No it’s the fact Parma weren’t in the same stratoshphere as Barce and Bayern and the rest less so
The season before, as well as winning the ECWC to qualify, they finished 3rd in Seria A, above Juve and Roma…
The season we beat them, they finished 5th, above Roma and Inter…
I just dont see the point in diminishing trophies full stop.
As a club we dont win enough to indulge in the ‘tinpot cup’ sort of banter.
Each and every competition puts teams on a level playing field and every win is one thats hardfought, involving years of hardwork and tons of resources.
Fuck the snobbery.
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Was too young when we won it and didn’t get into football untill 2003.
When and why did they axe it?
Well Parma had won it the year before and Barca where in 3 finals in 7 seasons at that time.
So I think that negates your statement really.
Not snobbery, then calls a European trophy a trinket. Lol.
So basically, he didnt win it then either…
Honestly not if you followed European Competition back then. If Barce were in it, it was because they failed in the league. Parma weren’t a top European team. Average teams managed to win it because it wasn’t loaded with top teams.
The ECWC was never the meeting of Europe’s best, it just wasn’t.
And in case you didn’t notice when we won it we were way off winning the league,
We were all happy to win it but the ECWC back then is of the level of the FA Cup now. Neither us or United were proclaiming ourselves as the best teams because we won it.
Mate Liverpool were 20 points off the league when they beat Millan 05 but you cant take the champions League off them.
No, but the CL is way more protegious than the ECWC by fucking far. And yes Liverprool fluked the thing.
And?
The ECWC was prestigious enough for all the truly massive teams to play in pre CL expansion and takeover of all euro competitions…
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Yes, because there wasn’t a bigger comp. but the ECWC was the easier trophy and allot easier at that
Well if you have 20 fucking goes at it you should get clost to fluking it too.
Plus they got back their 2 years later with Bellamy and fucking Crouch in the team.
With far better players Wenger has failed misreably to emulate that.
A few so called big teams here dont you think? The year we won and as an open draw you played you got win or lose no second chances like the CL nowadays, Corporate bullshit.
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The EC was always the bigger cup…but the UEFA cup was seen as the harder one to win, as it was full of teams who had finished high up their relative leagues, and had more rounds…
Fact is though, our win over Parma was excellent and against a team who had also finished 3rd in Seria A…not against some flukers who had finished as low as 4th or even 5th and qualified for the CL…
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No snobbery from me, if we happen to finish 5th or 6th this season ( very good chance we do) I want to see us take the Europa League very seriously next season.
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There’s enough quality sides in it to warrant taking it seriously, it’s just the sad realism of the all important cash prize.
Go all the way in the Europa League and it’s about £15m in direct prize money I think. We’ve earned close to that already up to our last 16 CL exit, and of course full attendances + more lucrative sponsorship and TV means the bigger competition dwarfs it.
Taking that out of the equation, there’s enough supporters out there like me that want the European glory for what it represents to the club’s history, not the balance sheet
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I am so fed up with the way things are at the moment that I don’t even care if we win our next game or not, if Alexis and Ozil sign a new contract or not or even if AW extends his contract or not. After 10 years of rinse and repeat, my hopes are dead, my expectations are non-existent. Nothing matters anymore. The only thing that will get me interested, maybe even excited would be if AW or the club announce his departure at the end of this season.Only that can get my to care enough again. Don’t get me wrong, I will still follow AFC but knowing fully well what to expect each season.
I know a new manager, if we get one, will not instantly rectify all our problems and make us competitive and relevant again but there is always hope, like Conte has done with Chelsea. We don’t have bad players, just not the right mentality and tactics to get the best out of them. So there is every chance that a new manager can find a winning formula with these players. Even if he doesn’t and we don’t finish in the top 4 or even finish behind the scum, am okay with that because sometimes in order to take a step forward, you have to first take two steps back. And, at least it will be different from watching us fail at the same hurdle year after year. We might get a few surprising results, both positive and negative, like Liverpool have in the last season and a half. They aren’t consistent, have lost to some ordinary teams, but have also beaten some big teams, and beaten them well. All I know is WE NEED A CHANGE.
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