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BONANZA DETAILS COMING SOON
Big win for Real Madrid over the expected C. We considered the E again, and did have some tucked away in our plans ready to deploy but we didn't need to go to a plan B or C today as we soon raced into a 3-0 lead and it was plain sailing from there.
Our keeper rates up, and so does Trent's shooting which is good for some important games coming up. We did suffer a suspension with Varane missing out on the next game but luckily we have enough cover.
Another 3 points picked up were Roma failed, same as AC Milan the other game which can only be good as we show the Roman's how to do it.
The game started with CvC and Leverkusen seemingly enjoying the majority of the chances, but Lyon got the first goal passed the awful Rui Silva (despite him rating up last game), a second shortly went in and Leverkusen change to a more attacking E which should have given them the advantage, but this seemingly turned the game into Lyon’s favour as they started an onslaught at the Leverkusen goal.
3-0 seems extremely harsh and a summary of the game is a battle of two keepers, Gollini seemingly unbeatable and Silva with paper hands.
Another failed C experiment against The Roma Way. We were 3 up after 23 minutes but with you know who in goal - we weren't confident of a victory until the 4th rolled in.
PSG switched to A when they went behind but offered nothing really. (30-12 was the shot count)
Shame Celtic rolled over for Madrid.
After our embarassing cup exit this was the perfect tonic - just need to give Mr Edwards the same treatment on Sunday.
Roma 4 PSG 0
terrible end to a terrible day. Embarrassing defeat and embarrassing stats with 30 v 12 shots. Cant even blame it on the red card which came after the 4th, or a crazy A formation cos 51013 is still strong for PSG. Just cannot get my head around our away form this season. The joy has gone at the moment and once we get knocked out of the CL our season will be over. The sooner the season ends the better
GG Derek
Another result that makes me wonder why I play this game....Valencia play A and score 4 vs us, I play it today and yes, Rangers score 4 vs me. My defence which was 2nd best in the league last season, has all of a sudden become absolutely awful.
A couple of early Rangers goals, followed by a goal from ourselves maybe set up an interesting tie but we knew what was coming.
Rangers restored their 2 goal advantage by half time and 6 minutes after the break it was 4-1....
We pulled a goal back but it wasn't enough.
Statistically we were outplayed and we continue to struggle.
We seem to lose playing C, P or A...at least with A we might get more abs.
Napoli are a decent side and always felt this was a tough game. A relatively tight game 10-8 shot count was won by Napoli being more clinical on the day. Two goals from Cunha were better than the one from Vinicius. It was a game that does nothing for the short-term or long-term so a disappointing day all round for Atletico.
We actually miscounted the number of games after the last game. There is 1 more to the half way stage - Real Madrid at home. We will enter the second half of the season in an encouraging position between 04th and 06th place which is above our expectations.
Will try and punch a small dent in the Real sea of green but this is probably the 04th hardest game of the season for us.
Extremely tough game, as I knew it would be. We trailed early but stuck with the game plan and got ourselves in front 3-1 at the break. Sevilla wouldn't go away though and pulled it back to 3-2 with 15 mins left and it was very uncomfortable reading from there on in especially given our recent history of conceding late goals.
Probably fortunate to get the win but delighted to do so and we've bounced back well from that defeat at Monaco the other week.
Our final fixture of the first half of the season sees us visit Roma. It doesn't get much tougher than that especially on their own turf. We'll give it a go in the hope that lightning can strike twice within the space of a few days.
Extremely tough game, as I knew it would be. We trailed early but stuck with the game plan and got ourselves in front 3-1 at the break. Sevilla wouldn't go away though and pulled it back to 3-2 with 15 mins left and it was very uncomfortable reading from there on in especially given our recent history of conceding late goals.
Probably fortunate to get the win but delighted to do so and we've bounced back well from that defeat at Monaco the other week.
Our final fixture of the first half of the season sees us visit Roma. It doesn't get much tougher than that especially on their own turf. We'll give it a go in the hope that lightning can strike twice within the space of a few days.
Unlucky Stew, good game.
