UEFA Champions League 2013/2014

Atletí plays like a premier side , very direct. Chels played like a SerieA side organize n safe. I expected the result it was boring at times, but Atletíco had a few chances free headers just wasn't meant to be.
 
I expected this result or maybe 1-0 but thats it. Just look at chelsea line up.. 4 defenders 3 DMF.

As for goals i think tomorrows match will bring us a lot of goals.

4-2 for Real i think
 
Very cynical set up by Mourinho.
The ref should have allowed 8 or 9 minutes injury time after all the time wasting. I am one of the few people here who likes Chelsea and find them genuinely attractieve, but this was horrible.
 
@miguell, agree whit that, but still is a danger result to bring to the 2nd leg.

@ZeroTheHero, that's precisely what I felt. I like defensively football, but that was too much. Give your team a chance on counter-attack at least. Torres probably felt like an abandoned child at the bus station, so alone that he was.
 
gerd said:
Very cynical set up by Mourinho.
The ref should have allowed 8 or 9 minutes injury time after all the time wasting. I am one of the few people here who likes Chelsea and find them genuinely attractive, but this was horrible.
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Well, I find it hard not to strongly dislike how Chelsea play without Hazard.
IMO he's the one that gives them the spark they need to be great going forward (especially now since they don't have a world class striker).
 
bebo said:
Atletí plays like a premier side , very direct. Chels played like a SerieA side organize n safe. I expected the result it was boring at times, but Atletíco had a few chances free headers just wasn't meant to be.
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what my friend bebo meant to say with this diplomatic metaphor is that chelsea were awful and that atletico were surprisingly good for a liga team :P

if i may play devil's advocate for a minute, i would argue that, back when italian teams used to master the art of defending (wich was quite a long time ago, as over the last decade italians got significantly worse in defending, and are today no better than the average english or german team), they didn't display such a one dimensional approach to the game (contrary to popular belief).
to make it short, back then italian teams had a reputation for being good at defending, wich means defending well with 4, 5 or 6 players (tops). a good defensive display also implies a decent offensive effort.
committing 9 players to merely defensive duties is not what i'd call "a good defensive display". with that many players behind the possession line, it ceases to be about quality defending and it becomes merely a matter of occupying space.

having said that i can't really criticize a coach for getting exactly what he wanted. josè clearely aimed for a goal-less draw and he achieved his goal (no pun intended).
it might have been ugly, but he absolutely nailed it. whether this decision will come back to bite him in his ass, that's an entirely different story. ;)
 
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Wasn't very impressed with Atletico tbh. Their gameplan consisted solely of getting the ball wide and chipping it in for Fellai... Costa. Thought I was watching a Moyes team. There was very little of the fluid passing you'd expect from a top LL team.
 
this is a team which football is designed by simeone: don't ever use words such as "fluid" or "passing" to describe it.... or at least don't put them in the same sentence ;)
 
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Well, there wasn't much space for them to play in, was there? Two counter attacking teams having a go at each other, while the other ones (us obviously) defended very deep. Boring as hell, but Mou got away with clean sheets, which is what he wanted.
 
Pass, pass, pass, pass concede ;)

This is uber-Pep football so far. Dull possession, foul the second you lose the ball. Soooooo boring.

Madrid have had the ball for about 30 seconds and created 4 good shots.
 
This ball possession football was stupid, is stupid and will always be stupid unless you score some goals. I'm not sure if the Peps and van Gaals of this world will ever get this.

Apart from that: I'm saying this for years now, but today the evidence is crystal clear: If Bayern or Germany has a corner and Kroos is about to hit that, you could also hand the ball over to the opponent, that would be less embarrassing than seeing him kicking them so badly.
 
The possession football Guardiola stands for particularly actually, in my opinion, becomes destructive because most of it is equivalent with time wasting.

A few years back when Barcelona was leading 1-0 they kept passing the ball without creating anything just for the sake of having the ball for 30 minutes.

