CL & UEFA Cup Draw Official Thread

[Poor Student]

What a mouth watering tie. Good money spinner for both clubs. Theoretically attendences should be good with it easy for away fans travel. An Irish side is guaranteed to be in Round 2 now. ;)

Should Shels get through Steaua aren't the worst draw. Obviously it's good to avoid Celtic, Liverpool, Anderlecht, Dynamo Kiev, Partizan and Lokomotiv Moscow. I think Steaua are one of the more doable (that's not a real word is it?) teams.

[eirebhoy]

Would've thought that was better
No, playing 2nd leg at home is a huge advantage.

[Slash/ED]

Would've thought that was better - definitely a live tie....

Money wise it's probably better, getting through wise it's worse.

is Romania a summer or winter league, when does their season start?

[Macy]

No, playing 2nd leg at home is a huge advantage.
Football wise, but financially it might not be.

[garykelly]

http://www.steaua.com/Foto/foto/stadium/pictures/stadion.html
Here's Steaua's Stadium anyway... ;)
Quite decent!

just quite decent :D flipping hell it's a class ground.

[Poor Student]

Money wise it's probably better, getting through wise it's worse.

is Romania a summer or winter league, when does their season start?

It's the conventional late summer/early Autumn to May kind of league I think. Don't know exact dates. Steaua won the European Cup in the 1980's but that was under communist rule when the best players could not leave until their late 20's. After Celtic I think they are the only side to win the European Cup with an entirely homegrown team. Maybe Crvena Zvezda did as well, not sure.

[Slash/ED]

It's the conventional late summer/early Autumn to May kind of league I think

I hope so, that could prove to be a big advantage for us

[Buller]

Romania's Season is in the winter as far as i know...
I know, their stadiums class!!!!

[Kingdom]

Steaua....nasty. Doesn't look like it'll be as good a year for Shels as last year.

That is exactly what i was thinking. First of all the 1st round draw isn't exactly straightforward. For all the talk of the North being the poor cousins , I think it will be tough for Shels. As others have pointed out , they will need to improve drastically, because even if they do win out over the Glens they will be in a far tougher draw with Steaua than they had against Hajduk last year.

Steaua did well in the uefa cup last year , qualifying from the group stages of a group with Parma

Athletic 4 3 0 1 11 4 9
Steaua 4 2 0 2 4 3 6
Parma 4 2 0 2 5 6 6
Besiktas 4 1 1 2 7 7 4
Standard 4 1 1 2 4 11 4

they then knocked out Valencia in the next round and were unluckily knocked out by Villareal in the next round. So they will be no push-overs.

Here is their record in european comps. :

european records
Competition AP Pld W D L GF GA

ECCC 17 83 33 21 29 125 116
ECWC 11 40 14 12 14 51 54
UEFA Cup 9 46 15 14 17 58 61
UEFA Super Cup 1 1 1 0 0 1 0
Total 38 170 63 47 60 235 231


Prediction:

Shels to snuff it in the 2nd round.

[pete]

No idea how good Steau are but Romania is crap draw for any hope of tv money.

Might get a lot of Romanian ex-pats at the game though? ;)

IMO Shel$ will do well to get past Glentoran. Shel$ will have everything to lose as favourites & in current form can't even beat Rovers & only scrapped past Kildare County.

[Baker]

Steau won their league only about a fortnight ago and sacked their coach only a few weeks before that. Here is the report on soccernet from June 11.

Steaua clinch Romanian title


BUCHAREST, June 11 (Reuters) - Steaua Bucharest beat Politehnica Timisoara 2-1 on Saturday to clinch their 22nd Romanian first division title.
Steaua, who last lifted the trophy in 2001, finished the season with 63 points to seal a place in the second preliminary round of the Champions League.


Dinamo Bucharest, who finished second, and third-placed Rapid Bucharest qualified for the UEFA Cup.

Senegal striker Gueye Mansour put Politehnica ahead from 20 metres in the 26th minute before forward Andrei Cristea volleyed Steaua level.