Disappointed to end the first half of the season in the bottom 3 .. with the squad improvements made we should be comfortably in DPT placings ...
Again we take an early lead thanks to Nunez, sitting in a deeper role, but we were 2 down at the break ...
With 20 to play Jose scored a wonderful scissors kick (watch it on MOTD - if it's on this week) and we tried to force an equaliser but couldn't ...
We accepted we would concede possession, but actually had 10 shots on target to their 7 !
Barring the top 3, we have conceded less than all but 2 other sides, with 3 key close season improvements there..
.. our problem is scoring where we have scored less than all but 2 sides ... perhaps a rethink in strategy for the 2nd half of the season ...
We went with what many these days seem to call the "lazy C" option. But in truth what do you do when you know you are facing the equally "lazy P" that's rolled out week in week out? We therefore had tactical advantage all game long and made it pay with five unanswered goals with Juanmi and Christian Kouame grabbing a brace apiece. Sergio Reguilon completed the rout with a late goal to cap his MotM performance. If you look at the stats there was precious little between the two teams but no one wins games on paper. We were far more clinical and Inter looked devoid of imagination or determination. Another big plus for us is seeing Koen Casteels rate up to become a 20 rated keeper, which should help us immensely going into the second half of the season. Unfortunately we picked up two bookings which could come back to haunt us later in the season, especially the late one to Kouame. For now though we are happy to have clawed our way back out of the bottom two.
Good game Hamza.
Next game is another tough one where we play hosts to Chris Waters Napoli outfit.
We travelled to an inconsistant Bayern on a reasonable run of form with 7 points from a potential 9 and lined up with a similar team to that which had served us well in previous games.
Any game plan we had went out of the window when Bayern took the lead before 10 minutes had been played, in recent matches we have score early and gone on to make the most of it, where this time around we conceded early and seemingly didn't know what to do to comeback. Just after the half hour mark Bayern grabbed a second which was the cue for us to change things around to try and chase the game.
This tactic normally goes one of two ways, either we go on to lose by a considerable amount, or we can get a foothold back in the game. This time, however, neither of those occurred and we were holding our own in the second half until Bayern scored a third with 20 minutes to go. At this point we had made all the substitutions we could and therefore there wasn't a lot we could do to try and get back into the match, instead it became a case of holding out to try and prevent a landslide.
Not the performance or result we wanted but we go again next time against Juventus hoping for a better performance.
Good game JB, good luck for the rest of the season.
After back to back defeats Sporting Lisbon really needed to get something from this tricky tie against Dortmund in Germany.
Things got off to a disaster of a start when Dortmund took the lead with the first real action of the game in the 3rd minute, NDicka on possession of the ball and hit an unstoppable shot.
Sporting Lisbon were struggling to get into the game and hardly touched the ball in the first 20 minutes but then dominated the game for the next 20 minutes and there was no surprise when Matteo Politano lobbed Kobel who made a hash of the save that pulled Sporting Lisbon level in the 39th minute.
The score remained 1-1 at the half time whistle.
Sporting Lisbon seem to be having better of the 2nd half but a switch to attacking tactic saw Dortmund retake the lead in the 65th minute via Reinier who slotted home the rebound after Lopes saved the initial shot.
Dortmund parked the bus in the 70th minute as Sporting Lisbon threw the kitchen sink at the German side.
With seconds to go before the referee blew the final whistle Luke Shaw found Matteo Politano who slipped the ball past Kobel to score a dramatic last minute equaliser.
A draw seemed a fair result when the stats are taken into account with Dortmund having slightly more possession at 54% and both sides created 10 chances and 6 shots on target each.
Windebank Post Match Comments
That was a dramatic ending and when you score so late a draw feels like a win. We really need to get something from this game and a draw breaks the run of back to back defeats we have suffered.
Matteo Politano managed to get a brace and takes his tally to 10 which we are going to need him to add to over the 2nd half of the season.
We have fell further behind the leaders and drop down to 5th and need to start winning games again soon if we are to prove the doubters wrong.
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