Posted in Champions League, Match Preview on Apr 16th, 2024
Embed from Getty Images This season has been an aberration for Bayern Munich in that they will not win the Bundesliga title. The German champions will be Bayer Leverkusen and our own Granit Xhaka. It’s a well worn joke by now but no less worthy of repetition for that – one of “their own”, Harry […]
Posted in Champions League, Match Preview on Mar 12th, 2024
Two hours or so inland from the city of Porto lies the northeastern Portuguese province of Trás-os-Montes, or Behind the Hills. I drove that route nearly 30 years ago but recalled it this week because Arsenal will have been working on some clever ways of getting in behind the Porto defenders to prevent a recurrence of […]
Posted in Champions League, Match Report on Feb 22nd, 2024
Embed from Getty Images Mikel Arteta unsurprisingly went with an unchanged side from the one which won 5-0 at Burnley on Saturday and 6-0 at West Ham the weekend before –Raya; White, Saliba, Gabriel, Kiwior; Odegaard, Rice, Havertz; Saka, Trossard, Martinelli; Subs: included Ramsdale, Smith-Rose, Viera, Nwaneri, Sweet and Heaven. For Porto, manager Conceição had […]
Posted in Champions League, Match Preview on Feb 20th, 2024
And so into the Dragons’ den. The time: Wednesday evening. The occasion: the Champions League Round of 16 first leg against FC Porto. The location: a sold-out Estádio do Dragão. The 50-000 seater stadium, the third largest in Portugal, was built for the 2004 Euros. Porto moved in the year before, travelling a few hundred […]
Posted in Champions League, Match Report on Nov 9th, 2023
Embed from Getty Images My Spanish is very poor (like my Italian, German, French, and Dutch) but I could swear that drifting over from the Sevilla supporters was the refrain “Six times champions of Europe, you’ll never say that”. Frankly if that was what they were singing it sounded as ridiculous in context as the […]
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