Nicolae Dica headed the winning goal four minutes after halftime.

The Steaua fans saluted former coach Walter Zenga, the Italian who was fired three rounds before the end of the competition.

'Thanks Walter, this title is yours too,' read a banner.

Dinamo Bucharest beat Arges Pitesti 1-0 to finish one point behind arch-rivals Steaua while Rapid Bucharest drew 0-0 with Sportul Studentesc Bucharest.

[Anto McC]

Eh,lads,i think youse are jumping the gun a little,We'll worry about getting past Glentoran first.

[Sheridan]

No idea how good Steau are but Romania is crap draw for any hope of tv money
Recent pedigree is quite impressive. Last season, they defeated FK Zeleznik (S&M), CSKA Sofia, Standard Liége, Besiktas and Valencia (home and away) in the UEFA Cup, before suffering elimination by Villareal in the 1/8 finals (having previously lost to Bilbao and Parma in the group stages.)

[Schumi]

Steaua look a decent team based on last year's UEFA run, difficult to see Shels getting through that if they beat Glentoran. The timing of the first round (in the middle of Glens' off season) should make Shels favourites to get through though the Setanta Cup showed that there isn't a big gap between the leagues.

[eirebhoy]

Shels are in Belfast on 12th July. :eek:

[Lux Interior]

Shels are in Belfast on 12th July. :eek:

Ive heard the 14th being mentioned.

I'd much rather we were away that week. :(

[Macy]

The timing of the first round (in the middle of Glens' off season) should make Shels favourites to get through though the Setanta Cup showed that there isn't a big gap between the leagues.
Sure we, at a pretty low form ebb, would've gone through on away goals. Shels have to be big favourites imo. It would be Vaduz ( :rolleyes: ) style humiliation if they don't...

[Schumi]

It would be Vaduz ( :rolleyes: ) style humiliation if they don't...But wasn't that not a humiliation at all. :D

[Macy]

But wasn't that not a humiliation at all. :D
No hence the :rolleyes: ... :D

Shels have by far the biggest squad and budget on the island. If they can't beat a part team in pre-season who would've lost to us over 2 legs in the prime of their season then they may never utter the words "Champions League Group Stages" again for the rest of their lives...

[Slash/ED]

I agree with Macy, but we'd want to start playing something approaching football soon.

[brendy_éire]

I agree with Macy, but we'd want to start playing something approaching football soon.

Get your act together and ye's'll beat them no bother. They're not great really.

[Slash/ED]

The hard part is getting our act together, we lost to the bottom of the table team at home under a week ago. At our best we will beat them though, I'd say, but will we be at our best? We need to turn it around in the league and fast.

[Kingdom]

I think this is where a certain undeserved arrogance creeps into Irish domestic soccer.
With the notable exception of last season, Irish clubs in Europe are rightly in the doldrums of the European competitions due to a lack of success. As others have pointed out it wasn't so long ago that Shels were knocked out by Hibernians (the bad Hibernians for that matter).

I think eL fans would be wise to look no further than the 1st round game and then see where things go from there (if they go anywhere at all).

Remember this is a derby between two well supported teams. We (as in the Southeners) mightn't regard the northies as despised rivals but have no doubt over how much delight they would take in knocking Shels out.
In the height of summer and the height of the marching season. Tensions will be high and it would be a massive turn up if the tie wasn't in the melting pot right up to the last quarter.

The main eL fans on this MB were saying they would take a derby match against the Glens over a match against one of the continental teams to try and keep expenses down. To me that equates looking fto be against Liverpool in the 2nd round just to be guarenteed some cash.
Jaysus H Christ. I would take a match against any of these teams

FC Haka (FIN), HB Tórshavn (FAR), FC Levadia Tallinn (EST), NK Gorica (SLO) or FH Hafnarfjördur (ISL), Anorthosis Famagusta FC (CYP), Sliema Wanderers FC (MLT) or F91 Dudelange (LUX)

instead of a derby match against Glentoran. They are all very beatable , and are not the hardest in the world to get to.

