The road to Wembley really begins!...Champions League round of 16 match ups.

I'll have thoughts on these match ups a bit later, but the draw shook down pretty much the way I though it would, especially for Arsenal and Spurs. Real Madrid are out for revenge against Lyon for last years dismissal at this stage, and finally we have a rematch of last years final between Bayern Munich and Inter Milan. Great match up, however both sides are a shadow of the sides that played in the final in May.

Here's the results of the draw....discuss amongst yourselves!

Roma v Shakhtar Donetsk

AC Milan v Tottenham Hotspur

Valencia v Schalke

Inter Milan v Bayern Munich

Lyon v Real Madrid

Arsenal v Barcelona

Marseille v Manchester United

FC Copenhagen v Chelsea
 
Cheers,
Mike

Quick thoughts on today's Champions' league draw

The Champions' League starts in earnest today with the drawing of match ups for the round of 16 which starts in February. The potential exists for some seriously sexy match ups like another Manchester United v AC Milan showdown or Barcelona v Inter Milan...tell me you wouldn't watch that!



Who's playing who?



See this is the thing about Champions League I love, the potential for amazing match ups in the knock out stages. If I could just take off the intellectual football fan hat off for a moment and put on the simple fan hat, the knock out stages of this tournament excite me more than the World Cup. Mainly because there is the potential for titanic games between the best club sides in the world, which boasts the best players in the world. It also doesn't hurt that it's every year, and FIFA is not involved as well. I've heard arguments from platforms like the Footy Show, Match of the day and others that the group stage of the tournament takes some of the luster out of the match ups, or that the amount of money that floats around kills the vibe. Although I agree that the group stage can drag at times, I do believe this is the best footballing tournament in the world today.

Friday will prove me right with some excellent match ups. It also gives us an insight into some of the lesser known leagues like the Danish Superliga in which champions Copenhagen will enter the knock stages for the first time. It will be an up hill climb for the club whoever they draw, but as last year taught us with Bordeaux, anything could happen.

The draw I'm most interested in seeing is Arsenal's. In theory they could draw Barca or Real Madrid (Would take a day off work to watch that one) which could be instant classics. This is a squad most people thought along with Barcelona to have been drawn into an easy group, and it looked that way through the first three group games. However the wheels fell off a bit and it took a late fury of goals on match day 6 to qualify in second place. Now they face a real test against Europe's finest, will this force some serious spending by Arsene Wenger in January?

Also pre tournament favorites Real Madrid could come out with a slightly easier draw, or they could draw the already mentioned Arsenal or a stingy Marseille side who could provide some problems for Jose Mourinho's side. Remember he was brought in to get them past this stage in which they have fallen in 4 straight years. His goals were straight forward, retake the league from Barcelona, and win Champions league (European Cup) for a record 10th time. The pressure is on Mouriho and Ronaldo, but I would fancy them to make a deep run.

So much to talk about, but honestly let's see who draws who and then the fun can really begin.

Cheers,
Mike

Round of 16 thoughts so far

As I was out with family yesterday I only had the opportunity to see bits and pieces of the two games, because of this is I will not be offering an opinion on the two games. All I can really say about them is congrats to Uruguay and Ghana, two teams I did not have making it this far. If you had the opportunity to watch them let me know what you though of the games, especially the Ghana v USA match, I heard it ended up a classic.

As for day two of the round of 16 your intrepid footy analyst was back on the couch watching England v Germany and then the sexy match up of today, the rematch of the best match in the 2006 tournament Argentina v Mexico.

Germany 4 England 1: (Germany advance to quarter finals)
This was pretty much the worst case scenario for both teams coming into the round of 16 as neither really wanted this match up as early as this. Especially England who had hoped to finish first in their group and avoid this hard of a game. Now I must admit that I have a soft spot for England and was hoping for a victory from the the Three Lions, because of this I watched the game again taking my bias out of it. Once I did that it was clear that Germany were the better side on the day. Yes the Lampard goal that was ruled no goal was absolutely one of the worst calls I have ever seen in a World Cup, and yes it may have changed the complexion of the game a bit. However the match was not lost on that call really, it was actually lost in two key areas, tactics set up by manager Fabio Capello, and defensive play. I will go about trying to explain how this was.

First Capello's tactics in this game weren't horrible, but they were misguided against a strong squad like Germany. The squad lacked ideas and many times were very narrow in attack. England's best chances, and the goal scored were set up on wide play from James Milner. When the team was narrow it was easy for Germany to close down on Rooney and Defoe, which in turn made the link up play ineffective. Also when you cannot spread the field you leave yourself open for counter attacks which three of Germany's four goals were scored on. In this, all credit must go to Germany who countered brilliantly mainly through Mesut Özil who again is proving to be the young player of the tournament so far. When the German manager moved him a bit more to the right after half time, Özil was able to take advantage of the space left by the advancing England right back Glenn Johnson.

Speaking of the defensive backs, they did not have a great day, John Terry and Matthew Upson in particular. On the first goal by Klose, Terry uncharacteristically misplayed he flight of the ball which allowed Klose to walk in the back door. Upson ended up being out muscled by Klose for the goal. On the second goal it was a combination of excellent German movement and sloppy coverage by Terry and Johnson left Lukas Podolski wide open on the left wing to score.

I know this will not sit well with the England supporters, many will use the disallowed goal as a rallying point to say that England were robbed. I agree with them; England was robbed of THAT goal, but not of the match. Not enough credit is being given to Germany who yes rode of bit of luck but who overall were the better team on the day, and they outclassed England. To read another point of view on England's world cup proformance read BBC chief football writer Phil McNulty's assesment (Click on his name)

Argentina 3 Mexico 1: (Argentina advances to quarter finals)
This was to be the sexy match up of the day as both teams liked moving forward. The first 10 minutes provided just that, with Mexico holding the majority of the play at the time....then controversy hit again. Carlos Tevez scored on a flicked header off floated shot by Messi. The issue was that Tevez was quite clearly offside. After some confusion between the ref and the line judge the goal stood. Mexican players complained for a good two minutes and pretty much lost their head after that. Argentina took over the match at that point, plus it didn't he;p that the Mexican defence handed Argentina the second goal on a poor back pass by the defender.

Overall Argentina bossed the game and until the last 10 mins looked like they could really run up the score on Mexico. By the way if you get to watch a replay of the game, Tevez's second goal which made it 3-0 was a lazer, and Henandez's goal that made it 3-1 was a lesson on how to turn a defender. My one criticism of the game would be Argentina's lack of zest going forward at about the 75 minute mark. This seemed to coincide with the substitution of Carlos Tevez who provided alot of the spark and work rate upfront. Never the less Argentina manager Diego Maradona seems to have pulled off another managerial master class in planning and tactics....yes I said it.

Looking forward to the rest of the week! Let me know what you think will happen or on any of the games from this weekend.

Cheers,
Mike