A feline invader merits a Uefa inquiry, while Danny Welbeck showcased with impunity the English talent for deception also displayed by Sterling, Vardy and of course Dele AlliPresumably, everyone is up to speed by now about the reassuring news from Uefa, permanently trying to find different ways of curing football’s ills, that it has launched disciplinary action against Besiktas because of the pitch invader that briefly interrupted the club’s Champions League tie against Bayern Munich.Even by Uefa’s standards, it’s a belter of a story given that it was actually a ginger cat who had wandered in off the streets to investigate what all these silly humans were up to. Unfortunately for Besiktas, nobody at Uefa appears to be aware that...
Uefa’s president wants to improve competitive balance but the top clubs’ financial dominance equates to power too, and it is unlikely his mooted measures will make a significant differenceFor football people raised on the foundational European Cup feats of Manchester United’s home-schooled Busby Babes and Celtic’s 1967 triumph with a team of local lads, the modern Champions League is a mixed blessing. Over the last 23 years the tournament has constructed a glittering stage for Lionel Messi and the world’s greatest players but European football’s concentration of wealth is delivering the final rounds and trophy itself to the same few richest clubs. Related: Chelsea given painful reminder of declining European status by Barcelona | Dominic Fifield The measures Ceferin has...
Max Rushden and co dissect Manchester United’s and Chelsea’s exit from the Champions League and in the last-chance-saloon, Saints go for Mark HughesRate, review, share on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Audioboom, Mixcloud, Acast and Stitcher, and join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and email.Max Rushden is joined by Jonathan Wilson, Nick Ames and Paolo Bandini to review the midweek Champions League games and round up the big games across the leagues.Starting with Manchester United’s 2-1 defeat to Sevilla at Old Trafford and the Spanish media’s mauling of José Mourinho’s team on the night, the pod discusses Chelsea’s felling at the boot of Messi in their defeat to Barcelona and which of the remaining teams are in the running for the top...
Antonio Conte had reason to curse the absence of a ruthless streak but the grimmer reality is Chelsea have won two games in the knockout stages of this competition since 2012Chelsea could at least seek to console themselves in the immediate aftermath of elimination. They had reason to curse profligacy, and the absence of a ruthless streak which saw the Premier League team strike the woodwork four times over the two legs but succeed in scoring only once. They could always point, too, to Lionel Messi’s brilliance. Antonio Conte described the tie’s decisive performer as “not a top player, but a super, super, super top player”, the kind who crops up once or twice a century. He was the difference....
Barcelona’s injury-plagued €105m French forward scored his first goal for the club against Chelsea, but the Argentinian had the final word as everFive men slammed on the brakes simultaneously. Together they had been running towards Lionel Messi and together they turned and ran away from him again, as if he had flicked a switch, as if he had some kind of control over them. Which, in a way, he did. The moment that led to the second goal on a night which ended with the Camp Nou roaring their team into the quarter-finals, was an encapsulation of the power that ultimately took them there.Messi twice sent shots through the legs of Thibaut Courtois and into the net, in the third...