I’ve seen two European Cup Finals at Wembley.
Would love to see another in May.
I wonder how the widely-loathed Real Madrid will be playing in March and April.
They look very powerful and penetrating right now, and I’m impressed by how Mourinho is using new boy Ozil. They thrashed Ajax 4-0 in the ArenA on Tuesday night
The game of the week was in Rome.
Bayern Munich went 2-0 up with goals by Mario Gomez. But Roma came back to win 3-2.
Some differences of opinion on Rooney’s comeback at Ibrox last night.
I thought he looked slimmer, keener and quicker. His one-touch passes speed the game up, which is what United need. His touch to set up Carrick was different class but Carrick fired straight at the keeper. Rooney started his first game for United since September 26. When Fabio won a penalty in 87, Rooney placed the ball and ran away from the spot before smashing it in for three points. His over-celebration was understandable. An air-shot volley attempt, a difficult one, showed that he isn’t match-sharp yet. But the conditioning week in Portland, Oregon has done Rooney a lot of good, I’d say. He could have a hot December. He could have a hot January as well. We’ll see.
Without Rafael van der Vaart, Spurs beat Werder Bremen reserves 3-0.
In Braga, Arsenal were playing to win Group H and avoid the big boys who will win the other seven groups.
Wenger played one up against a small town club that’s never won the Portuguese league! When Alan Curbishley’s Charlton played 4-5-1 against Arsenal, the moaning, squealing Wenger said it was anti-football. But after he played 4-5-1 in Madrid, and Henry scored, he liked 4-5-1 and used it a lot.
Four years later he threw away 2009- 2010 by waiting a year to get Chamakh on a free, and played Van Persie as a lone striker. After RVP got crocked again, he played the tiny Arshavin at centre forward !
Wenger plays one striker to save money and has five in midfield because his keeper is dodgy and his back four can’t do the basics.
Wenger was 2-0 up against Spurs last Saturday and lost 3-2 and his response to that was to make seven changes, dropping Chamakh and Nasri, the players who scored against Spurs.The player he should have rested was Fabregas. My brother told me that Wenger said on 5Live that he phones Fabregas every morning to ask how his hamstring is.
In Braga, Arsenal played in a tame, tedious manner against a team of third-rate Brazilians. Then Fabregas went off with a hamstring and Mattheus scored two breakaway goals in seven minutes near the end.
Hungarian ref Kassai had inexplicably denied Vela a penalty as he moved onto a knockdown by Chamakh. Seen in real time, it was a 24-carat penalty and you didn’t need to see a replay. Chamakh had replaced paceless Danish egotist Nicklas Bendtner in 73.
Instead of being galavanised by that injustice, Arsenal conceded a breakaway goal To Matheus. When Denilson bodychecked one attacker on the next breakaway, the ref allowed advantage and Matheus scored again with a fierce shot that hit the underside.
SCORE : Braga 2 Arsenal 0
VERDICT : Possession does not win games. Goals win games. Possession puts crowds and viewers to sleep and will reduce season ticket sales for 2011-2012. If you don’t put the ball up for grabs at times, if you don’t mix your game up, you become predictable and easy to nullify. Pretty football is over-rated.
Houllier’s Aston Villa might prove that again on Saturday.
This is Tottenham’s first season in the big time.
They top Group A but concede too many goals.
If they can tighten up in defence, Spurs will go further than Arsenal.
| P | W | D | L | F | A | GD | Points | ||
| 1 | Chelsea | 5 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 14 | 3 | 11 | 15 |
| 2 | Man Utd | 5 | 4 | 1 | 0 | 6 | 0 | 6 | 13 |
| 3 | RealMad | 5 | 4 | 1 | 0 | 11 | 2 | 9 | 13 |
| 4 | Bayern | 5 | 4 | 0 | 1 | 13 | 6 | 7 | 12 |
| 5 | Barcelona | 5 | 3 | 2 | 0 | 12 | 3 | 9 | 11 |
| 6 | Spurs | 5 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 15 | 8 | 7 | 11 |
| 7 | Inter | 5 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 12 | 8 | 4 | 10 |
| Shakhtar | 5 | 4 | 0 | 1 | 10 | 6 | 4 | 12 | |
| Arsenal | 5 | 3 | 0 | 2 | 15 | 6 | 9 | 9 | |
| Braga | 5 | 3 | 0 | 2 | 5 | 9 | -4 | 9 |