Thursday, April 24, 2008

Champions League

The latest midweek midnight offerings of the champions league were all about mistakes and the biggest of them all was the presence of three premier league teams in the semi-finals. The premier league teams are surely the strongest in the world but considering the fact that their national team is the weakest, it is but a mistake that they be so dominating.

Premier League is supposedly the best league in the world and Manchester United is undeniably the best team in this league. So  what the heck was yesterday's match all about ?

Considering the form of Barcelona, Manchester United should have quite easily won the match or at the least , should have dominated the proceedings. But what conspired was that they were not only reduced to counter attacking but were also forced to suffice with a meagre 35% ball possession. Add to that Ronaldo's penalty miss and what we get is a clear picture of Chokers.

Stats have it that Man Utd have been to the semifinals 9 times (prior to this year)  but all that they have managed to do is to go down 7 of those times. So maybe yesterday's performance wasn't surprising after all.

Liverpool seem to be the only English team capable of rising to the occasion but they too have faltered (albeit temporarily) this time around. Riise surely rose to the occasion (but for the wrong team) and saw to it that the second leg wouldn't be a drab 0-0 draw, which would surely have been the case had Liverpool won 1-0.

Chelsea were once again lackluster all around except for maybe Michael Ballack who showed that he doesn't belong in that unimaginative team cumulated courtesy Russian currency. Chelsea surely don't deserve to win any silverware this season and i hope Liverpool and Man United do exactly that over the week.

Based on these two matches, Liverpool deserve to win the champios league.

Manchester United, on the other hand can end the season with just the premier league title.

Chelsea can happily get rid off Avram Grant citing a feasible reason.

Barcelona and Arsenal can continue playing their fancy football albeit unsuccessfully.

p.s:- IPL match between Mumbai and Chennai was much better than all this disappointing football.

9 comments:

  1. the problem is that when u visit an Adidas Showroom, you only get to buy the jersey of Chelsea FC :( and I don't wanna do that :X

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  2. The toughest and the best football leagues in the world are Spanish and Italian, and No friggin way EPL. EPL's all about hype. Barca even on low form is dangerous than most of the teams in the world. You should see the Champions league semifinal ( i think last yr or the year before) between Barca and Chelsea. Chelsea was literally tamed by Ronaldinho, Messi and Eto'o.

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  3. @sid:- The top four teams of the premier league are surely better than the teams of any other league. There can be no doubt about that.

    Chelsea did beat Barca in the year prior to what u say i think. They won 4-2 or something.

    Liverpool also beat Barca at Nou Camp. So i guess Barca ain't the gr8est

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  4. ayyooo ... you're extremely mistaken ... just see the italian and the spanish leagues for footballing talent .. those are the places which produce all time greats in football. EPL's all about cash, publicity and etc. real talent on display is low.

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  5. I hope Liverpool win CL and ManU lose to Barcelona. The though of looking at Ronaldo's pathetic face after they lose brings a wide smile to my face.

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  6. @ Namrata and Rahul : I'll mark your words. We'll all witness what happens at Old Trafford.

    @Namrata : I for one would love to see Gerrard's disgusting face after he is yellow-carded for a dive at the Bridge. a dirty cheating bastard he is.

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  7. I think I'll disagree with your saying that the top four clubs of the EPL are the best in the world.. As sid says, I'll like to believe that some of the Spanish and Italian teams are pretty good.
    As for the Barca match, I thought that the United defence was pretty good, especially it being the away match. Hope they wrap up the semis next week.
    I agree with the PS :)

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  8. Maybe the individual talent on display is not the highest, but the teams are surely the strongest. Aren't they?

    Over the past 5 years, "talented" players have been coming to play in the EPL too.

    eg:- Ballack, Torres, Tevez, Shevchenko, Drogba, Essien, Ronaldo, Carvalho, the whole Arsenal team etc.

    Many promising players stay away from EPL because of the ever-probing English media.

    Some people do go about claiming that the serie A is the most technically difficult, then how come Inter Milan won it???

    Coming to the Spanish league, all the teams are highly inconsistent and the least inconsistent team wins the title. Dropping points every now and then doesn't mean that the competition is high, it just means that the top teams aren't good enough.

    p.s:- last year's La Liga title race was simply awesome but that only showed how vulnerable the top three teams are

    p.s2:- The strength of the overall league maybe worth arguing but when it comes to the teams that qualify for UCL, EPL sides are friggin best (at least that's what the results over the past couple of years say)

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  9. Haha Chelsea won

    but since Ballack scored the goals, i ain't complaining :D
    Penalty or not, Chelsea surely deserved to win the game (but that doesn't mean they are gonna win the title)

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