COMMENT – The UEFA Champions League football returns this week, for the second leg matches in the round of 16. Arsenal will be travelling to Spain to play Barcelona, while Shakhtar welcome Roma, for whom a period of transition is imminent, both on and off the pitch. The day after these ties, AC Milan will be looking to light up White Hart Lane against Tottenham, as Schalke welcome Valencia to Germany.
As tends to be the case, both in league and cup competitions, the home side have a greater degree of comfort owing to the familiarity of the pitch, the noise of the crowd, and the fact that both these factors work against the visitors. This week, there is a mix of objectives for the home sides, as some look to build on their first leg results, while others look to recover from the same.
Barcelona manager Guardiola was optimistic even immediately after the defeat to Arsenal in London, and threw down the gauntlet to the English title contenders as he invited everyone watching to a feast of football at the Camp Nou, where Arsenal endured an evening of strict chastening at the hands of Messi last year. The nippy Argentinean was not able to stamp his authority on the game at the Emirates stadium, but that night was barely a blip in another outstanding season, where he shows no sign of departing from his scoring ways.
In this very encounter last season, Messi scored all of Barcelona’s four goals and it will be up to an unreliable Arsenal back line to keep him out this time. I say unreliable because, after a night where Koscielny and Szczesny put in master class performances, the two combined for a moment of bizarre miscommunication that gifted the Carling Cup to Birmingham.
A 5-0 thumping of non-league Leyton Orient cannot mask the fact that Arsenal still lack a solid foundation at the back, and a single error like that will cost them the tie against Barcelona. Last year’s lesson should also not be forgotten, as it was an Arsenal comeback that was undone at the Camp Nou. Guardiola himself is facing a back problem that has seen him miss out on some training sessions, and surely the Catalan tactician is resting himself to be at the touch line come Tuesday. Barcelona will welcome the return of Carles Puyol in time for this matchup, while Arsenal will have to make do without Van Persie and Walcott. Fabregas, for so long the object of a tug of war between the two sides, looks set to participate.
Shakhtar are in a very comfortable position to welcome Roma to the Ukraine. The side from Donetsk have a long stretch of 11 European home games without defeat, and that is all they need to avoid to progress to the quarter finals. Roma, on the other hand, are in a difficult spot. Their performances in the Serie A have been anything but consistent, and they face the very real possibility of not qualifying for any European football next season, let alone the Champions League. Since their defeat at home to Shakhtar, Roma have also lost stalwart manager Claudio Ranieri, who resigned from the club in light of their continued dismal performances under his charge. The new manager is undergoing a baptism of fire, as it were, and it will be a most difficult task to come back from the first leg loss.
Another Italian club that need to face up to harsh realities is AC Milan. Once a powerhouse of European football, the Italian giants cannot quite seem to cut it on the continent in recent seasons, owing largely to an aging side failing to come to terms with the pace of the game outside Italy. Before last year’s all-conquering edition of Inter Milan, it was the Reds from the San Siro who performed better in Europe, despite Inter’s domestic domination.
This season, however, has seen a reversal of fortunes. Inter are struggling in every competition, while Milan are poised to win the league title. Almost as if to counteract this, Milan are finding themselves on the verge of elimination from the Champions League. The combination of Pato, Ibrahimovic and Robinho has destroyed many a Serie A defense, but not so much in Europe.
Ibrahimovic has long carried the tag of being an underperformer in Europe, and this is yet to change. As is the case so often in Serie A, Pato’s presence on the pitch adds a completely different feel to Milan’s game, and, as one of the few Milan players capable of outrunning Tottenham, he has to be given a start if Milan are to have any hope of overcoming the Londoners.
For their part, Tottenham will be without the services of the marauding Gareth Bale, and that is one less headache for Milan to contend with. In addition to their excellent home record in the competition this season, Tottenham will be buoyed by this little piece of history: the only team in the competition’s history to lose the first leg at home and still progress were Ajax in the 1995/96 season.
In the last match of this week’s Champions League clashes, Schalke will face off against a Valencia side that is always eager to attack. The Spanish side are as yet unbeaten on their travels in this competition, while Schalke themselves are unbeaten at home in this season’s competition. For all their disappointment in the league, Schalke are doing well in this season’s domestic and European cup competitions, and their win over Bayern Munich will give much confidence to the German side, whose only clear shot at European football next season would be actually winning the Champions League this season.
Valencia themselves lost to Barcelona in a very entertaining match at the Mestalla, and it was the Spanish side’s willingness to attack outright, whether home or away, that will be crucial for their bid to progress to the quarter finals.
