Serie A Thread - 2014/15 Season

[gerd]

Hi Ben, i was well aware about Inter and Facchetti.
But if that would be true, then those scudetti should go to another team...the team that finished third behind both Inter and Juventus.

This is like in cycling. There are people who say that Armstrong's doping should not be punished, because every single cyclist doped and that regardless of his performance enhancing drug abuse, Armstrong still was the best.

I don't agree. Even if there was only one cyclist who didn't cheated and even if he was the last in the general ranking of the Tour de France, that guy is the winner for me. And anyway, since i have inside information from cyclism, i know that Cadel Evans never took performance enhancing drugs, that is the reason he was never like by his Lotto team mates and in the end het left the team...but i'm going wildly off-topic.

I can understand twhat you are writing about Juve as a club, but you suppose that the club Juventus and the owner Agnelli didn't know what Moggiwas up to. Well, i don't buy that. This also happened with the fraudulent traders at banks (De Kerviel, Leeson e.a), i don't believe that they acted on their own...

If you are right that "Juventus" (Agnelli, the management) didn't know, i agree. Otherwise i don't.

But i found that last post very interesting, i've learned a lot and i feel silly even discussing this with you...this is not my thing, so perhaps it's stupid to counter you...i'm talking with my heart while you are reasoning.

 

[lo zio]

Hi Ben, i was well aware about Inter and Facchetti.
But if that would be true, then those scudetti should go to another team...the team that finished third behind both Inter and Juventus.

that's a reasonable conclusion and many people agree with u. but i think voiding the entire season would have left a better message.
today u could look at serie a recordbook and think nothing ever happened. leaving 2 blank spots for those 2 seasons would have been a much more appropriate "mark of infamy".

everytime the calciopoli topic pops out, people immediately think of juventus, but the truth is calciopoli exposed the ineptitude and the corruption of the entire italian football establishment. moggi didn't do everything by himself, he wouldn't have gone anywhere without some help. he colluded with refs, with the referees commissioners, with some very important directors working for the italian federation.
calciopoli wasn't just the crime of a single man (or a few men).... it was an institutional failure. so, by not assigning those 2 scudetti, we would have sent a more appropriate message to the rest of the world:
"See those 2 blank spots? those are there to remind everyone that here in italy we can't even organize a football tournament".
but that's just my personal opinion, of course.

but you suppose that the club Juventus and the owner Agnelli didn't know what Moggiwas up to. Well, i don't buy that.

yeah i'm sure they didn't know anything. u see, the relationship between the agnelli family and juventus wasn't like the relation between any other owner and his club.
the agnelli family has been one of the world's 5 most influential families of the last century. compared to Gianni and Umberto Agnelli, people like abramovich, the glazers or the mansour family are shoe salesmen. and i'm not just talking about money or economic interests here... i'm talking about real power, real influence and gravitas. Gianni Agnelli received monthly phone calls from the most powerful men on earth: kennedy, kissinger, margaret thatcher, gorbaciov, mitterand. because he also was one of the most powerful and influential men on earth.
juventus was just a plaything for the agnellis, a guilty pleasure, a distraction... but they always had too much stuff on their hands to dedicate any time to their toy.
and that's why they hired a proper general manager. not just a team director or a financial director. a gm with total control over the club. the agnelli's role inside the club was almost comparable to an honorary position. they gave their gm complete freedom to control the club (especially in the '90s).
another proof of their distance from the actual management of the club is the fact that they often appointed as presidents people who weren't members of the family (craveri, dusio, catella, boniperti, grande stevens, cobolli gigli, blanc).

in most clubs the owners are directly involved with the management... think of zamparini and palermo or abramvich and chelsea. if what happened to juve had happened in those clubs, then i would have no doubts the owner would have been aware of what was happening..... but juve wasn't run like those clubs. and that's why i'm sure the agnelli didn't know anything.

and i also believe the appointment of another agnelli as president (after so many years) is meaningful. it's a message. the family decided it was time to take back the complete control of the club. for the first time in many years a member of the family was nominated president.... and this time the presidency isn't just an honorary position.... andrea agnelli really is at the helm of juventus... no more general managers, but an agnelli directly involved with the management of the club.
.......... if only andrea agnelli were even just a fraction of the men his uncles were.... but then again, people like gianni and umberto agnelli don't belong to this world anymore. this is the world of the abramovichs, the manrours, the berlusconis... ignorant buffoons with no education, no class, no curiosity and no charme at all.

