Looks like the French Border Staff have been drafted in for the match. What a truly wonderful customer experience.

It’s so annoying that we’ve never won this trophy.

All through the first half I’ve been convinced that Real Madrid would win. That was based on them doing absolutely nothing combined with their outrageous luck throughout the competition.

But having listened to the Peter Walton nonsense as to why Benzema was offside I can see that their luck has run out. Yet another example of the nonsenses that the laws of the game are becoming.

Don’t understand that goal being ruled out for Real. Peter Walton says it doesn’t matter that it came off the Liverpool player because he was not deemed to have deliberately played it, it was a deflection so Benzema is offside.
I assume that’s only a thing because the Madrid player shot or played it first. Madrid player played it forward towards goal, Konate the nstantly blocked it away from goal, then Fabinho sliding in knees it in to Benzema’s path who is offside and scores.

The rule can’t just be whether the touch was deliberate or not. What happens if a defender goes to play a long ball and it hits his own team mate in the back and bounces through for an offside striker to score. Of course he can’t be offside

Presumably if a ball cannonballs onto an attacker and goes in the net then it shouldn’t be a goal because he didn’t mean it.

Courtois has been excellent tonight

He has. And that Ancelotti chap seems to know what he is doing too.

Amazing. In the end Liverpool ended up winning the same as us in 1993.

Talk about grit.

Seems like a manager who thrives with big name players but wouldn’t do as well with weaker players (Everton!) of course that sounds simple but there are plenty of managers who are the other way round.

I’ve read that Ancelotti is a bit of a hands off manager in terms of tactics but much more a man manager - and if that’s true then he’s got to be one of the best man managers in football

Players taking off their runners up medals as soon as it’s round their neck with a look of total disgust always looks too try hard to me, ‘look how much of a winner I am by showing how disgusted I am that we only just missed out on winning, this medal is going in the bin’
Always feel like players should show more respect for the competition and certainly for the guy handing out the medals than this faux outrage and tearing it off before it’s even fully been placed on them

I agree bromley. I don’t like Real, although I dislike Barcelona even more, but I’m delighted they beat Liverpool tonight. The only good thing I can find to say about Liverpool is that I dislike Manchester United, Tottenham and Chelsea even more.

I didn’t watch the game (I haven’t even seen the winning goal yet), but players doing that doesn’t bother me. A runners up medal means you’ve lost the final. Had I played for the losers tonight I wouldn’t want it round my neck and I’d take it off immediately.

Couldn’t agree more. It’s the only traditional trophy I’ve not seen us win, either as the Champions League or European Cup.

How big any club is will be open to some debate, at least at the margins. What factors are relevant to club size? In no order of importance, factors that spring immediately to my mind (some overlap) are fan base size (domestic and world wide), wealth and spending power, stadium size, average attendances, history (with longevity being a part of this), stature and status in the game leading to things like newsworthiness and from that even glamour, trophy wins (what was won having relevance though Huddersfield have won the top tier English league more often than Tottenham, yet Tottenham are immeasurably bigger), and the desirability of a club for players and managers to go there (which is also linked to things like money and status).

The timing of trophy wins is also relevant. Huddersfield won three titles almost a hundred years ago. That makes their trio less relevant to their bigness now. Sadly, although Arsenal still have more trophies and league titles than Chelsea, the latter’s big success has come more recently than ours, which explains why they now have a bigger fan base. Chelsea have also won the Champions League (once being vital though they’ve done it twice).

There’s no single factor that overrides everything else. Money is vital but despite having even more spending power than their near neighbours, I simply don’t think City are as big a club as Manchester United. Arsenal have won many more trophies than Nottingham Forest. But Forest have won the European Cup two more times than Arsenal. But Arsenal is a far bigger club than Forest. So winning it does not make a club huge on its own. I thus think there’s a balance between my factors above.

I’ve always seen Arsenal as the biggest club in Europe not to have won the European Cup or Champions League. PSG haven’t won it either and currently possess a lot more money via wealthier owners than even the Kroenke’s, but were only founded in 1970 so I just don’t see them as having the history of Marseille let alone Arsenal. Atletico Madrid haven’t won it. Sorry they are a very big club but I just don’t see them as big as Arsenal. However, I think Arsenal need to win it before the club can claim to have the elite status I believe it deserves.

I hope I live to see the day we win the CL. That would pretty much complete my Arsenal fan life. Yes, I'd love to win more titles, and havd the most FA cups of any side but the CL is the one I want badly. It was very, very painful seeing Chelsea be the first London club to win it. Twice Bayern choked to make me sad.

Australians set to pay more to watch Premier League as football fans juggle costs of multiple streaming services

https://www.msn.com/en-au/sport/news/au ... li=AAgfLCP

Considering how much you mention disliking Bayern for choking, do you also dislike Dennis Bergkamp if you consider him to have choked to miss that penalty that would have stopped Manchester United from winning the FA Cup, part of their treble in 1999?

