It might be a bit early for this (no premature jokes please) but if we were to go into the Europa league tonight i would excited. Dont get me wrong it would be shameful to be the first team to win the cup and then go out at the group stage but I love meeting new teams and the Europa league would offer us that. Playing Barca nearly each year is just a tad boring for me now, the only surprise with them is how are they going to cheat their way through the tie this time.

Am i the only one who feels like this? Every cloud has a silver lining and all that! UTC!

Well Roman has never won it and as they say 'every cloud has a silver lining'

We will get a fair few quid if we win it but I feel unless we buy a decent striker that is just a pipe dream.

There are sides far more equipped to win it than us and an early exit will end Rafa's reign in the summer for sure.

There will be some Anti Rafa Chelsea fans thinking us lifting the Cup would be a bad thing.

When it looked like we'd be in this from the start of the season I was looking forward to it, now I'd rather it wasn't the case, but you are right hopefully we'll get a good tie against a team we've either not played before or 1 we've not played in ages!

I just couldn't get excited at the prospect of Europa League, now that we have tasted champions league regularly for the last 10 years. It would just be a step in the wrong direction, however if we go out of it early and that means FSW is gone early then perhaps that is the silver lining. 

I know it's a different competition, and entirely different circumstances, but us winning the Cup Winners Cup (Zola!!) is one of my favourite footballing memories, if Shaktar don't do us a huge favour tonight, I really hope we go all out and try to win the Europa Cup.

It didnt do United any harm last season. I think we will be fine.

It's a trophy we never won if we are in it I'd love to win it. That means we would have won all 3 European trophies.

The funny thing is that whilst people dismiss the Europa League as a tournement that is below us the quality at the latter stages of the competition is very high indeed (just look at the gulf in quality between the sides when we met Athletico Madrid earlier this year)..

 

We could be facing the likes of Napoli, Inter Milan, Lyon, Athletico Bilbao, Lazio, Hannover, Athletico Madrid not to mention Premiership sides such as Liverpool, Newcastle and Tottenham.

 

It would be quite funny if after winning the CL and demoting Spuds to the Europa League we them met them in the final and prevented them from winning the competition.

 

If things don't go our way tonight it will be a tough pill to swallow, can't deny that, but I would still hope we took this competition seriously and gave a good account of ourselves against some of Europes old greats.

 

Bottom line is we weren't really good enough to qualify from a  tough CL group, we can have no complaints.

The funny thing is that whilst people dismiss the Europa League as a tournement that is below us the quality at the latter stages of the competition is very high indeed (just look at the gulf in quality between the sides when we met Athletico Madrid earlier this year)..

 

We could be facing the likes of Napoli, Inter Milan, Lyon, Athletico Bilbao, Lazio, Hannover, Athletico Madrid not to mention Premiership sides such as Liverpool, Newcastle and Tottenham.

 

It would be quite funny if after winning the CL and demoting Spuds to the Europa League we them met them in the final and prevented them from winning the competition.

 

If things don't go our way tonight it will be a tough pill to swallow, can't deny that, but I would still hope we took this competition seriously and gave a good account of ourselves against some of Europes old greats.

 

Bottom line is we weren't really good enough to qualify from a  tough CL group, we can have no complaints.

Spot on mate. Bloody hell, some people are spoilt

Remember how overly enthusiastic I was for it last season?

Albeit, it was a bit tongue in cheek, I was still desperate to see us win it though, because I just

wanted to see our players lift a European trophy, I'd given up on THE European Cup.

As it turned out, we qualified, and the rest is HISTORY.........

As for this season, I'm not really hurt as much, because I've finally seen us do it, if we were to ever

win it again, it would be a bonus.

Winning the Europa League would still be good for me, I appreciate us winning any trophy, whether it's the Asia Cup, Carling Cup

or the European Cup, if it's there to be won, we might as well do it.

Not to mention you get some decent teams towards the end of the Europa League.

