 5 minutes + change should make for a super 2H. Should be 2-0 if Maxi had just rifled it on net instead of trying to get tricsky with dribbling. Great to see Liverpool creating chances and positive play. Com’mon you Reds.

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  13. Wow – good post Citro; that will teach me to be too wordy. My thought would be that he should stay in England where he already (hopefully) has some good will built up. Honestly, if he were to move, I wonder if Italy would suit the Deuce — skill and counter-attacking at a premium.

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  14. Interesting viewpoint because on the surface the Bundesliga has a good balance of technical and physical play which I think would suit Deuce. If in fact the effort quotient in practice is higher in Germany than the other top Euro leagues (and assuming Deuce’s style doesn’t mesh with that?), then where would be a good non-EPL move for him?

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  15. I don’t think Dempsey’s style would go over well in Germany. Dempsey often looks like he is not trying very hard – think about how critical this board is of Dempsey after USMNT games. I understand that German clubs (as all Euro teams are) are often very tough in practice and that the appearance of “effort” during practice competition is very important in who makes the team on game day. I think a move to Germany could be a step backward for the Deuce.

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  16. Maka – how can you say that this sucks? A Bulgarian playing soccer in England against Blackburn – a team (perhaps even a city) that most non-soccer fans have never heard of — scores 5 goals – and it makes SportsCenter’s top 10. I think that is great for soccer in America. Furthermore, it was not even the ESPN game, which was Arsenal v. Villa. And even more so, on the final regular season day day for college football, with college basketball starting to get going. Wow, you are really looking for a way to be negative.

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  17. I said that basically as :

    IF Fulham were relegated then Dempsey would be leaving. That’s as obvious as the sky being blue. Now I doubt that they will be relegated but if so most likely some club will get him on the cheap.

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  18. Dempsey has 5 league goals. Not too bad in 15 matches, several of which he was as a sub and played as a winger and not just at striker.

    I read a thread on Bigsoccer about a rumor from Bayern Leverkeusen wanting to pick up Dempsey. One never knows but if Fulham keep falling, you just know Dempsey will be out.

    Zamora’s return in January should help Fulham climb back and also give Dempsey more space and time to score more goals. I personally give him 10 league goals for the end of the season.

    BTW Fulham need strikers who can score asap

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