By Myles Palmer
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It’s here at last !
Matchday 7 is here at last.
Europe’s best teams are playing each other.
Real Madrid v Juventus.
Barcelona v Chelsea
Man United v AC Milan.
And Bayern Munich v Arsenal.
So four of the big eight will go out.
LAST WEEK a friend was talking to Owen Hargreaves.
Hargreaves said that new coach Felix Magath had them training a lot harder than Hitzfeld ever did and Bayern are fitter now.
Roy Makaay?
I warned he was a danger when Deportivo came to Highbury, but he didn’t do much. Djalminha was sent off at 2-1 and Arsenal won 5-2.
Makaay was deadly even when Tenerife were relegated and Deportivo signed him after that.
Will Ballack play?
Well, he has been training and he will tell the manager he wants to start.
Past behaviour by Bundesliga superstars suggest that will happen.
Ballack is a phenomenal talent who can time his shots and headers with Brazilian skill.
However, Mehmet Scholl is back in the side and he played in the 5-0 demolition of Borussia Dortmund on Saturday. Makaay scored three.
On crosses, the Arsenal defence looks made-to-measure for Makaay, Pizarro and Ballack.
Are Bayern strong in defence? I don’t know. Bayern tend to play conservatively, giving little away, and convert a high ratio of their chances.
They are usually efficient on set-pieces.
FREDDIE will play up front with Thierry, with Reyes on the left and Pires on the right, probably.
Freddie is a big game performer, a great jack-in-the-box goalscorer.
But he will be marked when playing there.
He will struggle to find space. Zipping in from the flank, he finds spaces.
Would you pack midfield, play Flamini with Edu and Vieira?
With that back four, and no Dennis, this is the moment for Arsene, surely, to abandon his attacking formation and pack midfield and go for damage limitation?
Or will he just cross his fingers and hope that Thierry has a good night?
Likely teams:
BAYERN: 1-Oliver Kahn; 2-Willy Sagnol, 3-Lucio, 5-Robert Kovac, 69-Bixente Lizarazu; 8-Torsten Frings, 23-Owen Hargreaves, 7-Mehmet Scholl 20-Hasan Salihamidzic; 10-Roy Makaay, 14-Claudio Pizarro
ARSENAL: 1-Jens Lehmann; 12-Lauren, 28-Kolo Toure, 18-Pascal Cygan, 3-Ashley Cole; 8- 7-Robert Pires , 4-Patrick Vieira, 15-Edu, 9-Jose Antonio Reyes ; Freddie Ljungberg, 14-Thierry Henry
The ref is Danish, Kim Milton Nielsen .
LEVERKUSEN will eliminate Liverpool and might even beat them at Anfield tonight.
Usually, I say that the big factor in the Champions League is, “My Brazilians are better than your Brazilians”
But this week I think : watch the big men.
For me this Matchday 7 is about Vieira, Zidane, Ibrahimovic, big men with skill doing the business on the big night.
Real Madrid against Juventus, Zidane against his old club? Zizou will be good tonight.
ADRIANO will score for Inter in Porto. They say Adriano is off form but I think he was just waiting for Porto.
In a city where everyone speaks Portguguese, Adriano will show Porto what an unplayable monster he is.
WHILE I’m writing this, the washing machine repairman arrives to fix the Bosch dryer.
David is East German, a sports fan, loves F1, tennis, golf, football. A Bayern Munich supporter !
Now 27, he used to play semi-pro in the German 5th Division.
David says, “Ballack’s free-kicks are amazing.”
He reckons Ballack was the main man at Leverkusen, so it was easier for him to play at his best there.
I tell him I’ve been to Munich three times but I’ve never been to Germany, He speaks superb English and understands exactly what I’m saying.
He fixes the machine, I give him a cheque and a signed copy of The Professor, he’s delighted. He says he knows a lot of Arsenal fans.
LAST NIGHT we go to a Stop The War Meeting.
Tony Benn is the first speaker, as he has to leave early to go to the BBC.
Tony is robust, sane and hilarious.
He finishes by saying, “I’m now going to go off and welcome Bush in language that he will find….quite surprising.”
He gets a standing ovation.
Another speaker is Jeremy Dear, the General Secretary of the NUJ. He is excellent too.
Then a woman speaking from the floor says that the government is pushing through a bill to prevent demos in Parliament Square and Trafalgar Square.
WHAT ??????
It will go through the Lords on March 7th – unless we stop it.
February 22nd 2005