Champions League Week 3

eirebhoy

Tonights games:

Dynamo Kyiv v Lyon
Steaua v Real Madrid
Celtic v Benfica - RTE2 / Sky Sports 2
Man. United v København - ITV
CSKA Moskva v Arsenal (18.30) - Sky Sports 2
Porto v Hamburg
Lille v AEK
Anderlecht v Milan

Celtic are without Gravesen, Wilson, Venegoor of Hesselink and most likely McGeady. Miller and Naylor are also big doubts. Not very good. Thankfully this season there's plenty of back up so Maloney will play instead of McGeady, Sno instead of Gravesen, Jarosik/Zurawski instead of Venegoor/Miller. If Naylor's out there's huge problems though and it'll probably mean a start for Darren O'Dea. Almost certainly a 4-5-1. Can't bloody wait!

btw - Sno could be as big a bargain as Kevin Doyle if he keeps it up. He cost £80k from Feyenoord, is younger than McGeady and a lot of the reserves and has still dominated games. Best player on the pitch against Chelsea. Look out for him.

zAbbo

He looks useful, I'm gonna cheer on a Celtic win. Maloney could be back to his best, and Jarosik setup 3 goals at the weekend (watched some highlights, may have been Maloney)

København for a win

mike65

We're all very PC and European with the spellings lads!

Arsenal playing now! Not 18.30!!

Mike.

Roddy23

Arsenal a bit all over the place at the back . Losing 1-0, cpuld have been two a min ago.

_blank_

Against CSKA Moskva!

mike65

Indeedski!

Mike.

eirebhoy

mike65 wrote:

We're all very PC and European with the spellings lads!

Copied and pasted from UEFA which is also why I also got the time wrong. It's not on Sky either so I don't know what I was doing.

What a player Carvalho is. His touch is top class.

Big Nelly

Arsenal on Setanta now, very poor game and Arsenal not playing well. CSKA 1-0 up and arsenal dont look like scoring!

Roddy23

What the hell? Henry just scored a legitimate goal. Dam that ref. :mad:

Big Nelly

Roddy23 wrote:

What the hell? Henry just scored a legitimate goal. Dam that ref. :mad:

Bit mental alright, but on the reply his arm does move towards the ball but it hits his chest, the look on Henry's face was class!! looks like they are going to lose now!!

Royale with Cheese

He even managed to book Henry for it. Doubt that will be rescinded. Ah well, it's been a while since a ref royally screwed Arsenal over. Just have to take it on the chin. 3 games gone, 6 points in the bag and 2 home games to come. No panic.

Necronomicon

Final score guys? I completely forgot they were playing earlier on account of being in Russia.

Royale with Cheese

1-0 to Moscow

Roddy23

Great bit of play already from Nakamura, and Maloney. Could be another very good game, savage atmosphere as usual.

super_furry

The Celtic game is live here - http://www.rte.ie/sport/2006/1017/celtic.html

Roddy23

Sno looks lost for Celtic, Sabrosa had the ball in front o fhim, and Sno kept standing off him.

Xavi6

Kallstrom just banged one in. Great fantasy league points there!

eirebhoy

Benfica the better team for the last half an hour but I'm not too disappointed. If Maloney scored after a minute I doubt Celtic would have kept a clean sheet. Strachan will change things at half time, hopefully Benfica will come out and won't give Celtic as much respect. Maloney barely got a touch in the last half hour and he needs to ball more. With 2 holding midfielders he has to come back too deap to get it.

That was the first time I can actually remember Naka hitting the ball. Excellent position for him at the end. Miller's causing havoc as usual, very very underrated player.

Benfica have had one decent chance that I can think of from a header and I don't think they've hit the target yet. They've come close and Celtic need to really up their game in the 2nd half.

btw, I'm forced to watch the match on RTE but they could have did a bit of research. Maloney played virtually every single game last season on the left with Naka on the right. A few things they said I just wanted to jump to the screen and correct them. I can pretty much predict what Giles will be saying at the moment.

Necronomicon

Big blow losing Ferdinand and Giggs (Giggs even more so) in the warm up. I would've preferred to see Solskjaer get the nod ahead of Fletcher after his performance on saturday.
Great goal by Scholes, terrific to see him do that again. Pretty open game so far, Copenhagen not there to sit across the midfield and play for a draw. United have gotten in behind them a few times on the counter, Saha should've had two goals. He always seems to get the hard ones and squander the easy ones!

tdv

Xavi6 wrote:

Kallstrom just banged one in. Great fantasy league points there!

Yeah great bit of play by the Swede, Juninho fired in one his trademark free-kicks just before it aswell which should get me a few points

cournioni

Pure class back heal from O'Shea...

jank

PORNAPSTER wrote:

Pure class back heal from O'Shea...

