San Marino

[Bilo]

Just bagged their first ever competitive win against Liechtenstein and only second ever win in over thirty years of football.

 

Played 206

Won 2

Drawn 9

Lost 195

Scored 34

Conceded 824

GD -791

 

Imagine the scenes in Serravalle tonight. 

 

[foxy boxing]

I hope the San Marino government give the manager and the players the countries highest honour!.

The players keep playing international football knowing that 99% of the time they will be beaten. They are just proud to play for their Country.

Every country has the right to play international football no matter how good or bad they are.

Edited 5 September by foxy boxing

[StanSP]

Last time they won a game, we were relegated from the PL and didn't return for another 10 years

[stripeyfox]

10 minutes ago, StanSP said:

Last time they won a game, we were relegated from the PL and didn't return for another 10 years

that's the spirit! 

 

[jammie82uk]

 

 

 

 

[Corky]

The Ever-Obliging Liechtenstein thread on LiechtenTalk is HOT right now

[lcfc278]

I think this is one of the benefits of the current nations league format - the likes of SM, Liechtenstein, Andorra, Moldova etc. will play each other more often and, you'd hope, get a little bit more competitive and taste the odd victory here and there.

[Manwell Pablo]

7 minutes ago, lcfc278 said:

I think this is one of the benefits of the current nations league format - the likes of SM, Liechtenstein, Andorra, Moldova etc. will play each other more often and, you'd hope, get a little bit more competitive and taste the odd victory here and there.

 

I'd prefer it if they just staged the world cup qualifying so that happened and only one or two of them actually got through to the final group stage to save fixture congestion.

[SpacedX]

 

[Tuna]

Well done to San Marino!

[Bilo]

I was watching the highlights of this game a few days back and it got me thinking. 

 

How far down the English football pyramid would you need to go before finding a team that San Marino could reasonably expect to beat? 

 

Obviously the PL and EFL are out, I wouldn't fancy their chances against a team from the National League either, but could they beat one of the smaller clubs from the NLN or NLS? Would they be able to come out on top against Marine or Weymouth?

[Wymsey]

3 minutes ago, Bilo said:

I was watching the highlights of this game a few days back and it got me thinking. 

 

How far down the English football pyramid would you need to go before finding a team that San Marino could reasonably expect to beat? 

 

Obviously the PL and EFL are out, I wouldn't fancy their chances against a team from the National League either, but could they beat one of the smaller clubs from the NLN or NLS? Would they be able to come out on top against Marine or Weymouth?

Reckon Hinckley/Nuneaton level.

 

Not sure if correct, but think some of San Marino's team have jobs away from football (like Gibraltar)?

[Bilo]

2 minutes ago, Wymsey said:

Reckon Hinckley/Nuneaton level.

 

Not sure if correct, but think some of San Marino's team have jobs away from football (like Gibraltar)?

So do some players for smaller NLN and NLS clubs, I believe. Professionalism starts to get a bit patchy around the sixth and seventh tiers. 

 

The thing is that San Marino, to my knowledge, only have one or two professionals on their books - and they play in the Italian third and fourth tiers. It'd be interesting to see how they'd get on against the teams you've mentioned, as I think it'd probably be competitive. 

[CosbehFox]

1 hour ago, Bilo said:

I was watching the highlights of this game a few days back and it got me thinking. 

 

How far down the English football pyramid would you need to go before finding a team that San Marino could reasonably expect to beat? 

 

Obviously the PL and EFL are out, I wouldn't fancy their chances against a team from the National League either, but could they beat one of the smaller clubs from the NLN or NLS? Would they be able to come out on top against Marine or Weymouth?

Very low 

 

this summer Hadley from tier 8 beat a top division San Marino team, 9-1. Even bringing on a fan in the process 

 

https://southern-football-league.co.uk/News/135959/HADLEY-EUROPEAN-ACTION

[Bilo]

1 hour ago, CosbehFox said:

Very low 

 

this summer Hadley from tier 8 beat a top division San Marino team, 9-1. Even bringing on a fan in the process 

 

https://southern-football-league.co.uk/News/135959/HADLEY-EUROPEAN-ACTION

I had no idea of this!