 

[ImpossibleYesbutitsTrue]

as for the ref's calls themselves, they were all tricky, border-line decisions, so we should also cut the ref some slack

I wrote about that, 50/50 decisions in big games with Juve as a part of the match, outcome is likely in Juve's favor, exceptions confirm the rule. It's not about form, or the general bad decisions we see from Italian refs, it's about things that happen exactly how they have in that match we are all writing about.

Or take Milan/Inter for example, remember that second half of the campaign for Milan?
Yes Allegri did good tactical changes, but Milan never would have played CL the next season w/o the ref. decisions, Viola should have played in the CL.

any team takes advantage from a wrong ref's call sooner or later...

That's like saying there can be rain the next day, or something similar, you know?
Not related at all to the topic.

so let's just drop the prejudices and apply logic.

Right.

edit
All this can be seen in the so called "true standings" year for year, and pls I know this is not scientific, but it gives a certain indication.
Compare this standings for clubs like Roma/Viola and lets say Juve/Milan for the past years.

I'm not saying that there is something fishy again, I'm just saying the ref. decisions are favored for the big clubs, looking at the whole season that is.

 

[gerd]

Ref decisions always and everywhere favour big clubs.
They sort of deserved that.

 

[cfdh_edmundo]

This is like in cycling. There are people who say that Armstrong's doping should not be punished, because every single cyclist doped and that regardless of his performance enhancing drug abuse, Armstrong still was the best.

I don't agree. Even if there was only one cyclist who didn't cheated and even if he was the last in the general ranking of the Tour de France, that guy is the winner for me. And anyway, since i have inside information from cyclism, i know that Cadel Evans never took performance enhancing drugs, that is the reason he was never like by his Lotto team mates and in the end het left the team...but i'm going wildly off-topic.

I agree with you completely. I don't have a problem with Inter being awarded the titles as there just doesnt seem to be cast-iron evidence they did significant wrong-doing. If there is/was it should have come to light and they themselves should have been convicted in the way Juventus were. If the evidence comes to light (and they are convicted) then I also agree with you that the historic winner should be cascaded down to the highest club that was innocent during those seasons. If Inter are/were guilty then they should give the 2005 title to Udinese, if they were implicated it should be given to Sampdoria. There were some Italian teams in 2004-5 who were totally NOT implicated in the scandal, why should they be punished?

To me it has smacks of collective punishment/responsibilty. It makes a mockery of everything, is unprofessional and its almost as though there is an attitute of, "Well Juventus were caught doing bad things, but you know what, we also caught Milan doing bad things, maybe not as bad but still bad, and we kinda think Inter might have been doing it too, and didn't Franco Sensi give some guy a watch years ago? Well let's just say everyone was guilty and scrub off the 2004-5 season" To me this is scandlous, if other clubs are guilty they should have been investigated too (and they still can/should be investigated), and if there is enough evidence those clubs should have been punished (or should be retrospectivly punished now) but tarring every club with the corruption charge is false, misleading and deeply unfair to all the Italian clubs who were not guilty of any wrong doing.

I can understand twhat you are writing about Juve as a club, but you suppose that the club Juventus and the owner Agnelli didn't know what Moggiwas up to. Well, i don't buy that. This also happened with the fraudulent traders at banks (De Kerviel, Leeson e.a), i don't believe that they acted on their own...

If you are right that "Juventus" (Agnelli, the management) didn't know, i agree. Otherwise i don't.

