Champions League Matchday Six

He’s been our best player despite only coming on at half time.

How the fuck are we letting that guy receive the ball in acres 25 yards out?

They’re going for it now.

This is very very disappointing.

Seems we settled for 0-1 with around 10-15 minutes left and equally they’re happy to get a win on the night rather than really driving forward for the 3-goal margin they need to go through.

Roma are through - but will they win the group?

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Yes they will!

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Grazie Roma

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That was a strange ending to the game. Can’t understand why they didn’t push forward to test us.

All in all that wasn’t a great performance, despite a better second half. And it wasn’t really much of an improvement, if any, over last season. We were beaten comprehensively twice by PSG. Our Bayern home performance was good but not better than our game against Man City at home last year. Our away performance against Bayern was poor enough. Our away win against Anderlecht was a terrific result and a strong performance after a shaky start but it wasn’t much better than our draw in Germany last year.

I think we’re still a long way short of being competitive at that level, or in the Europa League after Christmas.

Boyata isn’t really good enough to be one of the back four but we’re screwed without him. Simunovic has his off days but he was good tonight and can play a bit of football and has the potential to be very good if he can stay injury free.

Brown remains our most consistent midfielder, despite more errors in Europe than in the league (it’s almost like there’s a difference in standard). McGregor is generally comfortable, Armstrong more inconsistent. Rogic is good enough for qualifying rounds but that’s his limit. He’s not quick enough or strong enough by the time it’s CL Group stages and he doesn’t work hard enough, nor seem to understand his role well enough.

Sinclair is a particular disappointment but he has the talent. Not sure the changes in formation have suited him and Tierney isn’t as strong going forward in Europe (understandably) so he gets more attention but he needs to rediscover his form.

In summary: we’re crying out for a centre back and we don’t have a viable attacking #10 at this level because Sinclair can’t play there, Rogic isn’t good enough and Armstrong and McGregor are only really useful playing that role more defensively.

9 European home group games without a win.

Bottleham seem to have arrested their slide as Llorente and Son have them 2-0 up on APOEL. Same scoreline in the Donbass Arena as the home side lead Man City.

Sadly I called this one correctly.

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The Champions League is too big. There has only been one decent fixture in this supposedly decisive round of games, PSG v Bayern.

True . At this point they need to try a champions league format to invigorate the competition .

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10 countries represented in the last 16. I wonder is that a record

Champions League Senior A and Senior B groups is what they need. Spike could help them out with the finer details if they get lost.

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5 from the EPL
3 La Liga
2 Italy
1 Swiss
1 French
1 German
1 Ukraine
1 Turkish
1 Portugal

Is it not 9? Are you counting Catalonia?
EPL is back being box office.
All 5 through and only Chelsea couldn’t top their group.

EPL>La Liga & Bundesliga combined

The Bundesliga is absolutely shite

  1. You’re right. And it appears 9 is an regular occurrence

Celtic are the only team who qualified via the champions route to progress to European football after Christmas. Well done Brendan and bhoys for the victory and plucky defeats over the group campaign. :brendan: :ireland: :shamrock:

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