Champions League Round of 16

Sport
1

Start next week and are spread over two fortnights with a week’s break in between with 2 games each night.

Lyon
APOEL
14 February
7 March

Napoli
Chelsea
21 February
14 March

Milan
Arsenal
15 February
6 March

Basel
Bayern Munich
22 February
13 March

Bayer Leverkusen
Barcelona
14 February
7 March

CSKA Moscow
Real Madrid
21 February
14 March

Zenit
Benfica
15 February
6 March

Marseille
Internazionale
22 February

Schweinsteiger has torn ankle ligaments so will miss the two legs for Bayern. I think they’re comfortably the third best team in the tournament this season but he’s a big loss. Should still have enough to beat Basel though.

2

Can any Italian football fans give me some information on AC Milan? Will Arsenal have enough to get past them?

3

they are riddled by injuries at present. wouldn’t be surprised if Arsenal got the better of them over two legs

4

Quiet enough build up ahead of tonights games. Easy wins for Barca and Lyon?

5

Pato, Boateng and Nesta should be available tomorrow.

6

Barca should win handy. I think they’ve more or less given up the ghost for La Liga this season and should be rearing to go after resting the likes of Iniesta, Xavi and Fabregas in their defeat to Osasuna at the weekend. Lever are missing Ballack and have worries over leading scorers Deriyok and Sam.

I wouldn’t rule out APOEL taking something from Lyon. They’ve proved their a decent team by topping their group and Lyon are no world beaters, currently 11 points off the pace in Ligue 1, lyuing in 4th place Could be value in the DNB market here.

7

Barca have won very few knockout games in the CL away from home under Pep, they haven’t lost too many either. Inter is the only one that comes to mind. Barca will be happy enough with a draw or one goal win.

4/6 available for Leverkusen +2 looks a bit of value

8

Barca’s away record in the CL isn’t too hot, especially in the knockout stages. I’d expect them to progress comfortably over the course of the two legs however.

9

Arsenal as well.

10

Yes, surprised I forgot about that, I was at that game and all :lol:

11

Iv backed Leverkusen DNB at 11/2

12

Xavi is out for Barcelona.

Ballack isn’t all that important for Leverkusen anyway. They have Renato Augusto available after injury but have only won one of their last seven games so can’t imagine them being good enough tonight, even at home.

13

Pique dropped by Barca tonight - not an injury.

14

Who’s doing the commentary on TV3 - is it Keown? He wasn’t long bringing out the cliché, and to be fair to him he used the line exactly: “Well we know the Germans will be organised.”

15

Barca weren’t playing great and Leverkusen seemed to be doing a good job of frustrating them but Sanchez streaked away there and finished nicely.

16

Lovely ball by Messi into Sanchez and he finishes well. 1-0 barca

17

Leverkusen certainly didn’t do much with the ball (both Busquets and Iniesta passed the ball more each than the entire Leverkusen team) but Cascarino had a right go at them for being negative at half time. I actually think they pressed quite well for the majority of that half and Barca weren’t exactly carving out chance after chance. Difficult for them to switch into attacking mode when they got the ball then, which is always the challenge, but it’s been apparent for some time that you need to press Barca to beat them. Tony knows better though.

18

Kadlec with the equaliser. Barcelona look awful at the back they had loads of chances to clear that.

19

Sanchez is a class act. Great composure. He finishes really well at full speed.

20

Did Valdes get a finger tip on that shot that hit the post?