I also agree here and think the idea that the top level of management didn't know what was happening is not (in my opinion) highly creditable, although it's hard to prove it either way - I think the Nick Leeson comparision is very true. Nonetheless even if you take it as face value and assume the people at the top didn't know what happened, there is the notion of corporate negligence/responsibility. As a company, Juventus senior management (in effect the owners) had a duty of responsibility to ensure that (a) they were aware of all goings on at the club and (b) the club was run in such a way that serious malpractice could not happen. Maybe if Juventus were entirely a private company this wouldn't been such an issue, but in fact they've been listed on the Milan stock exchange since Dec 2001 (so were a listed publicly traded company at the time of Calciopoli) means there should have been, in theory, preventative measures against such scandals happening. Juventus's listing is fairly complex, even now. Around 64% of the company is owned by EXOR, an Italian investment company which itself is 51% owned by the Agnelli family. 10 years ago, during the scandal, Exor was then known as IFIL/IFI but the structure was essentially the same. Also then (as now) around 30-40% of Juventus's total shares were owned by regular (public/institutional) investors. Norges Bank own around 1% Blackrock just under half-a-percent of Juventus, which has big implications for corporate governance. The board (and owners) had not just a responsibility to all employees but also to these shareholders.

 

[lo zio]

I agree with you completely. I don't have a problem with Inter being awarded the titles as there just doesnt seem to be cast-iron evidence they did significant wrong-doing.......
......To me it has smacks of collective punishment/responsibilty. It makes a mockery of everything, is unprofessional and its almost as though there is an attitute of, "Well Juventus were caught doing bad things, but you know what, we also caught Milan doing bad things, maybe not as bad but still bad, and we kinda think Inter might have been doing it too, and didn't Franco Sensi give some guy a watch years ago? Well let's just say everyone was guilty and scrub off the 2004-5 season"

whoa!! wait a minute mate, i did not mean any of that!!! and if that's what u got from my post, then i must have explained myself very poorly. let me try again.

the reason why i think it would have been a better decision to nullify those 2 seasons has nothing to do with the suspicions surrounding inter. What i wrote about inter was merely an attempt to explain juve fans' perspective on this whole situation. but i'm not a juve fan and i would never call someone "guilty" before the verdict (and like i said, we won't ever get a verdict on inter because the statute of limitations already ran out).

and i most certainly ain't trying to somehow deminish juve's responsibilities or to make a mockery of calciopoli. i simply see this situation from a different point of view.
i'm not saying my point of view is "the right one", and, like i already said to Gerd, many people in italy share your opinions on this situation.....
... but from my point of view, the situation is completely different from how u pictured it. in my opinion assigning those scudetti to inter makes a mockery of calciopoli and is an embarassing attempt to reduce calciopoli to a simple fraud of one man (alone). to me that is a spectacular manipulation of the facts, which allows serie a (as a league) and the italian federation to wash their hands of this entire scandal (as if they had no part whatsoever in it).
to me THAT is a scandal. and as a small club fan, as fan of a club which didn't cheat, i can tell u i consider this denial much more insulting than the alternative (voiding those 2 scudetti).

calciopoli was not a simple fraud. like i said, moggi couldn't have done anything without some help. and the whole concept of corruptiuon and collusion inherently implies the involvment of multiple individuals. moggi colluded with the refs commissioners (bergamo and pairetto) and also with some italian federation directors (like innocenzo mazzini). this is not debeatable anymore, as it has been proven in court, and there's a verdict confirming it today.

and so we get to my point... i don't want those 2 seasons erased from serie a recordbook coz i want innocent clubs to pay.... i want those 2 seasons nullified because i want the federation to pay. it's the federation's duty to monitor our competitions, to supervise our competitions so that theese situations don't occurr.
and they didn't just ignore their responsibilities, they didn't just fail to monitor and supervise...... they freaking cooperated with moggi! they didn't just allow moggi to do whatever he wanted (which would have already been bad enough)... they helped him!!!!

i've listened (with my very own ears) to a phone conversation between moggi and mazzini (a italian federation drector), in which mazzini suggests moggi that the best retaliation to counteract Della Valle's opposition inside the serie a board would have been to assign "their refs" to fiorentina's upcoming matches (so they could screw up fiorentina's games and persuade Della Valle to lighten up and stop being such a pain in the ass).
this man (Innocenzo Mazzini) was a freaking federation director! he was working for the federcalcio when he made that phone call (and many others).
so why on earth should the federation get away with it? we have a verdict stating some federation directors were accomplices to the fraud.... the very same sentence which establishes juve's, milan's and fiorentina's responsibilities..... juve got punished, milan got punished fiorentina got punished...... why the fuck should the federation get away with it!!!!

