UEFA Super Cup

[JaredL]

Super Cup final is played today. In last year's version Sevilla crushed Barcelona 3-0. This year everything is overshadowed by the tragic death of Antonio Puerta. This will be the first match for Sevilla since Puerta died.

Any sort of prediction is difficult for this. AC Milan are certainly the more experienced side, but Sevilla don't match up too poorly and could give them serious problems especially if Alves plays. The real question mark is the motivation and preparedness of Sevilla. They will be super motivated "playing with 12 men" as they say but the events of this last week have to be draining and have taken away from their prep time.

There is also the much less significant issue of Alves who has clearly stated that he wants to go and is angry about staying. That has cooled obviously with the Puerta situation but it's still lurking in the background. The deadline is tonight at midnight so we'll see what happens there. He traveled with the team and they say that he may play. He does not lose any eligibility because the intertoto and Super Cup are exempt. Last time there was talk about him maybe playing he did play against Real Madrid in the second leg of the Spanish Super Cup and played well.

Match is on FSC, kickoff at 2:45 but it would be well worth watching the pregame I'm sure as there will be emotional displays from both teams and fans.

[Droogie]

No offense to Sevilla, regarding the Puerta situation, but this trophy is so meaningless. European Super Cup = bleh.

[ThaSaltCracka]

FSC won't have any pregame stuff.

I think Milan wins this, sorry Jared.

[JaredL]

[ QUOTE ]
FSC won't have any pregame stuff.


[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not quite sure about this. The broadcast starts at 2:30 and the kickoff isn't until 2:45 so there should be at least the standard intro stuff where they will show crowd shots and whatnot while giving lineups. I really want to see the Biris' tifo and I hope that they show it.

I don't mean some long half hour deal or whatever but just the normal pregame like you get for most matches.

[JaredL]

[ QUOTE ]
No offense to Sevilla, regarding the Puerta situation, but this trophy is so meaningless. European Super Cup = bleh.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think meaningless is going overboard. Other than random cups that teams have at the end of the summer, it's certainly less important than any other competition. However, I think this match will be more important for both teams than say an average game in their domestic league.

This makes it interesting because it is sort of like a friendly-plus between two top teams.

[JaredL]

BTW for Sevilla this match will be interesting as it'll be the first match against a huge European club that isn't Spanish. The last few years Sevilla have done incredibly well against Real Madrid and Barcelona so it'll be interesting for me to see how the match against Milan goes.

I personally think Sevilla has the squad to make a deep run in the Champions League, and this match could be a fair indicator either way on that. If Sevilla hold their own, even with a close loss, that'll be a good sign. On the other hand getting thoroughly outclassed would probably mean that I'm overly optimistic. Of course the Puerta angle makes either of these a lot more noisy.

edit: the next big test, should they survive AEK, is the first CL group stage match against Arsenal at Emirates.

[JaredL]

This broadcast is weird. WTF only one commentator?

[jgunnip]

wtf was that yellow for??

[Daysleeper]

It's Poulsen so it's safe to assume that it was for being a prick.

Was it Jankulowski who scored that beautiful goal for Milan?

[jgunnip]

I was referring to the Duda yellow a few minutes before that.

That was Jankulowski with the pretty one time strike.