Lasange-gate changing everything is rubbish. We were a weaker side back then than we are now, or were when we finally did get into the CL. By any stretch of whose imagination would it have meant us becoming a CL regular? I'm sorry, but that's total bollocks.
Remember who qualified for the CL a year before lasagne-gate? I don't see Everton as CL regulars now. There is nothing to say that we wouldn't have gone out at the qualifying round had we finished in fourth that year. Oh that's right, we would have had all that CL money to dump into new signings, just as we did in 2011.
I just mean the way it felt to miss out by such a fine margin, in THAT manner... the result may not have changed 'everything' (I take that back) but the way it felt at the time, it was as if our entire footballing World had just met a very ugly, MESSY end, and there was fuck all we could do about it...
No doubt we'd have gone tumbling out of the CL a year later, and spunked all our CL money on players who were only HERE for CL football, and same old same old.... maybe we DID need a few more years' experience in the EL before taking on Europe's Elite... but fuck me it woulda been fun seeing Jol take us into the CL! (and straight back out again!!!)