why should the federation be allowed to hand a trophy, as if moggi's fraud were the only anomaly in an otherwise perfectly valid competition!!!!
should we really pretend that, apart from moggi's cheating, those 2 seasons were absolutely regular????
are we really so naive to believe that assigning those 2 scudettos to inter (or to any other club) would serve justice and restore some kind of balance?

u seem to believe that "saving those seasons" and assigning the scudetto anyway would be the most fair solution for those clubs which didn't cheat. well let me tell u, as a palermo fan i don't find this solution "fair" at all. of course i can't speak on behalf of all the fans of innocent clubs.... but still i am one of those fans and i believe not assigning those scudetti at all would have been much more appropriate and fair.

the federation shouldn't have been allowed to assign any title, because the entire final table was compromised by a fraud in which some of their employees were found to be accomplices!! they should not be allowed to act as if everything was regular apart from juventus position on the table, because that's not true! the entire table has been altered as a result of the cheating and those 2 seasons produced no champion at all, because no club in serie a has a legittimate claim to those scudetti (not even the ones which didn't cheat.... but i'll explain that later).

u seem to suggest that my solution would make a mockery of calciopoli and "somehow" deminish juventus resposibilities. that's absolutely false. i don't want to absolve anyone.... infact quite the opposite... i want all the responsibles to pay (including the federation). the calciopoli scandal destroyed juventus reputation and dishonoured serie a, but didn't seem to effect the italian federation at all.... a federation which was allowed to bring 3 clubs to champions league..... and one of them even won the cup!

i understand economic interests carry a lot of weight in theese sort of decisions, but, had money not been a factor in uefa's decision making process, the italian federation would have probably been banned from uefa for a good chunck of years and their clubs woudln't have been allowed to take part in any uefa competition. and without uefa's pressing to elect a champion, those 2 scudetti would have been voided (that was infact the original intention of the italians).
a federation which can't organize and monitor the regularity of a championship shouldn't be allowed to crown a champion, nor to send any team to eufa competitions.

when it came to juventus ownership, u mentioned the concept of corporate responsibility (aka "strict liability") to establish the agnelli family responsibility in moggi's fraud (which is a reasonable argument)...... if u know what strict liability means, then u must realise that this concept also applies to the federation (which is guilty of the same sort of negligence).

and finally let's consider the football-cycling comparison. u see, so far i explained u the ethical reason why i think those scudetti shouldn't have been assigned. such reason is obviously subjective and personal, and one might well disagree with me (infact i'm not trying to persuade u my point of view is the right one here, i'm just explaining myself more accurately, coz it seems u misuderstood my previous posts).
but there's also another reason to throw those 2 seasons into the garbage. and this is a logical reason, not one based on ethics or personal values and opinions. and that football-cycling comparison offers me a chance to show this reason to u.

such comparison can't hold up because football and cycling are very different sports. cycling is based on a single competitive event wich involves all the partecipants. so, if one of them cheats, then u can simply scrub him off the competition and the final classification will be absolutely regular.
a football league instead, is completely different, as it's based on multiple events which involve only 2 partecipants (the games). and the result of theese events effects both teams position on the table (in terms of points).
therefore, whereas a cyclist cheating only effects his own position on the final classification, a football club cheating effects the entire league table as not only juventus' points, but also other clubs' points (and position) were altered.
practical example: i seem to remember one of the matches investigated was a juve-udinese match which juventus won thanks to an undeserved penalty (or something like that). udinese didn't cheat, and yet their position on the table has been obviously altered because of that event. and there's simply no denying that.
there were dozens of episodes like this one. the entire table has been altered. the race to avoid relegation was altered, the race for europa league was altered, the race for champions league was altered. and it's impossible to retroactively "fix" all theese match results, because no one can tell which team would have won (perhaps juve would have won all those matches anyway).
so now u must realise the football-cycling comparison is a terrible one..... and u must also realise why i think the entire final league table shoud have been nullified.

