Other Domestic Leagues 16/17

[Ajacied]

Final matchday in the Eredivisie. Will be exciting, but Feyenoord will likely win their first title in 18 years.

Meanwhile Ajax' starting eleven vs Willem II this afternoon, is the youngest in Eredivisie history, with 20 years and about 100 days. They've yielded an ever younger side during a Cup match, if not for Heiko Westermann's 33 years of age.

 

[bluesfan94]

Feyenoord!!!

 

[Savi]

Good for them. The Heracles defenceman slipping and giving Kuyt an easy goal after half a minute certainly helped the nerves I think

 

[HajdukSplit]

Viitorul Constanta win their first ever Romanian league title, in somewhat controversial fashion.

In Romania there is a split season (regular season then the top half play in the "championship league"...similar to a league like Belgium for example). Both teams ended up with 44 points after the championship season ended. The tie-breaker in Romania is H2H but the controversy is the Romanian league only looked at the two matches in the championship round (which Viitorul had a better H2H) rather than the four matches they played overall including the regular season (where Steaua had the better H2H). Steaua will appeal but I doubt much can be done, though I think its kind of ridiculous they don't look at the whole season when it comes to H2H. If it does matter, Viitorul did win the regular season so maybe justice is done at the end but still....

Also an interesting statistic; the Romanian league have had 7 different clubs win their league title in the last 11 seasons, so the league is usually pretty open, despite the fact most of the champions other than Steaua eventually go bankrupt but even they have their own problems with naming rights

 

[Savi]

Gent knocked Viitorul out of the EL this season. I think they beat them 5-0 or something and they honestly looked they would be a bottom team in the Belgian league. So I'm surprised they won their league. Or maybe Romanian football just isn't very good these days.

Also, in the Belgian league, when two teams are tied after the playoffs, the team who finished higher in the regular season gets the advantage (because that way the regular season still has some meaning).

 

[Pouchkine]

The Romanian league at the moment is probably on par with the Scottish! Those stupid playoffs are absolutely terrible and have NO PLACE in soccer. One real Championship and one real CUP that's what it should always be. In no way should there be a playoff.

Look in Eredivisie now FC Utrecht finished 4th with no less than 13pts more than AZ and a ridiculous 19pts more than Groningen and Heerenveen and they have to play 4 more games with those teams to have the Europa League spot they should have earned already. Disastrous, no wonder the crowds are bad for those fake cash grab games. Just no logic for it.

The system in Belgium and Ukraine and others? is even worst.

 

[Savi]

I disagree, to some extent.

You're right, Europa League playoffs are pretty stupid and unnecessary. However I think that championship playoffs can be a good thing. Have a regular season to set up positioning and then let the top teams battle it out versus eachother for the title. The whole "you win the league against the small clubs" I find to be pretty outdated. You want to be the best, you have to beat the best.

Ever since the Belgian league introduced the championship playoffs, title races have never been more exciting, and Belgian clubs done way better in Europe as well because they play a larger quantity of competitive games in the domestic league.

 

[Pouchkine]

Then do like in Switzerland have a premier league with just 10-12 teams and one real season. I just don't care about a meaningless half of the season. Lucky if you are a fan of one of the top teams in Belgium or else the league might as well fold.

In a real championship you don't win the championship by beating the small clubs you win it by beating EVERYONE.

 

[HajdukSplit]

Rijeka are one win away from their first ever title after beating a potentially tricky Slaven Belupo away 2:0 with relative ease. On Sunday, Rijeka can clinch the title with a win over relegation threatened Cibalia, who are unbeaten in three matches but really no excuses for Rijeka. Dinamo have a tough fixture on paper too away at Osijek, Osijek still fighting for 3rd place which means you start your EL campaign a round later than if you finish 4th

Four-team title race in Poland with two rounds to go, like previously mentioned in Belgium, Romania they have a split championship as well

1. Legia Warsaw 39
2. Lech Poznan 37
3. Jagiellonia 37
4. Lechia Gdansk 37

Legia Warsaw jumped from third to first today after beating Poznan and Jagiellonia lost as well. On Saturday all four of the title contenders face each other (Lech vs. Lechia, Jagiellonia vs. Legia). If Legia manage to win then they become favorites to retain their Polish title

Kosovar side Trepca 89 will become the first team from that country to compete in the Champions League qualifiers after winning their domestic title. Its also their first ever title. Like the national team however, they will likely have to play their matches abroad as Kosovo does not have a UEFA approved stadium

 

[YNWA14]

I was pretty confident that Feyenoord would be challenging for the title, though I thought Ajax would need more of a transition under Bosz to finish in 2nd. They really rallied in the second half and introduced some big game changers -- so props to them for finishing over PSV who looked pretty stale this year.

Ajax will pretty easily take the Eredivisie next season though.

