A big half hour for Man City's season - down to 10 men and 1-0 down at home to Barcelona. Hard to see them overcoming anything more than a one-goal deficit.
Leverkusen are also down to 10 men at home to PSG, having held out for a commendable two and a half minutes before conceding the first of three goals.
Hard to tell how good Barca were, Man City just were not that interested in making a game out of it, maybe they were afraid losing by a landslide had they tried to play their usual game. Maybe Barca just outfoxed them completely so they couldn't play. For a £1bn team, Man City were made to look like novices in the CL. We'll know better about Barca (re their title hopes) in the next round when the standard of the opposition should be better.
City actually looked better with ten men, going forward at least they seemed more positive. Demichelis actually played well for once but it was part of a rearguard action, whereas without him they were more confident and let their natural game flow.
It was weird supporting Man City. I feel dirty.
DID YOU NOTICE A SIGN OUTSIDE MY HOUSE...?
no guarantee of better opposition in next round still a few poor teams make still sneak through, Kompany nearly had a kevin keegan moment in his aftermatch interview " they were there for the taking / not the best team we played this season comment must be some savage teams in the mighty premier leagueOriginally Posted by geysir
" football is a simple game "
I'd say he was talking about Bayern, but still they were far from there for the taking, although City had chances even with 10 men.no guarantee of better opposition in next round still a few poor teams make still sneak through, Kompany nearly had a kevin keegan moment in his aftermatch interview " they were there for the taking / not the best team we played this season comment must be some savage teams in the mighty premier league
Or Chelsea... who completely outplayed them a couple of weeks ago, were more defensively sound and created far more than Barca. Still silly comments tough after being outclassed.
I'm prepared to cut Kompany some slack. He's a class act in every regard and was clearly just upset after losing a big game.
The commentary on ITV was so one-eyed it was ridiculous. So what if the initial contact was marginally outside the box. It was a penalty all day long. 99pc of refs anywhere would have given it and morally it doesn't matter if it was technically not a penalty - he was clean through on goal in total control of the ball.
They then said that City had just as many chances as Barcelona even after the sending off because Hart hadn't a save to make. The disallowed goal that was offside wasn't mentioned. Alvez had a shot inches wide. Barcelona cut them open a few times but wasted the telling pass. I agree that Valdez made a couple of important stops or interventions but the better team won from what I saw (second half only).
Barca still looked very suspect when trying to deal with crosses in their box. Negredo seemed to win everything in their air. A back line of Alves, Pique, Mascherano and Alba is great going forward but none of those players great at defending in say the way players like Thiago Silva, Lahm, Subotic, Chiellini etc, are - if they afford that much space to a player like Ibrahimovic, Cavani or Mandzukic (if he is picked) then they'll conceed.
Roy surely helped regain some balance...
I'm confused by this.
Morally, it does matter if it technically wasn't a penalty. That Messi was clean through is relevant only to the red card, which was correctly given.
Whether it's a penalty depends on where the foul was, not whether Messi was clean through. From my watching of it - in a pub with the sound down - it seemed that contact (the tackle) was made just outside the box, and Messi's momentum caused him to fall inside the box. But the only contact was outside, therefore it's a free, not a penalty surely?
The ref probably shouldn't have given the penalty as such - the linesman would have had a better view of where the foul took place, so if the ref was in doubt, he should have checked with the linesman.
Course, they could have gotten it wrong, which is fair enough - it was a very close call, and after a few replays, I wasn't entirely sure myself where the contact was - but I don't see why you'd say it was morally a penalty because Messi was through on goal?
Good grief, if anyone was thinking about skipping the start of the Arsenal match to watch the end of Corrie, you're missing out on one of the best openings to a football match ever.
Penalty Arsenal!
edit: Ozil misses! Awful peno!
On the penalties, if the tv coverage stopped just as the taker was about to make contact with the ball and each pundit gives an appraisal of the confidence, approach and likely scenario of what's going to happen next, would we have the same comments "he never looked confident" "he was leaning back" etc?
True, but Ozil was very hesitant in the run-up, as typified by the stutter that I thought was illegal?
I'm not so sure Szcezsny should have been sent off. Surely Robben's touch had taken the ball away from goal so it was hardly a goal-scoring opportunity he prevented? Ozil looked more in control of the ball when Boateng fouled him but that was only a yellow.
Not 100% sure but I think if the striker is continually moving forward then a slowdown stutter is allowed, basically a stop is not allowed.
Feel a bit sorry for Sir Chesney, its a no win situation if he doesn't react in all probability he let's in an away goal, if he does go for it then there is a risk of a pen and red.
Regardless of whether it was a goal scoring opportunity, I don't like the red card rule because it doesn't discriminate between cynical and non cynical. That was just a natural coming together, each player making an honest effort to play the ball, a penalty would have been suffice, imo.
Brilliant first goal by Bayern, the cut back was just met perfectly by Kroos.
All 4 seeds were well superior (varying levels of) to their opponents, so far in this CL last 16.
Pep must be earning a bit more with Bayern seeing as he's no longer wearing that jacket with the elbow patches.
Last edited by geysir; 19/02/2014 at 9:02 PM.
It's interesting because it's one of the few fouls where intent isn't taken into consideration when the punishment is being decided - the only criteria is the material effect of the foul. Usually, a professional foul and an incidental foul are treated differently.
Giles's analysis of this was interesting. He reckons Ozil didn't have a plan for where he'd hit the ball - he was relying on Neuer making a decision before he hit the ball and then he'd choose the opposite side.
Then he ruined it by suggesting Ozil should have stopped completely before making up his mind, which is very much illegal.
I'm not sure what the sanction would have been had Ozil completely stopped. I think it would have been a yellow and (if he had struck the ball after stopping) a re-take of the penalty.
On the red card the very least UEFA/FIFA could do is give the team with the red carded keeper an extra sub. For instance last night, Arsenal had already made one sub (Monreal for Gibbs) due to injury, they then had to make a second sub (Cazorla for Fabianski) to bring on a keeper, which meant as well as giving away the pen, and losing a man, they also had to play the remaining 50-60 mins with only one sub. In reality they couldnt afford to freshen up the team before 75-80 mins as doing so would leave them with no subs left and running a risk of going down to 9 men if they got an injury. It just became a case of the 10 men being run into the ground.
If the Cazorla for Fabianski sub hadn't counted as one of the three, then at least then would have been able to introduce subs to freshen up the team and give them a bit of respite. Say on 60 mins they could have taken Sanogo off (for Giroud) and on 75 mins Chamberlain (for Rosicky) it might have made it more of a contest.
In that case, Giles could only make that comment after he had seen Ozil's poor shot selection and it was a fair assessment of what went down. Mostly commentators/co-commentators and pundits come out with gospel like statements of absolute certainty afterwards, about the player lacking confidence in the run up to a missed penalty. Yeah, sure Ronnie
I don't know why some commentators go to such contorted lengths trying to pronounce Ozil's name. Just say Ozil.
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