Juventus's listing is fairly complex, even now. Around 64% of the company is owned by EXOR, an Italian investment company which itself is 51% owned by the Agnelli family. 10 years ago, during the scandal, Exor was then known as IFIL/IFI but the structure was essentially the same.

yep. but exor and ifil are not operative companies, their both investment companies..... they're holdings, and as such, they're not involved with the operative management or the day to day management of the companies controlled by it.
exor (and ifil before exor) are nothing but vaults... they're only there to count the money that comes from their controlled companies.
exor controls a shitload of different companies (from fiat to insurance companies.... from real estate service firms to banks, to companies which sell agricultural equipments).
they're not supposed to know everything that happens inside theese companies, simply because they couldn't possibly know.

so pointing out that juventus belongs to the "exor family" is not good a reason to assume the agnelli family knew about moggi's malpractices.

 

[gerd]

But Ben, i agree with most of what you said, but it have been more logic to punish Juventus more severely ?

I understand that the federation (or some people at the top) were guilty too, but it all started with Moggi (Juventus). I know what you are going to say: Moggi is not Juventus.

One can also say that Mussolini and his fascist party wasn't Italy and that the Nazi's weren't Germany and that the Japanes emperor and his generals weren't Japan...yet those countries were sanctioned after WWII and because of that all the people suffered....

Maybe we should stop this discussion, we will never agree about this, i understand your point of view. You stated it with much more eloquence and expertise than i did, but to me it simply doesn't feel right...

And after all, it's only football...

 

[lo zio]

But Ben, i agree with most of what you said, but it have been more logic to punish Juventus more severely ?

I understand that the federation (or some people at the top) were guilty too, but it all started with Moggi (Juventus). I know what you are going to say: Moggi is not Juventus.

oh no, i would never say that. moggi was juventus and juventus had to face corporate responsibility for his gm malpractices.
if u pay attention to my previous posts, u'll notice i didn't write moggi isn't juventus. i wrote juventus wasn't just moggi (big difference), but also plenty of other people, like del piero, cannavaro, marchisio, damjan, lami and millions of fans across the world.
but to say that juve shouldn't have faced responsibility for what moggi did would be crazy.

as for the severity of the punishment, i guess that's subjective. in my personal opinion juventus faced a severe punishment, but that's just my personal opinion, of course.

what's most important imo (and that was our original topic of conversation) is that even if moggi was juventus, he isn't anymore. that juventus doesn't exist anymore and, therefore, it would be unappropriate to throw unproven accusations any time juve gets a favourable ref's call (as that happens to all the clubs).

 

[gerd]

How are Palermo doing.
It seems they are doing reasonably well at home, but not very good away.

Have they any good players ? I'm a litle bitout of touch with the current crop of players.

 

[andy18cruz]

I agree with you Lo Zio regarding the void on those scudetti. When you have the kind of systemic corruption and influence’s traffic around the federation there's no point in awarding a (rotten) title. Remove those seasons and make them a black mark on the illustrious story of calcio for all to see.

On a different note, it’s a shame that a mess up country like Italy in terms of institutions (no offense, just the outside perception isn't very flattering) could somehow bring a more or less reasonable solution, when in Portugal a similar scandal erupted and it was basically swept under the rug and the people evolve are still active members of the clubs and federations. But that's why our current football situation is a complete chaos and the foreseeable future doesn't bring me hope.

 

[johnconstantine]

Hey guys,
really enjoying reading your thoughts on this subject. For me as a Juventus Fan since the early 90s, Calciopoli was a big shock of course. Most of my informations are from Pro-Juve Fansites and as i´m not able to read italian, its pretty hard to inform proper.

As i recall the relegation was not for match-fixing but for "unfair sporting behavior". Moggi had contact with the referee designator, but so did other guys from milan, inter etc. There are so many complicated things, wich are hard to understand for an foreign fan.

Also there are reports like this one: http://bleacherreport.com/articles/3341-was-calciopoli-a-conspiracy
I know this is extreme Pro-Juve/Anti-Inter, but are they total false or is there some truth in it?

This post is not meant to be offensive or so, but this topic really interests me:-) PS: Please excuse my bad english...

 

[lo zio]

I agree with you Lo Zio regarding the void on those scudetti. When you have the kind of systemic corruption and influence’s traffic around the federation there's no point in awarding a (rotten) title. Remove those seasons and make them a black mark on the illustrious story of calcio for all to see.

