Are Barcelona even better than QPR circa 1976?

No the QPR '76 team were better by some margin. Barcelona could never have afforded Stan.

What very few people outside London and Manchester know is that Stan Bowles was a product of Manchester City's youth academy. I saw him score 2 goals on his debut for City. City actually sacked him for his gambling and the trouble it got him in to.
The rest as they say is history.

The Celtic team that won the European Cup in 1967 were pretty effing special, and I'm a Rangers supporter! What's quite remarkable, in this age when teams are collections of all the nations, is that every member of the team who played in Lisbon was born within 12 miles of Parkhead.

quote:

Originally posted by bob mccluckie:
What very few people outside London and Manchester know is that Stan Bowles was a product of Manchester City's youth academy. I saw him score 2 goals on his debut for City. City actually sacked him for his gambling and the trouble it got him in to.
The rest as they say is history.

And we sent back Rodney Marsh the other way. I still think we got the better deal.

Daft idea.

Thanks to the wonder of Betamax, I knew this from an early age, but I thought this forum had already established that the Ipswich Town side in Escape to Victory is the best club side of all time.

As for Barca? Third choice keeper for Spain if he's lucky; Puyol can't run, assuming he's even on the pitch; midfield can play a bit, I'll give you that; and the kid up front knows where the goal is, but he doesn't get many, and he can't win games on his own, can he?

And then there's Liverpool...

quote:

Originally posted by graham55:
The Celtic team that won the European Cup in 1967 were pretty effing special, and I'm a Rangers supporter! What's quite remarkable, in this age when teams are collections of all the nations, is that every member of the team who played in Lisbon was born within 12 miles of Parkhead.

An amazing fact even in those days.

As for Barcelona being the best team ever, well time will tell, but they will have to go some to beat the Real Madrid team of the late 50s, early 60s, or the Ajax team from the early 70s, or A C Milan from the late 80s, early 90s, or Bayern Munich, Liverpool etc, etc.

But especially QPR '76!

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:

quote:

Originally posted by bob mccluckie:
What very few people outside London and Manchester know is that Stan Bowles was a product of Manchester City's youth academy. I saw him score 2 goals on his debut for City. City actually sacked him for his gambling and the trouble it got him in to.
The rest as they say is history.

And we sent back Rodney Marsh the other way. I still think we got the better deal.

New player into winning team didn't go, and who can forget Alf Ramsey pulling him off at half-time.

Cheers,
OW

quote:

Originally posted by OscillateWildly:
and who can forget Alf Ramsey pulling him off at half-time.

Eeeeew..

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:

quote:

Originally posted by graham55:
The Celtic team that won the European Cup in 1967 were pretty effing special, and I'm a Rangers supporter! What's quite remarkable, in this age when teams are collections of all the nations, is that every member of the team who played in Lisbon was born within 12 miles of Parkhead.

An amazing fact even in those days.

Yeah, it is. I never knew that.

Best club side performance I can remember seeing is Milan's 4-0 demolition of Barcelona (Romario, Stoichkhov, Guardiola, et al) in the 1994 European Cup Final. I seem to remember Desailly played a great game, and a certain Fabio Capello would've been coach.

quote:

Originally posted by OscillateWildly:

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:

quote:

Originally posted by bob mccluckie:
What very few people outside London and Manchester know is that Stan Bowles was a product of Manchester City's youth academy. I saw him score 2 goals on his debut for City. City actually sacked him for his gambling and the trouble it got him in to.
The rest as they say is history.

And we sent back Rodney Marsh the other way. I still think we got the better deal.

New player into winning team didn't go, and who can forget Alf Ramsey pulling him off at half-time.

Cheers,
OW

Seriously Stan was extra-ordinarily gifted. There's a wonderful story - about '95 QPR were entertaining Man U. Just as the Reds were getting off their coach and about to the enter the ground Stan Bowles turns up. The Steward says to Sir Alex "can you wait please to let Mr Bowles through first" There's Cantona, Giggs, Neville etc with a look that says "who the f--- is that"! We were winning that afternoon until the 95th minute Cantona equalised then Sir Alex told the ref he could blow!! We were relegated

Extra time always used to be defined as the time that Man U needed to score the requisite goal before the ref blew for time up.

