CHOULO19

Going through the same kind of shock and emotions twice in two days...There are not many things that leave me speechless in this world, but I guess speechlessness is probably a good response to such brutality and mindless violence. From all I've read and heard about the tragedy I think this video expresses best how I feel and what I want to say: As citizen of a country who goes through a lot of tragedies, I can tell you that the feelings do not change, the shock and fear and anger are never diluted. I can also tell you that these tough moments are best for pure emotions, for empathy and for solidarity. This is a time to contemplate how human suffering is the same everywhere and how we all are people linked together as a species. There will be plenty of time for analysis and for scoring cheap political points, but right now I want to think about all the brave people who were trying to help in Paris yesterday, I want to think about Adel Turmos who threw himself at the second suicide bomber in Beirut the day before saving the lives of tens of people, I want to think of the natural goodness of human beings and I want to think about and feel for everyone who's lost someone they knew in this awful manner. May they all rest in peace..

And of course the western media headlines the suicide bombing of one the poorest and most crowded market places in Lebanon resulting in the death of 43 civilians and the injuring of over 200 as "Bomb hits Hezbollah stronghold".... go figure.

Sigh.....Honestly I'm still in shock at the moment. This is the worst atrocity to hit the country since the Israeli assault in 2006. I want to joke and say you knew something and didn't tell me but the magnitude of the crime is just too much....sigh. Politically, Lebanon has always been a sectarian country. Naturally there have been shockwaves of the sectarian divide in the region but generally nothing violent, just political. There have been some exceptions like rounds of violence between Islamic extremists and Alawites (technically not Shias but close) in Tripoli but most of the violence has been either directed towards the Lebanese army or towards civilians like was the case today. What I think of Hizbollah is not a question that can be answered simply. I've talked before in this thread about what I think of labeling Hizbollah as terrorists. To begin with, the term itself is not one that I understand nor can find consistent meaning for. So give me your definition of a terrorist organization and I'll try to define them accordingly. As for my own opinion of them, I wrote this a couple of years ago on here in response to a similar question and it still stands mostly true: Shortly, military wise in terms of resisting Israeli assaults the resistance has a near unanimous support from the people that goes well beyond political, ideological and even national barriers. In terms on internal politics Hezbollah has become part of the corrupt sectarian system in Lebanon (although not quite good at it as the rest of them). As for the involvement in the Syrian civil war, it was done for selfish reasons. They did it to preserve their main weapons supply rout, a strong ally and the strength of the so called resistance axis. They were not motivated by the best interest of the country and its people. That said, in a purely practical sense their involvement has had a positive effect on the country to first and foremost secure the border which was taken by takfiri jihadis including several Lebanese villages (a Lebanese village called Arsal is still till now under Qaeda and ISIS rule) and to actually stop the actual war from spilling over into Lebanon and from turning into another Iraq which was an actual possibility. In a geo-strategic sense, as a multi-cultural and religion country our best interest is in Bashar Assad staying power. However the actual involvement cannot be justified neither morally nor legally. At the end of the end of the day they are still supporting a tyrant and a war criminal. How this is viewed in Lebanon is only through the lens of one side or the other of the fighting in Syria because in Lebanon every political party is either with the regime or the rebels. So normally the criticism from their pro-gulf pro-USA opposition in Lebanon is invalid as those forces themselves helped fund and arm the Islamist extremists in Syria. Apologies for the probably incoherent and poorly written post. As I said, I'm still in a bit of a shock to be completely honest.

So sad to hear about Martin Fulop's death. Just 32! Thoughts with his family and friends.

Essien did play CB for us when we had that incredible injury full period when we lost the title in 06. He didn't do too well there IIRC and even scored and OG.

Remember the CL quarter final vs Valencia? One of my fondest memories of Essien.

Ah, 'Academy Day'. My favorite holiday of the year!

