Cristiano Ronaldo scores another for Madrid. Andre Villas-Boas has a night to forget at the Stadio San Paolo as Edinson Cavani and Ezequiel Lavezzi tear Chelsea apart, while two Champions League heavyweights suffer a first-leg deficit on the road. Here’s our round up of the European action as Matchday Seven finally came to a close…
AVB On The Brink
As confirmed in yesterday’s Scout Scribbles, Chelsea’s trip to Napoli didn’t get off to the best of starts, when confirmation filtered through that John Terry required exploratory surgery on his on-going knee problem. The day didn’t end much better, either.
A 3-1 defeat in the Stadio San Paolo will only add fuel to talk in the media of an early Stamford Bridge exit for Andre Villas-Boas, as the young manager walks the precarious tightrope of employment found under the stewardship of the notoriously impatient Roman Abramovich. The Blues continued presence in the Champions League seemed, to many, to be one of Villas-Boas’ saving graces in the eyes of the Russian oligarch; this first leg defeat will not have served to have helped matters.
As for the on-pitch action, things started nigh-on perfectly for the visitors, when Juan Mata -doing our Matchday preview some justice- found himself on the penalty spot to capitalise on a back-pass/bobbly pitch combination and tuck the ball away.
Chelsea more than held their own through much of the game, in fact, but the effervescent power of the Napoli strike-force eventually overcame the Blues’ back-four. Ezequiel Lavezzi levelled affairs with a sumptuous strike from outside the box, then, not to be outdone, Edinson Cavani had just the right amount of nous and gumption to shoulder home a pitch perfect cross past Petr Cech just before half time.
The South American pair then combined for the third half-way through the second period, as Cavani set up Lavezzi to dumbfound David Luiz before finding the net. Cavani ended the match with 11 points, just pipping Lavezzi’s 10.
Even the tactic of purposefully leaving behind fake line-ups in hotel rooms couldn’t help Villas-Boas in the end, however. With an away goal in their pocket Chelsea aren’t out of the tie just quite yet, but the London outfit will certainly need a sharp turnaround in form before the reverse fixture next month.
CRISTIANO RONALDO SCORES GOALS
A comfortable game in uncomfortable conditions afforded Jose Mourinho’s runaway La Liga leaders a 1-1 result that wasn’t particularly reflective of their performance. It left the Real Madrid manager with a smile on his face, though, as his side came away from Russia relatively unscathed, with a home game in warmer climes to follow.
Mourinho had Cristiano Ronaldo to thank for Real’s only goal. The Portuguese superstar opened the scoring for the visitors, picking up his fourth goal of the campaign in his fifth appearance. As the boys at Opta kindly pointed out, the former United winger has now bagged a mere 111 goals in 109 League and European matches.
European Fantasy managers who opted for Madrid front-line alternatives to Ronaldo will feel slightly hard done by. Karim Benzema was unfortunate enough to be withdrawn through injury inside a quarter of an hour, while replacement Gonzalo Higuain could or should really have been flying home with some kind of points tally.
Pontus Wernbloom (despite having a name more akin to a Pirates of the Caribbean character than a Swede making his debut in sub-zero Russian temperatures) gave the attending Muscovites plenty to cheer about. His injury time goal crushed many European Fantasy managers’ clean sheets in the process, yours truly included.
A trip to the Bernabeu awaits CSKA and, while realistic expectations will favour Mourinho’s men to come out very much on top, the omens are better than one might expect if history is anything to go by. CSKA have twice before faced Spanish sides in two-legged games and, on both occasions, they drew at home before winning the away leg. We’re just putting that out there.
RECENT FINALISTS, CURRENT STRUGGLERS
The 2009/10 season was the one year in recent history where the Champions League final was completely void of Barcelona altogether. Bayern Munich and Inter Milan were instead the two sides involved in the showdown at the Bernabeu, with the latter eventually wining 2-0.
Cut to a little short of two years later and European fortunes are less than stellar for the German and Italian heavyweights. They both suffered 0-1 away defeats at the hands of “lesser” Gallic sides FC Basel and Marseille – the French team getting the better of Inter and the Swiss outfit having the first leg advantage on the Bundesliga side.
Only one of the Inter starting XI had found the net this calendar year and that man, Maicon, was substituted at half time for Yuto Nagatomo. It was frankly no surprise, given their recent performances, that the result didn’t favour the Italians and is indicative of a downturn in form that has seen Claudio Ranieri’s side draw one and lose six of their last seven fixtures.
By comparison, Bayern are in far less of a crisis. Granted, they are not (like Inter) 14 points off the top of their domestic league but Jupp Heynckes’ side are trailing last year’s winners Borussia Dortmund and could face a second season in a row without the title- something that hasn’t occurred in Germany for nigh-on almost sixteen seasons.
This is all without mentioning the home sides. Both Basel and Marseille were worthy winners and travel away in a fortnight’s time with confidence buoyed by last night’s performances. The ties are still wide open, but, thanks to late goals from Andre Ayew (Marseilles) and substitute Valentin Stocker (Basel), confidence will only be growing, as 90 minutes and a goal advantage separates these two sides from the quarter finals.
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