LOL! that's kinda frustrating... it took me 15 minutes to wrote that last post of mine (not to mention the previous), and yet u perfectly summed up all my points in just a few lines

that's exactly what i wanted... a black mark on serie a's recordbook, to always remind us (and everyone else) of our institutional failure.

On a different note, it’s a shame that a mess up country like Italy in terms of institutions (no offense, just the outside perception isn't very flattering) could somehow bring a more or less reasonable solution, when in Portugal a similar scandal erupted and it was basically swept under the rug and the people evolve are still active members of the clubs and federations. But that's why our current football situation is a complete chaos and the foreseeable future doesn't bring me hope.

no offence taken mate. i know italy's perception abroad isn't flattering at all..... and to be honest, it doesn't look much better from the inside aswell.
actually the way we handled this scandal surprised me aswell, as italy's usual reaction to this kind of situations is to simply ignore responsibilities and sweep everything under the carpet. that's what we've been doing for the last 600 years, so we became quite efficient at that

How are Palermo doing.
It seems they are doing reasonably well at home, but not very good away.

Have they any good players ? I'm a litle bitout of touch with the current crop of players.

we're absolutely awful. we have an interesting young prospect in belotti, but such a young kid can't carry an entire team on his shoulders obviously.
our GK is pretty good aswell, but without a defensive line protecting the box, there's not much a good keeper can do.
like i said before the season began, i'd be amazed if palermo would somehow avoid relegation at the end of the season.


@johnconstantine: the unfair sporting behaviour consisted in colluding with the referee commissioners (so that juve would often get the refs they wanted) and with a couple referees (which were supposed to try and favour juve with their calls).
"match-fixing" is perhaps too strong a word to use, but yeah, that was pretty much it.
as for all the conspiracy theories, they're not worth your time (especially the ones involving guido rossi, which are absolutely laughable).

 

[andy18cruz]

LOL! that's kinda frustrating... it took me 15 minutes to wrote that last post of mine (not to mention the previous), and yet u perfectly summed up all my points in just a few lines

that's exactly what i wanted... a black mark on serie a's recordbook, to always remind us (and everyone else) of our institutional failure

It's actually easier to summarize an idea than to come up with one

 

[lo zio]

It's actually easier to summarize an idea than to come up with one

still, concision is a virtue i clearely do not possess, at least when i'm explaining myself in english
but it's nice to notice some people actually take the time to read my overly long posts.
i know for sure i wouldn't have the patience to go through them!

 

[andy18cruz]

You write long posts, but they contain a thoughtful POV and are good to open an serious and adult discussion, so if I've time to read it I will, because I know it won't be gibberish

Is always tough for us Romance speakers to concise in English. You need to be in a thought process that doesn't make much sense in our native tongues.

 

[ImpossibleYesbutitsTrue]

Ref decisions always and everywhere favour big clubs.
They sort of deserved that.

They need to deserve it "on the pitch", game for game, in a fair fight.
It's like momentum in footy games, you already have the better players, but then the game is holding you back even more when playing with a "smaller" team, makes no sense.

And as a person in RL, you already have ups n downs, no need to simulate crap in games, games like PES 3 were much more fun, clean and no bullshit, but thats off-topic.

edit
You need to fight against this, to admit its there and will be is going down, way down.

 

[lucagian]

If any team was favoured in Juve-Roma it was the latter.

Let's see:
1. At the beginning of the game Holebas fouls Marchisio in front of the goal. No penalty given. Should have been a penalty and a red card for Holebas.

2. Maicon's penalty was dubious no doubt but serves him right for not respecting the foam line. But it wasn't a foul.

3. Totti's penalty is completely invented, starting with the freekick which should have been for Juve. Then it's 50/50 between Totti and Lichtsteiner but 9.9/10 it's a defender's freekick.