I take it then it bounced of his bollox and went in..

Roddy23

Nice goal by Celtic. I have to say Sno is playing much better this half.

YeatsCounty

Bonera sent off for Milan just after half time for a second bookable offence (kicked the ball away from an Anderlecht player who was going to take a throw-in). Ancelotti responds by substituting Oliveira for Cafu. Still 0-0, the game has really opened up now. Milan are definitely not afraid to attack with 10 men.

Roddy23

Kaka scores. Milan winning 1-0.

Raskolnikov

What a class break from Celtic there. Excellent link up between Moloney and Miller to make it 2-0 and to give Miller his second of the night.

Celtic 2-0 Benfica.

Raskolnikov

Roddy23 wrote:

Kaka scores. Milan winning 1-0.

Anderlecht completely hopeless, I wish they'd go the way of Rosenborg and disapear from the Champions League.

cournioni

jank wrote:

I take it then it bounced of his bollox and went in..

Almost.

Raskolnikov

3-0 to Celtic now. Nice bit of skill from Kenny Miller to set Nakamura up in the box, his parried shot was driven home by Pearson from close range.

Is this a typical Kenny Miller performance? I just assumed he was just a salt of the earth sort of striker.

Necronomicon

Whoot 3-0 and all but through to the knock out phase. Glad there's not much pressure now, Denmark won't be a walk in the park.
Good to see Smith get a run out, roll on the weekend!

Raskolnikov

Steaua 1-4 Real Madrid
Dynamo Kyiv 0-3 Lyon
Celtic 3-0 Benfica
Man. United 3-0 København
CSKA Moskva 1-0 Arsenal
Porto 4-1 Hamburg
Lille 3-1 AEK Live
Anderlecht 0-1 Milan

Celtic will be very pleased with their performance. They had injuries to a couple of key players tonight but still managed to come out top against an almost full strength Benfica team. I would worry about the spell that they had in the last ten minutes. You can't give the ball away as easily as they did in the Champions League.

wheres me jumpa

United were pretty poor tonight. Never really got into any rythym. 3-0 despite this says alot about Copenhagen. The game by passed Carrick once again. Sahas whole game was awful, some terrible passes, terrible finishing and some terrible decisions.

On the plus side I thought Rooney stuck out once again, I was expecting a few goals from him today but his link up play is making up for his lack of goals. Vidic was solid, didnt have much to do but he really bossed the defense.

Hats off to Celtic, great result for them and they are looking good for qualification. Just saw the goals, Millers second was an excellent finish.

mike65

How lucky is O'Shea?

Mike.

wheres me jumpa

mike65 wrote:

How lucky is O'Shea?

Mike.

My four year old nephew fell around the place laughing when he saw that goal. Fluke, but it wrapped the game up.

Bateman

Celtic are definitely the team with most to be pleased about tonight. They played like all the best continential sides; when you have the other team where you want them, you lash into them, leather them and tear them to bits. Just didn't expect to see Celtic doing it anytime soon. :eek:

Gillie

Raskolnikov wrote:

3-0 to Celtic now. Nice bit of skill from Kenny Miller to set Nakamura up in the box, his parried shot was driven home by Pearson from close range.

Is this a typical Kenny Miller performance? I just assumed he was just a salt of the earth sort of striker.

Millers biggest asset is his workrate.
He has put that kind of effort in since he signed but the goals only started coming in the last while. Delighted for him.
I was over for the first game of the season and he was amazing. Did everything but score!
C'Mon the Celts!:D

Gillie

Apparently RVN and Junihno got great goals tonight.
Coming up soon on SS2.

Gillie

Roddy23 wrote:

Kaka scores. Milan winning 1-0.

What a goal!!!:eek:

A Dub in Glasgo

What a fantastic night. The atmosphere was fantastic and I am so hoarse now, I cannot face going into work tomorrow. Superb stuff from Celtic. Miller deservedly getting MotM.

wheres me jumpa

Kaka hit a shot from outside the box swerved into top corner.

Juninho hit a free kick from the corner of the box and whipped into the top corner.

RVN drew teh keeper of his line, defender got goal side but he somehow managed to lift it up over both of them. Very clever goal. I miss Ruud....

tdv

Gillie wrote:

Apparently RVN and Junihno got great goals tonight.
Coming up soon on SS2.

Yeah Rudd scored a class chip, Juninho scored a great free-kick (nothing new there) & Kaka scored 30 yard screamer

Gillie

Saw the three of them there. 3 Very special goals.

Roll on Chelsea and Barca tomorrow nite.

evad_lhorg

chelsea barca will be one of those big games that is hyped up and youll see no more than 2 goals. which will probably be a draw.

eirebhoy

Raskolnikov wrote:

Is this a typical Kenny Miller performance?