 

[HajdukSplit]

Match between IFK-AIK in Sweden was postponed due to potential match fixing. A player from AIK contacted the police saying he was offered a large sum of money if he contributed to AIK losing the match

 

[HajdukSplit]

Anderlecht win the Belgian league title with a game to spare

Brugge-Gent fighting for 2nd place which is a CL qualifying spot; Brugge host Gent with a point advantage

 

[Power Man]

Hanniiiiiiiiiiii

 

[Savi]

Anderlecht win the Belgian league title with a game to spare

Brugge-Gent fighting for 2nd place which is a CL qualifying spot; Brugge host Gent with a point advantage

It's been a weird season in Belgium, with none of the "big five" really having a good year domestically.

Standard have bee a mess both on and off the field for two years now and were never even in the picture. Genk did fantastic in Europe, but they up until January they were terrible in the league and by the time they figured things out it was too late to even get in the championship playoffs. Gent lost their three most important players (Sels, Kums and Depoitre) and wasn't able to replace them, that lack of leadership made them lose way more games than they should have, they had a few good winter transfers which ultimately put them back in contention a bit.

Now, that leaves Brugge and Anderlecht. Brugge won it last season and they really only have themselves to blame they didn't repeat. Of that championship team, only Meunier left. They were basically in first place the entire season and everyone saw them as huge favourites to win it again. And even though they went unbeaten at home, it was their terrible away form that prevented them from really distancing themselves at first, and then losing ground on Anderlecht in the playoffs. The entire season, they only won 1(!) away game against a team from the Top 6.
Anderlecht didn't exactly have a great season as well, even though they are the champs. They hired a new coach, Rene Weiler, after 2 years of lousy football to bring the "beautiful game" back to Brussels. We rarely saw anything of that kind of them this season, instead they became more of grinding team. In fact, in November/December, Weiler came really close to being fired. The results were mediocre, the football was horrible, frankly you got the idea that any decent results they got were based on coincidences. However as time passed by and their form got a bit better, I think that entire team started to feel invincible. They won a lot of games they shouldn't have (kinda like Madrid did this season) and they started to believe that maybe they could win after all.. which eventually they did. However they're still a really mediocre squad which has been carried the entire year by the partnership of Tielemans and Dendoncker in midfield (I think both are expected to leave for bigger clubs) and striker Teodorczyk up front who has been a real home run for them.

 

[HajdukSplit]

Celtic finish the season undefeated in the league, with Rijeka and FC Copenhagen losing a league match recently they can be the only team in Europe to accomplish this. Albanian champs Kukesi could also do it, they have one round left

Club Brugge finish 2nd in the Belgian league after beating Gent, meaning they will be in the CL qualifiers.

Russian league ended today too, CSKA get 2nd place (CL qualifying) over Zenit who will have to go to the Europa League once again (they must qualify) along with Krasnodar. Cup winners Lokomotiv are in the group stages

 

[ecemleafs]

Celtic finish the league unbeaten on 106 points. One match left (Scottish Cup Final) to go unbeaten domestically this season.

 

[Savi]

Club Brugge beat Gent on the final matchday 2-1 so they will finish second behind champions Anderlecht, and get the second CL ticket.

1. Anderlecht (CL group stage)
2. Club Brugge (CL qualifiers)
3. Gent (EL qualifiers)
4. Oostende
5. Charleroi
6. Zulte-Waregem (won the Cup - EL group stage)

There's still one EL ticket up for grabs. Genk and Sint-Truiden won their playoff groups and will play eachother next week. The winner of that game will travel to #4 Oostende with that EL ticket on the line.

 

[Savi]

Rijeka have won their 1st ever title in Croatia and ends an 11 year title run by Dinamo Zagreb. There is still one matchday to go and Dinamo actually host Rijeka so it would have been interesting to see what kind of weird stuff would have happened if it was a title deciding match.

Partizan won the Serbian league over rivals Red Star after turning a 3 point regular season deficit into a 3 point advantage in the championship playoffs. Partizan went 7-0 in the playoffs including a win at Red Star.


Most champions have already been crowned around Europa although there are still some undecided;

In Turkey, Besiktas holds a 4 point lead over Istanbul Basaksehir with two games left. Both teams play bottom feeders to close out the season so looks like Besiktas will have a good chance to repeat as champions.

Poland has two games left as well with as many as 4(!) teams still able to win it. Legia (40) are in the lead with Poznan, Gdansk and Jagiellonia (all on 38) right behind them. The top 4 will play the bottom 4 in the next round, the final round will see Legia host Gdansk, while Poznan travel to Jagiellonia.

In Hungary, Honved and Videoton are tied at 62 pts with one game left. They will play eachother on Saturday in Budapest in what's basically a gold medal game. Not sure what the tiebreaking procedure is. Honved have more wins but Videoton has the way better GD.
Ferencvaros, who won the league by 21 points last year, will likely only finish 4th.

In Bosnia, Zrinjski (61), Zeljeznicar (60) and Sarajevo (59) play the 4th, 5th and 6th placed teams on the final matchday.

