Part 87: Appendix: The Year in Football/Futbol/Fußball/Calcio/Soccer, 2018-2019

Appendix: The Year in Football/Futbol/Fußball/Calcio/Soccer, 2018-2019
June 1, 2019



Well, we know what happened in the Championship, but what happened elsewhere? In League One Coventry City and Hartlepool earned their way back into the Championship, with Crawley winning the promotion playoff. No word as of yet where Tackleford finished. I'm adding League One as a fully simmed division again, so we'll be able to keep tabs on those jerks.



The main megabastards are going back to the Champion's League, while Leeds, Aston Villa, and the Baggies drop back down to the Championship. AU-David Moyes is beloved by the Old Trafford Faithful after Man U held off Chelsea for the title. It's a very different universe than ours.



Arsenal beat out Crystal Palace for the FA Cup, while Championship opponents Fulham made it to the semis.



Up north Celtic retains it's stranglehold on the SPL. The Thistle drop to fifth place, but it's still better than Rangers, who appear to have become just another club beneath the thumb of Celtic.



Barcelona recovered from an early season swoon that saw them in 11th place in late fall. They still can't challenge Real Madrid for the title, only Atletico had a chance of that. La Liga is so boring at the top.



Dortmund wins for the second year in a row, though Bayern has somewhat recovered from their total catastrophe last season.



The only moderately interesting major league in Europe was the Premiership, as Juventus ran away with Serie A.



Oh, what a surprise, PSG runs away with the league again. Meanwhile, Orson Duchamps gets relegated along with Guingamp.



Porto lost only one game, which is impressive regardless of where you play.



It's only in the Netherlands where any intrigue is to be enjoyed. Heerenveen wins their first Eredivise title ever, while Ajax stumbles through a nightmare season that sees their lowest finish in two decades.



No one interesting even made it to the quarterfinals of the Europa League. Tottenham continues to be unable to win anything, which I'm sure pleases Arsenal fans.



Barcelona only won two games in it's group during the fall, while sitting in 11th in La Liga three months into the season. For them to come back and win the Champion's League is quite a turnaround, and should give hope to any real life Manchester United fans that they too might somehow pull a Chelsea and recover some glory from an ignominious season. I was pulling for Marseilles, though, it would have been galling for PSG to have someone else from Ligue 1 win the title, even if they themselves had won the previous year.




Japan and Morocco win their respective continental competitions. For Japan this is nothing new, for Morocco it's a huge achievement.



Jumping across to the Western Hemisphere, Montreal wins it's 4th title in three years. I've set MLS to be fully simmed, which will begin after the end of the current season. At the present Montreal and Salt Lake are by far and away the best teams in the two divisions.



Flamenco won the previous year in the Brasileiro, next season they will be a fully simmed league and I'll be able to offer a league table showing the prior year's outcomes.



Wow. Deportivo Moron was only just promoted from the second division the prior year, and previously had always been a lower division club in Argentina. Yet they overcame Boca Juniors, Velez, River and the rest to win the league twice in a row. I need to order my scouts to look at their team.



Viva Puebla!



Last year it was an all Brazil semifinal, this year only Palmieras represents joga bonito in the semis along with two Argentine sides and Mexico's Monterrey.

Overall a pretty boring year in the world of soccer. No real surprises in the largest leagues, and the megabastards generally won again. Hopefully in a couple years we'll start breaking that trend.