[brendy_éire]

but will we be at our best?

You won't need to be. They can play alright when they need to, but over the two legs it'll be very difficult for them.

[Slash/ED]

UEFA cup draw on now, it'll be a while before we get to Cork and Longford though

[thejollyrodger]

agreed. We really have to put the likes of Glen. away with such a squad like ours. The main problem is that were playing like crap at the moment. We really want to be flying when we make it to the 2nd round.

[Schumi]

UEFA cup draw on now, it'll be a while before we get to Cork and Longford though
Is it live on uefa.com? Can't find it if it is.

Never mind, found it.

[crc]

Longford get Carmarthen (Wales)

[Kingdom]

Longford have been drawn at home to Carmenthan of Wales

[pete]

Longford v Carmethen

home leg 1st

nice one!

[fosterdollar]

Longford Town V Carmarthen
first out of the bag.

Who knows what about them?

[Roo69]

Longford Vs. Caemarthen (Wales) Happy Days :-)

[Kingdom]

Cork away to ekranes Lithuania

[Schumi]

Cork have Ekranas of Lithuania.

[crc]

Cork away first to Ekranas (Lithuania)

[fosterdollar]

Ekranas V Cork

[thejollyrodger]

guess what, its Ekranas V Cork :p

well, what are Ekranas like ??

longford seem to have a good draw

[Kingdom]

Linfield at home to Ventspils Latvia

[crc]

Linfield v Ventspils (Latvia)

[Slash/ED]

Longford have no excuse if they don't come through this one.

Don't know much about who Cork are playing but they seem to be one of the lower seeded teams according to the order they're in on that UEFA website, and they're away first which is a big advantage for them. Hopefully we'll see both progress.

[Kingdom]

Portadown are away to Viking Stavanger

[crc]

Viking (Norway) v Portadown

[fosterdollar]

Tough draws for Ports and Blues i would have thought

[Gerrit]

****e draw... I wanted to go to Kazachstan, Georgia, Azerbaijan or Armenia. And no, not being ironic here. I have been wanting to play European for so long but my Belgian team never got to play European football, now it was happening with Shels and I wanted a real far away travel, a true travel and not some trip you can make in two or three hours. Also I prefered a country where I'd never been before so that it was a real travel and not just a football trip.

So there were three times I wanted to avoid: TNS, Glentoran, and Dudelange. Been in all three countries, so not interesting at all. While I had a fascination for Eastern Europe for many years.

So yes, I was hoping for Kazachstan or a Kaukasus country. This draw is the very worst that could happen. A European away game closer than some league away games, that is just so wrong IMO. Hopefully we beat Glens and then go to Romania, then at least I didn't save money for nothing. Saving and looking forward to my first football travel for months, and then not going further than Belfast would be a huge disappointment.

[brendy_éire]

Longford Town V Carmarthen
first out of the bag.

Who knows what about them?

We played TNS (Welsh champions 5 years in a row or something), about a year and half ago. Beat them 1-0, should have been more. We'd a mostly underage squad out. Didn't seem up to much at all.
Reckoning Longford should beat Carmarthen easily enough.

[pete]

Cork have Ekranas of Lithuania.

I'll take that. Could have been a lot worse.

[brendy_éire]

Tough draws for Ports and Blues i would have thought

Ports won't beat Viking, difficult one for the Blues. On their day, maybe.

[thejollyrodger]

with all due respect Gerrit. Shelbourne's progress in Europe is far more important than your stinking holiday to places like Kazachstan, Georgia, Azerbaijan or Armenia. :rolleyes:

[Gerrit]

OK, just read the UEFA Cup draw, and now honestly, Shels have the least attractive of all. I'm gutted... I was so hoping for the journey of a lifetime, a unique travel experience to a country I'd never been (eg ex USSR). And we got Belfast while lucky Ports go to Norway and lucky Lins and Cork go to the Balkan... I'm so jealous :(

[Slash/ED]

You have to be happy enough with the way the draws have gone today imo.