In Montenegro, Zeta (57) and Buducnost (54) both have their final game at home against clubs who've already been relegated.

And finally, the final matchday in the Czech Republic will see leaders Slavia Prague (66 pts) host 11th placed Zbrojovka Brno with a chance to win their first title since 2009. Second placed Viktoria Plzen (64 pts) winners of the last two championships, host 14th placed Vysocina Jihlava and have to hope Slavia slip up for a chance at a threepeat. In case of a tie at the top, Viktoria Plzen will be champions based on their better head to head record against Slavia.

 

[Prntscrn]

Edit: **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** **** ****

 

[HajdukSplit]

Rijeka have won their 1st ever title in Croatia and ends an 11 year title run by Dinamo Zagreb. There is still one matchday to go and Dinamo actually host Rijeka so it would have been interesting to see what kind of weird stuff would have happened if it was a title deciding match.

Totally deserved by Rijeka, they were much better than Dinamo this season and only reason why it was "close" is because Dinamo kept getting gifts from referees in matches they nearly dropped points in and they essentially get a minimum 12 free points a season vs. Lokomotiva (I will argue 2-3 other clubs gift them points as well)

This current Dinamo team has very little quality and their summer recruitments have been disasters despite being billed as superstars as usual by the Dinamo-cronies in the media. Other than Soudani, who has little ambition staying at Dinamo for another few years (though where else is he going to get paid 1.0-1.5m euros a season?) there isn't much there

Rijeka will need to strengthen in the summer, they rotated their squad very little and were helped they didn't suffer many injures + early exit in Europe. Will be difficult to see them in the Champions League regardless because of their low coefficient, they are already unseeded in the 3rd round, but their home ground is a bit of a fortress...they haven't lost at home since July 2015 to Aberdeen of all teams They have only lost twice at home since 2014 and that includes results against the likes of Sevilla, Standard, IBB etc...

 

[Savi]

How are Rijeka's finances?

 

[HajdukSplit]

How are Rijeka's finances?

Pretty good, owned by an Italian millionaire, his net worth has dropped over the last few years because he is in the oil industry, but obviously for Croatian standards good enough to field competitive team. They have put most of the money into infrastructure and a new stadium however, they haven't spent big on signings. Usually they try to attract Croatians players in 'smaller leagues' around Europe or ones who aren't playing much in top leagues. They also scout the ex-YU region pretty well, couple of solid Macedonia and Montenegro internationals. Their most impressive signings for CRO level is ex-Swiss international Marko Gavranovic and Austrian midfielder Alexander Gorgon

So far they are pretty much linked with younger players from the domestic league, they were trying to sign Nikica Jelavic but he decided to stay in China

 

[maclean]

And finally, the final matchday in the Czech Republic will see leaders Slavia Prague (66 pts) host 11th placed Zbrojovka Brno with a chance to win their first title since 2009. Second placed Viktoria Plzen (64 pts) winners of the last two championships, host 14th placed Vysocina Jihlava and have to hope Slavia slip up for a chance at a threepeat. In case of a tie at the top, Viktoria Plzen will be champions based on their better head to head record against Slavia.

Kinda hoping Slavia slips up. They were gloriously rotting into the basement the past few years until they got taken over by a Chinese company and suddenly started performing well this year. The people involved in brokering this deal are also involved with a lot of other Chinese investments and the whole group around the team and building their mega stadium a few years ago is just a whole swampful of corrupt types. Not that that's anything new in football, but. Well, they're also two tram stops away from the team I cheer for so it's hard to wish them anything good. To say nothing of the fact that I put more faith in Plzen having any hope in any European leagues.

 

[HajdukSplit]

Well, they're also two tram stops away from the team I cheer for so it's hard to wish them anything good. To say nothing of the fact that I put more faith in Plzen having any hope in any European leagues.

Bohemians?

When I visited my sister in Prague I was shocked at how close Bohemians/Slavia were. Slavia's stadium is nice but not in the best of neighborhoods (only based on appearance, world class stadium surrounded by typical commie apartment buildings)

 

[maclean]

Bohemians?

When I visited my sister in Prague I was shocked at how close Bohemians/Slavia were. Slavia's stadium is nice but not in the best of neighborhoods (only based on appearance, world class stadium surrounded by typical commie apartment buildings)

Yep.

I'm not a fan of any of these fancy modern stadiums without a soul really, I guess Eden isn't particularly worse in that regard, but there was a lot of **** around shady ownership structure and getting the municipal district to invest and then making off with their money. Bohemka is a more homey stadium. From an objective perspective I guess you'd call it a ****** little dirthole but it's our ****** little dirthole When they built Slavia's stadium Eden they were trying to do everything in their power to get Bohemians to play there too and for two years they actually had to while they were installing a heated field at our stadium. It's interesting that while Eden was being built, Slavia had to play at the old Strahov Stadium, which is known mostly for the big Communist synchronised gymnastics events. They weren't doing very well in those years and now they have to play their last game of the season there because there's a concert on at Eden.