Oh definitely. I know he won player of the year at Wolves last season playing mainly in midfield but I'd have thought he'd have stuck out a bit more in the Championship. It's not just his work rate but his control and skill is excellent. He's putting in performances that Robbie Keane should be putting in for Ireland.

I don't think he's the best positionally. His finishing is fine but he just doesn't get enough shots on goal. My brother's a Palace fan and he compared him to Andy Johnson, a nightmare for any defender. He was the exact same against Copenhagen and he has certainly won over the Celtic fans. He probably won't keep it up for the season but I'll enjoy it while it lasts.

Celtic can play better than they did tonight so I'm delighted. Possession wasn't kept well enough. Naka should have played more forward passes but I can't argue with someone like him. An encouraging fact though is that Boruc only had to make 1 save all night and it was a simple save tbh. Credit to the defence. Caldwell and McManus have formed a super partnership. Simao was easily beating Telfer but he won't be in the team when Wilson gets back. Oh, and what a buy Naylor was. Wolves certainly weren't getting the best out of their players or else the Championship is a really strong league.

Big Nelly

eirebhoy wrote:

Wolves certainly weren't getting the best out of their players or else the Championship is a really strong league.

Think it had more to do with the manager than the players or the strengh of the Championship!!

Dont know about that Sno guy, was his CL debut and all but he was pretty woeful I though from what I seen from him, remember at one stage he had the balls and was about to pass and even the fans thought he was going to give the ball away, seemed like that anyway from the reaction of the fans. Then at end of game Dunphy was signing his praises.

cournioni

mike65 wrote:

How lucky is O'Shea?

Mike.

Not at all! World class finish from a world class player...

Big Nelly

mike65 wrote:

How lucky is O'Shea?

Mike.

World class dummy to confuse the whole defence, O'Shea is brillanat!!

Anyone think the keeper should have done alot better, just kind of threw a leg in the direction of the ball and that was about it

Gillie

Big Nelly wrote:

Think it had more to do with the manager than the players or the strengh of the Championship!!

Dont know about that Sno guy, was his CL debut and all but he was pretty woeful I though from what I seen from him, remember at one stage he had the balls and was about to pass and even the fans thought he was going to give the ball away, seemed like that anyway from the reaction of the fans. Then at end of game Dunphy was signing his praises.

Done a lot lot better than I thought he would. All the radio reports said that Jarosic would be starting so it was a suprise.

Nalz

Mike65 wrote:

How lucky is O'Shea?
Mike.

to be playing for United, very lucky. He's a good player...but no more. He averages one great game in every 5 or 6, averages a fúck up in every second game. He had potential IMO but tbh now I think he wont improve to the extent that Ireland needs him to improve.

United were okay, the game on a whole was disappointing. Saha looked lively in terms of his running off the ball and linking with Rooney & Scholes. His decisions to dink the ball and nutmeg the keeper in his big chances in the first half were surprising. I was expecting the net to rattle with a powering drive. Rooney was great. Evra, Scholes and Vidic also looked good. Carrick was average at best. One or two neat passes that looked okay, but he doesnt look for the ball from the CBs or Scholes. He just seems to back off without moving into space or a decent position to create something or make a pass. I hope in time he comes on a bit more

Gillie wrote:

Roll on Chelsea and Barca tomorrow nite.

Gonna miss the start of the game unfortunately. I reckon a 2-2 draw will be the outcome.

wheres me jumpa wrote:

RVN drew teh keeper of his line, defender got goal side but he somehow managed to lift it up over both of them. Very clever goal. I miss Ruud....

that was a class goal, he really is fitting in there. Which I and everyone else thought he would.

Big Nelly

Trilla wrote:

to be playing for United, very lucky. He's a good player...but no more. He averages one great game in every 5 or 6, averages a fúck up in every second game. He had potential IMO but tbh now I think he wont improve much more to the extent that Ireland needs him to improve.

How many games that he has played for Utd this season has a fcuk up by him caused Utd to give away a goal?

Not look at Rio and how many goals have been his fault? One against Celtic anyway comes to mind

Mitch Connor

Big Nelly wrote:

How many games that he has played for Utd this season has a fcuk up by him caused Utd to give away a goal?

Not look at Rio and how many goals have been his fault? One against Celtic anyway comes to mind

Without Rio at the back, we are generally terrible in defence, so i would not slag him off too much - he was at fault for the Celtic goal, but in general i think he has been brilliant for us this season, and the second half of last season.

As for O'Shea, he may not cost us many goals directly - but the fact he can't seem to manage to pass to his team mates most of the time puts us under pressure, which is never helpful. He offers us pretty much nothing going forward and is not great in defence either - all in all i can't understand why he is still a United player. When i saw the lineup last night (the initial one) i could not understand why O'Shea was prefered to Brown at right back - Wes was gerat for us there this season when he has played.