4. Yanga Mbiwa fouls Llorente in the box, no penalty awarded.

5. Pjanic fouls Pogba on the line and therefore it's a penalty.

6. Skorupski clearly sees Bonucci's shot.

7. Morata's red card is shocking.

Look at that coincidence, 7 points.. just like last night's goals

Unfortunately roma fans are used to the referee favouring them so when the referee actually does his job they start crying, even though they were actually favoured against Juve. They didn't complain about any of these mistakes.
Roma 2013/2014

 

[lo zio]

Is always tough for us Romance speakers to concise in English. You need to be in a thought process that doesn't make much sense in our native tongues.

indeed. the translation in other romance languages is much more immediate. i can think italian and speak spanish or french.... with english instead, u have to "reconstruct" what u wanna say in a different phrasing structure. Funnily enough, if u spend even just a week in an english speaking country, then the english phrasing structure becomes absolutely natural to u..... and when u get back home it's your own language the one that sounds weird to u (even though just for 1 or 2 days)...... it's some sort of a linguistic jet-lag.

anyway the english phrasing structure is also inherently more concise than romance languages (due to their germanic heritage). us "latin" speakers always liked to play with words whereas germanic languages are more brief and "to the point", so there's bound to be some adaptating difficulties.
anyway it's still much easier for an italian to learn english than it is for a native english speaker to learn italian.

sorry for the short off topic rambling, but honestly, any conversation is less tedious than this referees-related nonsense.

 

[lo zio]

i was out for dinner yesterday, and when i asked the waiter for an update on the milan palermo game and he told me palermo was ahead by 2 goals, i thought he was just messing with me...
what the hell happened yesterday?!?

on a different topic, roma seems to be facing quite a form dip.

 

[Dominic]

It's been forever! Glad to see you're all still alive. How's things?

 

[PLF]

We're all still alive, just very inactive on Evo-web.

Life goes on but it's nice to reconnect with old pals every once in a while.

 

[Damjan]

I never knew a Dutch Juventino mod existed!

Too bad Sassuolo couldn't hold on to their lead, but I suppose a draw is still good for us, as Roma haven't gained anything from our result which wasn't a shame to draw. The match itself was awful though. I guess everyone's minds are on the Atlético match...

 

[Dominic]

We're all still alive, just very inactive on Evo-web.

Life goes on but it's nice to reconnect with old pals every once in a while.

Wow Sina! How are you?

I never knew a Dutch Juventino mod existed!

Too bad Sassuolo couldn't hold on to their lead, but I suppose a draw is still good for us, as Roma haven't gained anything from our result which wasn't a shame to draw. The match itself was awful though. I guess everyone's minds are on the Atlético match...

Well mod is a bit of a stretch , I have to say.

 

[PLF]

I'm good dude. Busy with life and not able to follow football the way I used to.

How are you? How's everything been over the last couple of years?

Hope all is well.

 

[Dominic]

Same here. Don't follow football very much anymore. The occasional Juve game, but I can't get fired up for a match like some years ago.

All is well though .

What are you up to?

 

[lo zio]

DOM!!! it's been years!!! it's so nice to hear from u again, pal!
sorry for being late to this "reunion", but this last month was freaking insane (thank God xmas holydays are coming.. i could really use a couple days of vacation).
many of us (me included, suddenly) don't come here as often as we used to (nor follow football as regularly as we used to) but none has gone awol like u. we all still try and pass by every once in a while to catch up. u should do that too
so, how's everything?

 

[Zeem]

Well hello guys! How's everyone doing?

Think about that most of us have been on this site for around 10 years, give or take. Pretty insane!

 

[juveboy]

wow, it's been so long, great to see some of the OG members still posting (you know who you are lol) I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas guys!!!!!

 

[Milanista]

Hey guys! Been off EW for a while - have a nice Christmas

 

[Dominic]

DOM!!! it's been years!!! it's so nice to hear from u again, pal!
sorry for being late to this "reunion", but this last month was freaking insane (thank God xmas holydays are coming.. i could really use a couple days of vacation).
many of us (me included, suddenly) don't come here as often as we used to (nor follow football as regularly as we used to) but none has gone awol like u. we all still try and pass by every once in a while to catch up. u should do that too
so, how's everything?

Ben! It has been years! Everything's fine. Had a roller coaster of a year, but i'm well. Like I said, my football interest took a hit, so did this forum.

How are you?

Well hello guys! How's everyone doing?

Think about that most of us have been on this site for around 10 years, give or take. Pretty insane!

wow, it's been so long, great to see some of the OG members still posting (you know who you are lol) I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas guys!!!!!

Hey guys! Been off EW for a while - have a nice Christmas

It's turning into a proper reunion. How are all of you doing?!