A lot of draws on Matchday 1, then.
Looking at last night\’s games, Arsenal fans will be glad that they were not playing Benfica or Napoli this week.
Both teams looked more dangerous than Borussia Dortmund.
Benfica scored first against Manchester United in Lisbon, in 24 minutes.
It was 1-1 at half-time and finished that way.
Napoli scored first in Manchester, rocking City with a clinical counter-attack in 69 minutes.
Both those goals were explosive and Latin.
When left-footed Argentinian midfielder Nicolas Gaitan hit a glorious diagonal ball to Oscar Cardozo, the striker chested the ball, swerved left into Jonny Evans, then exploded the other way and smashed it past keeper Anders Lindegaard. Sir Alex had made eight changes.
Didn\’t realise that Paraguayan Cardozo, 27, was such a prolific goalscorer. He got 27 in 33 for Newells Old Boys before joining Benfica in 2007 and he\’s scored 74 in 110 Portuguese league games. I call that consistency. The way he buried that chance suggests that Cardozo lives for passes like that and chances like that.
Ryan Giggs scored his first Champions League goal in a 4-2 win over Gothenburg on September 14th, 1994 and last night hit a fabulous equaliser with a fierce left-foot shot from just inside the D.
The oldest player to score in the Champions League, Giggs will be 38 on November 29th.
Napoli are a very professional counter-attacking outfit who sit deep and pinch the ball and kill you on the break.
A Barry-Nasri-Barry move broke down because Barry tried to backheel an awkward first time ball from Nasri, and Christian Maggio raced at two-man defence and played in Edinson Cavani, who fired his shot between the legs of Joe Hart.
So Manchester City were 1-0 down at home with 20 minutes to go. Welcome to the big time, boys. Five minutes later, City levelled when Kolarov hit a high-velocity free-kick over the wall and inside the near post.
Adam Johnson livened it up when he replaced Nasri. Unfortunately, Carlos Tevez, so recently The Main Man, is not a good sub.
For me, Napoli are like Udinese with a cutting edge.
Their team has older players than Udinese and that\’s why Napoli have more of a cutting edge. Christian Maggio, 29, made a fantastic goal for Edinson Cavani, who is 24 and has 34 caps for Uruguay. Napoli also signed experienced Swiss midfielder Gokhan Inler, 27, who played a major role in getting Udinese into the play-off places
Headline writers have to simplify but I\’d broadly agree with The Telegraph headline : Hesitant City given worrying taste of life in the fast lane.
Roberto Mancini said his team was nervous and will improve. He even said they\’ll win their next game against Bayern in Munich on Matchday 2. Since Mancini is an experienced manager, I\’m very surprised he said that. Maybe he doesn\’t rate Bayern.
I might agree with RM to the extent that nobody in the Bayern Munich team could have scored the explosively improvised goals that Cardozo and Cavani grabbed last night.
Cristiano Ronaldo didn\’t score in Zagreb but had eight of Real Madrid\’s 23 goal attempts. As theatrical and operatic as ever, Cristiano wants Row Z to see his powerful emotions and live the experience with him.
Benzema is slimmer, busier and sharper, a more mobile Van Persie who\’s in the team because Cristiano is more likely to get a pass from him than from Higuain.
Di Maria scored the only goal from a pass by Marcelo, who was then sent off for diving.
Real Madrid’s next game is Ajax, who drew 0-0 with Lyon in the ArenA.
I think the Round of 16 will be more exciting than usual this season. Especially if Napoli and Benfica are still involved.
VERDICT on Champions League so far: Matchday 1 wasn’t easy for anybody.