 

Anstey Nomads or Shepshed Dynamo would most likely do a job on them, then? 

[Lionator]

51 minutes ago, Bilo said:

I had no idea of this!

 

Anstey Nomads or Shepshed Dynamo would most likely do a job on them, then? 

I reckon so too, in the FA Cup if you get a PL club v National league standard club, it’s rarely ever a hammering. So you’d have to go a lot lower to get to the point where it would be a guaranteed hammering like what happens with San Marino everytime they play an elite country. 

[Bilo]

9 minutes ago, Lionator said:

I reckon so too, in the FA Cup if you get a PL club v National league standard club, it’s rarely ever a hammering. So you’d have to go a lot lower to get to the point where it would be a guaranteed hammering like what happens with San Marino everytime they play an elite country. 

The only thing I'd say about San Marino as a national team as opposed to Sammarinese clubs is that they do have a sprinkling of semi-professionals from the third and fourth tiers of Italian football, so they'd probably do better than Juvenes/Dogana did in the preseason friendly mentioned on here. 

 

That said, even Marine vs Tottenham in the FA Cup a couple of years back only ended 5-0 and there were 160 places between them. That suggests that even a seventh or eighth tier side would probably be a challenge for San Marino, which says a lot for the depth of quality in English football if nothing else. 

[Lionator]

13 minutes ago, Bilo said:

The only thing I'd say about San Marino as a national team as opposed to Sammarinese clubs is that they do have a sprinkling of semi-professionals from the third and fourth tiers of Italian football, so they'd probably do better than Juvenes/Dogana did in the preseason friendly mentioned on here. 

 

That said, even Marine vs Tottenham in the FA Cup a couple of years back only ended 5-0 and there were 160 places between them. That suggests that even a seventh or eighth tier side would probably be a challenge for San Marino, which says a lot for the depth of quality in English football if nothing else. 

That was the exact game that came to my mind. Or when Kidderminster nearly beat West Ham which was 112. 

[Bilo]

2 minutes ago, Lionator said:

That was the exact game that came to my mind. Or when Kidderminster nearly beat West Ham which was 112. 

To get to 8-0 plus on a more or less guaranteed basis as happens with San Marino, you're surely talking about an eight or nine division gap. Loughborough Students or Ashby Ivanhoe most likely.

[Heathrow fox]

I think San Marino would bobble about in mid table Step 4

[Graceroad]

10 hours ago, Bilo said:

To get to 8-0 plus on a more or less guaranteed basis as happens with San Marino, you're surely talking about an eight or nine division gap. Loughborough Students or Ashby Ivanhoe most likely.

That only happens when they play the likes of England France Germany Spain etc. Having said that the Indian national  team who are worse then San Marino played Oadby Town in a friendly in the early 90s and its was a draw so who knows

[Bilo]

6 hours ago, Graceroad said:

That only happens when they play the likes of England France Germany Spain etc. Having said that the Indian national  team who are worse then San Marino played Oadby Town in a friendly in the early 90s and its was a draw so who knows

India have a terrible national team, but they're about 75 places higher than San Marino in the world rankings. 

[Wymsey]

30 minutes ago, Bilo said:

India have a terrible national team, but they're about 75 places higher than San Marino in the world rankings. 

Am a bit surprised that the football quality is poor over there - especially as you sometimes see locals wearing top club shirts over there on the streets via television over the years.

 

There's big potential for Indian football, given they seem to be a good number of football fans watching the PL etc, but for some reason there seems to be little investment/ambition into the sport in the country.

[Walshy5]

Cooper would still play 3 defensive midfielders! You know just to be on the safe side.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited Sunday at 15:46 by Walshy5

[Graceroad]

15 hours ago, Bilo said:

India have a terrible national team, but they're about 75 places higher than San Marino in the world rankings. 

Can't believe I have to explain this but of course India are higher in the world rankings SM play against England France Spain  Italy  Germany etc  India play against Sri Lanka Pakistan Bangladesh  so of course they win a few matches it's like having Shepshed above Leicester in the rankings because they've  got more points this season.