The sooner that football adopts rugby's practice of stopping the clock to deal with injuries, the better.

quote:

Originally posted by Chief Chirpa:
Daft idea.

Thanks to the wonder of Betamax, I knew this from an early age, but I thought this forum had already established that the Ipswich Town side in Escape to Victory is the best club side of all time.

As for Barca? Third choice keeper for Spain if he's lucky; Puyol can't run, assuming he's even on the pitch; midfield can play a bit, I'll give you that; and the kid up front knows where the goal is, but he doesn't get many, and he can't win games on his own, can he?

And then there's LIVERPOOL...

Funny how you can go off people despite some great recommendations of music!

quote:

Originally posted by graham55:
The Celtic team that won the European Cup in 1967 were pretty effing special, and I'm a Rangers supporter! What's quite remarkable, in this age when teams are collections of all the nations, is that every member of the team who played in Lisbon was born within 12 miles of Parkhead.

Graham,
It was a marvellous achievement but that team's a long way short of the best in Europe. Real, Ajax, Milan, Juventus etc, nowhere near.
And sorry to nitpick but Bobby Lennox was born in Saltcoats. You should have known that. Try 40 miles. Still quite remarkable though.

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:
Graeme Souness suggested that this Barca team may be the best club side ever to play football. That would mean that they are even better than the great QPR side of the mid-seventies which contained Stan Bowles and Gerry Francis. Could this possibly be true?!! Are they the best team ever to play the beautiful game?

better than QPR circa 1976 possibly, but the best team in Europe at that time was Liverpool. In fact I would suggest that the LFC of the late 70s early 80s may well be the greatest era of club football ever. Yes i'm biased but look at the names... Clemence, Hughes, Heighway, Keegan, Neal, Kennedy, Fairclough, Hansen, Dalglish, Souness...

quote:

Originally posted by graham55:
The Celtic team that won the European Cup in 1967 were pretty effing special, and I'm a Rangers supporter! What's quite remarkable, in this age when teams are collections of all the nations, is that every member of the team who played in Lisbon was born within 12 miles of Parkhead.

Didn't they cost a total of about £5k to put together as a team. I still have my '67 commemerative badge that was issued at the time in the house.

However Barcelona after that display in the first half the other evening

quote:

Originally posted by King Size:

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:
Graeme Souness suggested that this Barca team may be the best club side ever to play football. That would mean that they are even better than the great QPR side of the mid-seventies which contained Stan Bowles and Gerry Francis. Could this possibly be true?!! Are they the best team ever to play the beautiful game?

better than QPR circa 1976 possibly, but the best team in Europe at that time was Liverpool. In fact I would suggest that the LFC of the late 70s early 80s may well be the greatest era of club football ever. Yes i'm biased but look at the names... Clemence, Hughes, Heighway, Keegan, Neal, Kennedy, Fairclough, Hansen, Dalglish, Souness...

Liverpool were slow and ponderous compared with QPR. And a word for Sir Bobby's Ipswich team. Arnold Muhren...........

You can argue against Barcelona being the greatest team ever, many have already mentioned Real Madrid, AC Milan, Ajax, Liverpool and (ahem) QPR. Other teams worthy of a mention are Man Utd's treble winning side, their '68 European Cup winning side, Don Revie's Leeds United, and the Benfica side featuring Eusebio.
It is hard to argue against Barcelona being the most entertaining great side. Most good teams are built on a strong defence whereas Barca seem to relish the prospect of outscoring opponents. A bit like Keegan's Newcastle.
Regards,
Steve.

Messi is a mean goal scoring machine!

quote:

Originally posted by graham55:
Extra time always used to be defined as the time that Man U needed to score the requisite goal before the ref blew for time up.

The sooner that football adopts rugby's practice of stopping the clock to deal with injuries, the better.

It's now Arsenal Time.


Barcelona - first leg, first-half - as good as the pressing and movement was, they didn't score - not that great. Yesterday, mistake by Silvestre for one goal and Vermaelen going awol for two of the others.