I am happy they have retained the rights despite an increase. I am an Optus phone subscriber so it’s not too much of an increase for me. The service is a good one as I can watch live, replay or watch highlights in 3,9,25 minute packages of basically every game. When Foxtel had it , limited replays and generally you had to get up in the middle of the night to watch it because you couldn’t record all games.

Now we need to have a really good season.

The chaos outside the game yesterday brought back memories of our final there.

We barely managed to make kick off on time. As usual we spent too long in the centre of Paris drinking and singing and tried to get a tube and never witnessed such chaos on the tube. A massive crush. We got out of there and got a cab across Paris which is slow and whilst we were waiting in traffic a load of cars drove past with a police escort forcing its way through the stopped traffic. It was the fifa delegates ! Literally getting treated like royalty.

More and worse chaos getting into the ground through the ring of steel and we eventually managed to just make kick off. Again like the Liverpool fans are reporting there were loads of French people sitting int the aisles of the stadium and walkways.

Its crazy football fans are treated like dirt. I have a feeling we may see a tragedy soon as the policing and organisation of these events is drifting worse

Actually the policing from the French for our cup winners cup final there was a bit mental too if I recall. They tried to lock our fans in after the game if I remember and it led to a group of fans bashing the gate open.

I remember walking past a huge platoon of armed French policeman on the way out. Seemed unreal

Every time I’ve been to Paris involves arsenal losing a football match

Failure I’m afraid

Possibly About 8 or 9 assorted lagers I vaguely reckon, wolfed down with the following… meze, mixed Greek grill, 2 packets of crisps, 1 packet of space invaders, a cheese an onion roll from the boozer and a chicken chow mein at about midnight when I should have known better

Sounds ‘different’. Good luck with that.

Perhaps English supporters have a reputation?

Great effort

Not sure about that. How much aggro have our teams caused recently.

Might be racism. Possibly racist towards the English.

Despite the stats Liverpool should have lost 2-0 so that's that. So called best team in europe lost. So called best team in England didnt win the league. They won the fa cup and league cup. Well done.

I like this Liverpool team and how they play but *%^@ off to the media in the circle jerk.

Almost certainly but stereotypes can often be mistaken for racism.

Perhaps some English fans abroad have left an impression on People.

The crucial question is what flavour were the crisps? My own favourite flavour is the Marmite crisps that Walkers do.

There were 2 packets so I would hope that marmite and a late night salt n vinegar were had.

That’s basically why I can’t stand Liverpool. I find the media’s worship of them bloody stomach churning. I find their (or Klopp’s) style of football more entertaining than Guardiola’s. But I was delighted when City won the title, as I was when Real beat them yesterday.

I can’t remember I’m sorry, it wasn’t traditional so it was something like chorizo or something. Quite nice

Even madder was eating the pre made cheese rolls on the counter of a dodgy looking boozer.

Don’t know why but we just kept eating and eating last night. I suppose half a dozen or so lagers does that.

After many decades of watching football I find the laws slipping away from me. I used to understand the offside law but no longer.

The Benzema disallowance baffled me last night. It seemed that a Liverpool player had played it through to him thus making it onside.

But no…according to the official Laws of the Game:
"A player in an offside position receiving the ball from an opponent who deliberately plays the ball, including by deliberate handball, is not considered to have gained an advantage, unless it was a deliberate save by any opponent."

So as it turns out the key word is deliberate. So the referee/VAR has to be a mind reader then.

It’s right up there with the handball nonsense.

What player ever ‘deliberately’ plays the ball to an opponent?

Rangnick is not taking up his consultancy role at Man U. So they bought him in as a temp manager, which isn’t his strong point, and now he leaves before he starts the role he is good at and was intended for!

Apparently Mané has decided he’s leaving Liverpool. Bayern are the strongest linked team. If Gnabry is leaving Bayern that all makes perfect sense as a replacement.

My evenings silliness aside on a footballing level I did find myself wondering what might have been if wenger had managed to convince Benzema to join us those few years ago when he was potentially leaving, a quality player without question that would have had a major impact.

We’ve missed a talismanic type player for so long, really it might have galvanised us at that point.

For this reason I’m not sure if Gabriel Jesus is the one. He will improve us indefinitely and if it’s him he will do a good job but it doesn’t strike me as the ruthless winner that we need

And Vinicius wouldn’t go amiss either

You are right,
I genuinely think there’s several deliberate interpretations of the rules so that the refs can make it up as they go along.

Probably for the best for Man U. It was never going to work well was it? I can’t imagine that ten Hag would pay him much attention.

Well most big clubs now operate with a director of football who deals with transfers and the overall long term vision and philosophy of the club - kind of irrespective of who the manager is. Man U haven't had this and is a huge reason they are in the mess they're in because they chopped and changed manager's so quickly giving each of them a war chest to shape the squad how they wanted which left a collection of players bought by 4 or so different managers each with a different view on how they want the game played.