I understand the tactical advantage, and I understand the skill, determination and work rate required to achieve such level but it doesn't help. It's just as boring and unethical as what Chelsea served us yesterday.

amineken22 said:
Well, there wasn't much space for them to play in, was there? Two counter attacking teams having a go at each other, while the other ones (us obviously) defended very deep. Boring as hell, but Mou got away with clean sheets, which is what he wanted.
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You can't say that Chelsea is a typical counter attacking team. That's just a cheesy attempt at hiding the fact that Chelsea and Mourinho are extremely cynical. Chelsea has proven that they are cynical with or without Mourinho, but the two of them together is obviously an abomination of football. Any team that have ambitions to win the league needs to be able to take the initiative in the majority of their matches. Counter attack can be a strategy all by itself and it can be an ingredient in a more dominating style. For Chelsea and Dortmund for that matter, since it would inevitably been brought up, the latter is the case.

For good measure, hardly any football teams in the world actively denies themselves to take advantage of counter attack opportunities on a regular basis. Aforementioned Barcelona under Guardiola did but that's the only example I know of. Spurs under AVB this season also looked quite inept at using them but that was probably not due to lack of wanting.
 
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It should have been 3-0.

Agree with s-nipe, bayern corners are awfull , their players are huge they should use better this!
 
Everything except their reactions to Real's counterattacks is working well for Bayern. They do have problems to create chances, but that's to be expected considering how defensive Real is playing.
Unfortunately, they're not back at that extreme level of accuracy and some players (Ribery, mostly) have a hard time getting into the game at all. One or two subs could get the much needed element of surprise back in. So: Smarter defending during the counters plus maybe Goetze and Mueller and scoring the crucial away goal should be achievable.
 
RM's 4-4-2 did the business ! Bayer wasn't sharp today and made a few errors that could of cost them. Muller getting his tits in a knot inside the box was funny.
 
Bale looked 65% he should of stay on the bench IMO.
@ Beachryan RM n Bayer did behave , but Lahm had the ball in the final 3rd to stop n kick it out was shocking :) fair play yikes!!!
 
Great game. High intensity. Poor tactical display by Guardiola. He must realize he is not in Barça anymore. Sterile possession. The possession game works very well, when you have players with can delivered that final pass, speed up the game at a key moment. He does not have those players at Bayern. Then if you play a slow tempo game, the opposition have time to get back and close the gaps. Players like Robben and Ribéry are more suitable for a direct game, a transitions type of game.

And what's up with that high defensive line!? Are you serious going to play like that against probably the fastest counter-attack team in Europe, with the likes of CR7, Bale, Di Maria and Benzema. You don't have fastest CB's to play like that.

If CR7 wasn't rusty and was properly fit the game would end up 3 or 4 nil.

Hope, he chooses a different gameplay in the second leg. This time it wasn't by lack of effort by the players.
 
beachryan said:
Wonderful discipline from Real. Can't believe discipline and a team with Ramos can go together, but hey.
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Ramos almost fuck it up on that Götze chance. Almost make a penalty, lost his position on the field without any sense. Ramos being Ramos!
 
Very fair and classy game throughout, too. Almost no antics. Webb with perfect refereeing.
José wasn't missed, that much is certain. ;)

Bayern doesn't seem to be able to recover from their loss of form in time, it seems. It's not all bad - not by a long shot, actually. But aspects of their game are lacking big time compared to the time before Pep's now (in)famous "The league is over"-speech. Since then there hasn't been a single performance quite on the same level as before. We drew against Hoffenheim (conceded 3 at home, scary stuff), drew in Manchester, lost in Augsburg (not scoring), did manage to kick out United with another lackluster performance, got our asses kicked by Dortmund and won the last two matches with painfully average displays against a second division team and a soon-to-be-one-again.
Well, and now this game against Real. All things considered, Bayern's game improved quite a bit. It is Real Madrid we're talking about here, let's not forget that.

It's really not the time to write off Pep or the style of football he wants to see, especially since 90% of the season it worked wonderfully, with lots of chances created and goals scored, only very few conceded at the same time. In fact: I liked Pep's Bayern a tad more than Jupp's. Up until a certain point, at least. :P
 
I think Jupps Bayern (last year) were much, much better than this years one. I think that team was genuinely dynamic, it could go long, it could do possession, it could do counter-attack, and I think in the very big games (versus your Arsenals, Manchester clubs, Dortmunds and to an extent Leverkusens) it makes a difference as you have to plan for every possible type of Bayern attack.
 