Trust me, mate. No one chooses to be Lebanese, they're usually just doomed to be! Tell me, what do you wish to know? To be fair the migrant crisis is hardly 'felt' by ordinary people. I mean why would it, they're just people like everyone else who even share the same language and pretty similar culture. It did however cause some disgusting racism from mainstream political parties. But even that has mostly died down 3-4 years into the 'crisis'. But it is felt very much as a crisis by the grossly underfunded NGOs and people who are scrambling to provide something that resembles basic human rights to the poorest of those refugees. Economically the situation was already terrible to begin with. We are just NOW feeling the full effect of the 09 crisis as Lebanon depended enormously on the money brought into the country by Lebanese people living abroad. We have no industrial sector and the agricultural one is in constant deficit. We rely on tourism and Arabian gulf money and both have dried up considering the situation in the region. Let's just say that Robert Fisk is a.......'unique' man.

Am I forgetting or did I miss anything?

Hahahaha So Jeb Bush said that if you're a Christian in Lebanon you'll get beheaded! :lol: I know the guy is only supposed to be a ceremonial figure and I fully expect him to be an idiot, but seriously, who is his middle east adviser?!

Seriously, where does all this money go? The FA is non-profit, right? So either they need all the fine money they collect to break even in which case there is a clear conflict of interest and they will be inclined to unfairly dish out harsh punishments when they need money, or (more likely) they don't actually need the money in which case the fines are an added profit for them and they are clearly no longer 'non-profit'. Jose once suggested that whenever the FA fines someone, the money goes to charity. I can't think of a single reason for that not be implemented.

Perfect. Then, he resigns and resolves the main issue which is his huge pay-off.

You know shit has hit the fan when the crisis manages to resurrect the great TorontoChelsea! How are you, my friend? I guess the question is: Is it worth paying Jose's salaries for the year (plus the new manager's obviously) in order to get rid of the drama and BS for the season when the new manager, whoever he is, is unlikely to achieve more than Jose? I think if the board does make the decision, they can go to Jose and say, listen, you're gone at the end of the season regardless, your job is to get us through the season without getting relegated and while integrating some youth players and we want to do it quietly. I guess I (maybe arrogantly) haven't contemplated that seriously so far. I do believe that we have the individual quality not to actually be drawn into a relegation battle. On any account, I think we can afford till at least February to address that. If by then we are still in bottom 5 then, yes, a decision needs to be taken. But for the time being, I see little that can be gained by sacking Jose before the end of the season.

Naturally he is not a selfish player and will more often look for the pass, but this season there is that milli-second hesitation in his decision making and not just in shooting but in dribbling and passing as well. The missed penalty also obviously hasn't helped, but on the bright side he is obviously regaining his physical and mental sharpness.

Excellent and showed some real determination after going down (as did most of the team, tbf). My MOTM. Confidence (or lack of).

I've actually voted differently in this poll and went with 'No'. The reason I wanted Jose sacked about a month and a half ago was that at the time (I thought) top 4 finish was still salvageable. Obviously, that is no longer the case, so there is little motivation to sack him right now, imo. Clearly still has to go at the end of the season, though, and the board has a lot of time to plan for everything so there can be no excuses.

Literally on the verge of tears when Remy stumbled after beating the keeper. Just nothing is going right. Sigh.... I think it goes without saying but obviously CL is out of the question and probably EL as well so would be interesting to see how the board decides to deal with the situation.

Because we had people like Lampard, Drogba, Essien, Ballack, Ferreira...etc. and obviously JT and Carvalho. The point is not have tall fullbacks, the point is to have at least 5 tall physically strong outfield players as not to get dominated in the air. Also, I've only heard him say this since his return so he may not have had that 'strategy' the first time here.

Am I the only one who thinks that that's how Jose genuinely thinks? Obviously there is a lot more attention now because of the situation but he's said the same thing before at least on a couple of occasions and no one gave it another thought.

Very good yesterday. Might even say he performed better than Azpi who made a couple of decision and positioning mistakes.

Can really see the effect of the lack of confidence on him. He started the match really poorly and was completely anonymous until the goal then absolutely brilliant till HT and decent in the second half. Hopefully with a couple more wins we can raise confidence and get more consistency out of him and the rest of the players.

Constantly out of position yesterday for the whole 90 minutes as his proper position on current form is firmly on the bench!

Tbf, Ronaldo is terrible FK taker. Seriously, from the regular FK takers he has by far the worst conversion rate.

What exactly were you searching that you found a video titled "Eden Hazard shirtless"?!

@Rhino's Skin, you need to put the link in [ img ] [ / img ] tags (remove the spaces).