I'll support us wherever we go... It's just the reason/manner why we're there that makes me apathetic.

a good run will do us the world of good in keeping up our uefa ranking

Well Roman has never won it and as they say 'every cloud has a silver lining'

We will get a fair few quid if we win it but I feel unless we buy a decent striker that is just a pipe dream.

There are sides far more equipped to win it than us and an early exit will end Rafa's reign in the summer for sure.

There will be some Anti Rafa Chelsea fans thinking us lifting the Cup would be a bad thing.

 

Not nearly enough money in the competetion compared to the Champ league.

 

Athelrico Madrid won just £8.5 million from winning the comp last year

 

by contrast, Manure earned £28 million just by getting knocked out in the group stages of the Champ league.

 

We won £48 mill in prize money apparently.....  

 

www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/20523405  

£48 million that didn't even buy Torres how sad.

At this point I'd love a good run in the EL. If we qualify to next round in the CL anything can happen so it is premature talking about it.

Don't you remember the commentator when Torres scored at Camp Nou: "50 million pounds have just been repaid by Fernando Torres."

If we win it I'll be happy

Not nearly enough money in the competetion compared to the Champ league.

 

Athelrico Madrid won just £8.5 million from winning the comp last year

 

by contrast, Manure earned £28 million just by getting knocked out in the group stages of the Champ league.

 

We won £48 mill in prize money apparently.....  

 

www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/20523405  

 

Well we will have earned over £20 million in the CL groups so winning the Europa (if possible) would bring us up to a near £30 million which isnt too bad really.

Our focus of course has to be a top 4 finish, can't get into a Liverpool habbit.

It might be a bit early for this (no premature jokes please) but if we were to go into the Europa league tonight i would excited. Dont get me wrong it would be shameful to be the first team to win the cup and then go out at the group stage but I love meeting new teams and the Europa league would offer us that. Playing Barca nearly each year is just a tad boring for me now, the only surprise with them is how are they going to cheat their way through the tie this time.

Am i the only one who feels like this? Every cloud has a silver lining and all that! UTC!

It will make a change, but club will have to look at ticket prices! Over the last 10 years we have continually sold out carling and fa cup games due to our cheap ticket prices and it always looks impressive with the crowds we get compared to other clubs for these cup games. we"ve had sell outs for games against sc**thorpe, southend, gillingham, notts county, forest ,huddersfield, watford, maccelsfield, cardiff, leicester, ipswich and others, so it would look great around europe if we get sell outs for europa league games as well. But tickets would have to be cheap maybe a £10 or £15 for adults and a £5 for kids??

Why would we be looking to win a 2 bit trophy that might not even be around for much longer when our league form is so poor? Champions league football is a priority unless we want to be attracting the Charlie adam's and Stephen Hendersons of the world

If we drop into it i want us to win it, i love this cometition, more often then not it is better to watch then the Champions League.

Why would we be looking to win a 2 bit trophy that might not even be around for much longer when our league form is so poor? Champions league football is a priority unless we want to be attracting the Charlie adam's and Stephen Hendersons of the world

 

Did you think the Cup Winners Cup was a 2 bit trophy when we won that out of interest?

 

We are used to CL football, so this seems like a step down, but I would still want it to be taken serioulsy.

 

Top 4 would probably take priority as in terms of the big picture getting back into the CL is vital for the reasons you point out but I don't see why it has to be one or the other- we wouldn't have to play the group games and could use a mix of experiance and youth for this competition, resting the odd player here and there if needs be.

If we drop into it i want us to win it, i love this cometition, more often then not it is better to watch then the Champions League.

It really is imo.

Teams are far more attaking in the Europa while in the CL it's more often than not an edgy affair.

 

Well if we win it, at least we can have another bash at the Super Cup.

Still, we've got one of those, so it's not all bad.

Two pages of this already? Come on, we are not here yet. I know the media makes it out as if we're screwed already, but it's hardly impossible for Shakhtar to beat Juventus and for us to win.