S-NipE said:
This ball possession football was stupid, is stupid and will always be stupid unless you score some goals. I'm not sure if the Peps and van Gaals of this world will ever get this.

Apart from that: I'm saying this for years now, but today the evidence is crystal clear: If Bayern or Germany has a corner and Kroos is about to hit that, you could also hand the ball over to the opponent, that would be less embarrassing than seeing him kicking them so badly.
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this ball possession is a style created by Jimmy Hogan, wich suits some teams who are from the appropiate football culture. this possession football was played originally by a Hungarian side too 70-80 yrs before.

i havent seen Bayern matches this season, neither this match but maybe it just doesnt suit German teams that much like latin teams
 
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Just think they're a little out of form. Earlier in the season they were electric and everyone was praising Pep for improving on Heynckes' Bayern
 
well, when we compare tonight's game to yesterday's, Bayern and RM did better job than respectively ATM and Chelsea.
Bayern did good in mobility and attacking animation, with good players movements, while Atletico failed at that.
RM did really good at attacking Bayern when they were under pressure, they turned deffence into attack in seconds, which Chelsea couldn't do, even if Hazard was playing, it wouldn't change anything.

all in all, tonight's game was at least enjoyable despite Bayern's boring possession.

I really didn't expect us to win, but we did it, and we deserved it and it could be even 3-0 in the first half.

Bayern had only Gotze's chance that was dangerous.

anyways, I still think it's very hard to pass to the final, despite the fact that tonight's victory made the odds 55% for Madrid.
only one goal is needed to make Bayern try to score 3.
 
I think it's still very delicately balanced, yes Bayern are strong and noone would be shocked if they scored 2 or 3. But on the other hand if Real can avoid conceeding an early goal then Bayern will actually have to push up and attack Real - with the pace of Di Maria, Ronaldo and Bale this could leave them very open to a counter attack and if Real get the first goal in Munich then I can't see Bayern recovering. Yes Real missed some good chances, and perhaps 2-0 would have been a more reflective scoreline but I think they will be happy with the 1-0.

Also one thing I would say about Chelsea the other night is yes it was dire to watch, but to be fair to them their best striker (Eto'o) got injured just before they left for Spain, their keeper was injured and they had to make a sub before 20 mins had passed, and then Terry got injured just after the hour and Lampard picked up a yellow (and actually could then have got a second yellow card for the handball). It wasnt great but having to use the early inforced subs for Cech* and then later Terry meant they were restricted. On 70 mins I'd like to have seen him bring on Oscar for maybe Luiz, but could he really risk this with his last sub, what if there had been another injury or Lampard or Mikel had been sent off?

*Personally I think the keeper should be an "extra" sub, managers hardly ever take a keeper off (apart from an injury or red card) so why not make it a sub in addition to the three allowed? The same was true when Arsenal played Bayern, not only did they lose a man but they also had to make a sub (was it Cazorla they took off for Fabianski) which meant for the next hour or so they could only use two more subs to relieve the remaining 9 outfield players.
 
Yes injuries conditioned Chelsea, but still you played with 3 DMF's plus Ramires on the right. You basically played only with William and Torres as offensively players. Real Madrid proved yesterday that you can play at the back, but be dangerous offensively. Chelsea was there only to defend.

As for the GK's "extra sub" I think the idea has merits, but would probably be exploited too much to be fair a rule. 1) If a GK was playing poorly he would probably be asked to fake an injury so the other GK could come to the game without wasting a sub; 2) If the team conceded a penalty late in the game, the GK could be replaced by a penalty stopper specialist, which would not be fair; 3) Late in the game some coaches would use that sub to waste time.
 
S-NipE said:
This ball possession football was stupid, is stupid and will always be stupid unless you score some goals. I'm not sure if the Peps and van Gaals of this world will ever get this.
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