Dion

And he didn't play the final because he couldn't. He was injured but still tried to be on the pitch for his team. He gave his all and even risked his body's health to try to make his side the winner. That's impressive on many levels.

Another example - at first I found it strange when I didn't see Suarez on the list. You know what? I bet Suarez found it weird himself. And I bet he got the message conveyed in not having him on the list. That's the purpose these awards should have.

It's not only about the goals. If Bale performed great on top of his goals maybe. Goals are important but so is not conceding or setting up those goals in the first place. I'm just tired of other great players not going further in these awards because Ronaldo and CR7 scored like crazy even when they were quiet in important games or the only thing they did was score a penalty with an overall mediocre performance.

IMO he wasn't. Not even close, actually.

There's that. Maybe you wouldn't check for every decision but at least the most important ones, like penalties. How does it work in Rugby?

I don't know if it should be Bale, but these billion goals scored by CR7 and Messi should be analyzed past the numbers and hold less weight than they seem to do in the present day. For instance, if the Ballon D'Or should go to any Argentinian player I'd rather have it go to Di Maria or Mascherano who actually performed the best amongst their NT squad in the World Cup.

As it should IMO. Performances in the highest stage of football should be worth more than in domestic leagues or, let's say, friendlies. Even if, the whole package considered, you are individually worse than player X, if you performed better than X when it mattered and led your team to victory, you should be held in higher regard. It's like Kaka in 2007. Kaka is a great player but he was not individually the best player in the world in 2007, he was the player that performed the best in matches of the highest importance that year, he was the player that showed up the most when the team really needed him, there's a slight difference if that makes sense. When everything was at stake he absolutely destroyed Manchester United and Cristiano Ronaldo, who was the strongest contender IMO. Kaka and also Seedorf who played out of his mind in the latest stages of that UCL. I believe the prize should put even greater emphasis on team success in important tournaments than it does as of now, because it encourages team work. You must play in a way that improves the chances of leading your side to victory whether you bag loads of goals and assists or not. Winning as a team should be of the utmost importance even for individual prizes, just so even the CR7's and Messi's care about team balance, about defending, about marking, and not only about being flashy or hitting 3 digits of goals and assists. A Ballon D'Or winner should come from at least one of the finalists in UCL or World Cup, with rare exceptions. Continuing this train of thought, I honestly find it a disgrace to the game that CR7 takes so many shots per game, it's simply not possible that every single one of those attempts were the best option available for him at the time he made them. IMO that kind of overly selfish attitude should be discouraged from football and one of the ways in doing that is not giving individual awards to players performing like that. I also think players who dive/cheat too much should not even make the list. The prize should be used to improve the sport more so than for awarding individual prowess which worsen it. But that's just me.

What should really be done is the use of technology to aid the decisions. Plenty of other sports do it. I believe FIFA is taking longer to change things in that direction because in a way it takes away a little bit of what makes football, football. Whether we like it or not wrong calls make newspaper headlines and it also heats up discussions between fans. In football there's just too much left to interpretation. Ideally it wouldn't be like that.

It was funny sometimes, mostly in the beginning of the meltdowns. Then it always came to a point when everything was just too much and it got only annoying. Besides, people used to rely a tad little bit more on personal attacks when they disagreed back on the day, if my memory serves me right. Lots of drama really, I believe we're better as a forum now. Back to your point, what I liked the most about Rafa was people referring to him as the fat spanish waiter. Got me every time, I miss seeing FSW thrown around here.

Yeah, Liverpool. My bad. Sometimes it's hard to keep track of all those small sides wearing red jerseys

You guys are thinking too narrow. The pass was still possible if he lobbed/chipped the ball. Sort of like the pass from James to CR7 goal recently against Arsenal. It would have been even easier for Hazard than it was for James, since Oscar had more space than Cristiano.

To be fair there were worst passes from him yesterday. I was more annoyed with the one which was intercepted by a Utd defender before it reached Drogba because he didn't put enough power in it. It would have been a great chance.

Yeah, hindsight is a bitch. We cannot know what would have happened if we went for scoring the second with more intent, maybe we would have conceded two and lost the game, then people would complain why couldn't Jose just settle for the 3 points 1-0, greedy as fuck and all that. IMO in long championships by points it's better to play it safe, it's all about consistency and playing it smart against the teams who are contending for first place. Jose knows this and that's what makes his teams so strong in domestic leagues. Maybe not the best choice spectacle-wise but certainly efficient. One point away is huge as long as we can grab 3 at home. I'm actually more worried about how we played than about the result. I think the draw was really good but I expected a lot more control from our midfield. If Oscar and Cesc play like this against sides whose midfielders are both physically imposing and technically gifted we're going to get slaughtered.

I didn't like Mikel either but I understand the reasoning behind it. It was not only because he wanted to improve us defensively but because of yellow cards. Pretty much everyone was booked in our midfield on that point (we had 6 yellow cards IIRC by that point) and I guess Jose thought having someone who could stop a dangerous counter attack (or just about any attack in general) without being sent off on top of his defensive contribution was an important asset at the time.

It's just that he started the first half in horrible fashion. I distinctively remember ESPN narrators saying in the first couple of minutes he had 33% of pass completion and then when the game progressed to about 15-20 minutes I guess they said he still had 44ish%. He got a bit better as time went by but the first half was horrendous. Nervousness and sloppiness from him and Oscar all the freakin' time. Second half both of them did slightly better and it showed, we started to contest possession and dominate Utd. Until Jose decided to try to maintain the 1-0 at least.

Honestly, now that I've seen a couple matches from him wearing our blue, I can safely say he's better going forward than I previously thought from watching him on Brazil NT. Great player all around.

It was a poor finish no matter what. If the shot went more to the left, closer to the post, then it would have been more about De Gea saving it (supposing he could reach it, which I doubt), but the way it happened his shot went too central, too close to De Gea. Not the greatest finish from Eden there. The great finishes both outsmart the keeper as well as put it beyond his reach.

Problem when people make these kind of assumptions is in real life things don't usually happen like that, like the way we usually think when comparing two teams. You can't take the average level City is playing and the average level United is playing and just assume that will be true on the day they face off. If that was usually true we would have smashed United today. But they stepped it up a notch against us and we played worse than usual (in part because they played well too and also nerves). And that kind of thing happens often in matches involving rival or big clubs. Those are the toughest games to predict.

So much overreaction after a draw on a strong opponent's home turf, you'd even think we'd lost. Maybe people forgot but I still remember most people predicted Utd finishing top four of the league and that was even before Di Maria was signed. Maybe they're not in a good moment and not playing to their full potential yet but they still have plenty of quality attacking wise and beating them at OT against the ref is not an easy feat. Fabregas didn't have a great game but it happens. Messi and CR7 were some of the worst players on the pitch just yesterday, it happens even to the best of the crop.

He was poor today but he has been good or decent in other tough matches. You guys are letting his fame cloud your judgements. Everyone was a bottler at that Arsenal because the team sucked and Barcelona didn't suit him. Anyhow, even if it was true and he was a bottler it's not impossible to change. Just look at Robben.

Maybe this should have been posted in Ivanovic's thread? But a dive all day to me, on full speed from live angle it didn't even look like Brana touched Di Maria.

Man Utd with the classic last minute goal aided by the ref, nothing unusual here.

This ref is a joke.

This was a great save. Amazing reflexes.

Luis? What game have you been watching? Luis has been great.