Cheers,
OW

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:

quote:

Originally posted by bob mccluckie:
What very few people outside London and Manchester know is that Stan Bowles was a product of Manchester City's youth academy. I saw him score 2 goals on his debut for City. City actually sacked him for his gambling and the trouble it got him in to.
The rest as they say is history.

And we sent back Rodney Marsh the other way. I still think we got the better deal.

If you are suggesting that Bowles and Marsh were part of the same transfer deal they most certainly were not.
After beingt sacked by City in 1971 Bowles went to Bury then resurrected his career at Crewe and then was sold to Carlisle. He transferred to QPR in 1972 six months after Marsh left to join City.
There was no link between them at all other than they were both fancy dans who never won a thing.

quote:

Originally posted by OscillateWildly:

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:

quote:

Originally posted by bob mccluckie:
What very few people outside London and Manchester know is that Stan Bowles was a product of Manchester City's youth academy. I saw him score 2 goals on his debut for City. City actually sacked him for his gambling and the trouble it got him in to.
The rest as they say is history.

And we sent back Rodney Marsh the other way. I still think we got the better deal.

New player into winning team didn't go, and who can forget Alf Ramsey pulling him off at half-time.

Cheers,
OW

and he never played again for England after telling Ramsay that at City all they got at half time was a cup of tea!!!

quote:

Originally posted by King Size:
[better than QPR circa 1976 possibly, but the best team in Europe at that time was Liverpool. In fact I would suggest that the LFC of the late 70s early 80s may well be the greatest era of club football ever. Yes i'm biased but look at the names... Clemence, Hughes, Heighway, Keegan, Neal, Kennedy, Fairclough, Hansen, Dalglish, Souness...

I watched the QPR of '76 completely dismantle that team at Loftus Rd. It finished 2-0 but should have been more. Bowles and Francis completely ran the game and Liverpool could not live with them.

QPR led the championship for most of that season and with 2 games to go only needed to win them both to be champions. Unfortunately their lack of experience at the top showed and they lost the penultimate game away at Norwich 3-2. Nonetheless Rangers still led by a point with Liverpool going into the last game of the season away at Wolves who needed to win to stay up. These days the games would have been played at the same time but Rangers played on the Saturday and Liverpool on the following Wednesday I think.

With 15 minutes to go Wolves led 1-0. Liverpool eventually won 1-0 and the championship by 1 point.

I still can't let it go!

quote:

Originally posted by bob mccluckie:
If you are suggesting that Bowles and Marsh were part of the same transfer deal they most certainly were not.

Not at all. I'm well aware of the facts. Stan was my idol as a kid and I was a regular at Loftus Rd from 72 onwards. In fact the first game I saw was Rangers taking Carlisle apart 4-0 in the old second division in Stan's 3rd or 4th game for us.

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:
I watched the QPR of '76 completely dismantle that team at Loftus Rd. It finished 2-0 but should have been more. Bowles and Francis completely ran the game and Liverpool could not live with them.

Fair enough, but great teams aren't just about getting up for big games but about consistency; putting together results week in and week out, and I think that the Liverpool team of that era could do that better than anyone else.

Someone else earlier said they were slow and ponderous, that is one way of looking at it. The other way would be to call it calm and considered.

quote:

Originally posted by Chief Chirpa:

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:

quote:

Originally posted by graham55:
The Celtic team that won the European Cup in 1967 were pretty effing special, and I'm a Rangers supporter! What's quite remarkable, in this age when teams are collections of all the nations, is that every member of the team who played in Lisbon was born within 12 miles of Parkhead.

An amazing fact even in those days.

Yeah, it is. I never knew that.

Best club side performance I can remember seeing is Milan's 4-0 demolition of Barcelona (Romario, Stoichkhov, Guardiola, et al) in the 1994 European Cup Final. I seem to remember Desailly played a great game, and a certain Fabio Capello would've been coach.

That was a fabulous performance but the following season Barcelona demolished Manchester United 4-0 in the Camp Nou. What a display of football that was.

I also remember watching Milan take Ajax apart in the 1969 final. Ajax were brand new at the time, playing beautiful attacking football and Milan were typically defensive Italian. But Milan went at them and took them apart 4-1 in a dazzling display of attacking football that made you wonder why they didn't play that way all the time.