Two Tales in One City

Football as they say is played with 11 men not names. Who on earth would have thoughtlast season finalist,Manchester United and sugar daddy-pampered city rivals Manchester City would end their  quest in the champions league this season without crossing the first hurdle. The UEFA champions’ league is by miles the greatest football competition in the world. The money spinning, lucrative competition brings the best players, under one football umbrella for blissful viewing for millions of fans worldwide. This season is no exception, clubs invest over-the hill to either qualify for the competition or bring home the decorated trophy.

              The thing I love the most about the competition is the un-ending upsets. Barcelona’s’ lost at home to Rubin Kazan will forever be a stand out, Inter’s defeat to Trazanspor at the San Siro …. The list is endless. This year didn’t fail to live up to expectation. ADESINA OLUWATOSIN looked at 2 of the biggest clubs that failed to makeit out of the group stage; there are clubs like Porto, Ajax, Valencia and Shakthar that flattered to deceive on the biggest stage in club football. But, am gunning for just 2.

MANCHESTER UNITED

Words cant describe how furious Sir Alex Ferguson must be rightnow, for him to label the Europa League as an “accident” says it all. When the draw was made, I said to my friend United should qualify with 2 games to go taking into consideration the quality of players, the reputation of the club and the lowly rated teams that completes the group (Benfica, Basel, OtelulGalati ). On paper that should be 15points in the bag, but football is played on the pitch not paper. United started the group with an away game to Benfica, an unconvincing draw thanks largely to some heroic goal keeping from Danish goalie saved their blushes. The writing was on the wall, the link up play was totally absent, the strikers had to drop deep to take a bite of the cherry. Fergie of all managers should realize you cant play at the top level with no creative midfielder, the Carrick-Anderson-Fletcher won’t give u 80% pass accuracy neither will they give you 4 assists in 6 games.  Basel’s visit to Old Trafford was one the faithful would love 2 forget quickly, leading 2-0 HT, cruising home… disaster struck! Football indeed is a game of two halves, 3 second half goals from the FREIs’ sent United to the Edge, thanks to Ashley Young’s stoppage time equalizer. United’s could only manage wins against the group whipping boys Otelul Galati, followed up with a 2-2 draw at home to Benfica  ultimately taking the last qualification ticket to the wire against Basel in Switzerland.Adraw would send United through, Basel didn’t read the script. Fastest out of the blocks, as they say “the rest is history “Manchester United failed to qualify from the easiest group and dropped to the “accidental” Europa League   

WHAT HAPPENED? : Lack of a top class creative midfielder. The link play was nowhere near present; Rooney had to do the creative job and his striking job, too much responsibility.  Too many  new players  inexperienced but talented youngsters, DE GEA, PHIL JONES, CHRIS SMALLING, ASHLEY YOUNG et al

Another big gun out of the champions’ league is Manchester city. Galaxy stars can grant u the fearsome reputation on the domestic stage not the champions’ league; it’s a different ball game. Tactically, formation, approach to every game is always different. Another homework city failed in their champions league is Calculation, leading 2-0 against Bayern why celebrate? It always going to be a tough group wit City drawn against Napoli, and Villareal. 

Manchester city started their campaign with a draw to Napoli followed up with a defeat in Germany to Bayern Munich; the double header against Villareal was as expected maximum 6 points. The must win game against Napoli was the turning point, two brilliant goals from Uruguayan goal predator Cavanni forced Manchester’s destiny out of their hands. It was all going swimmingly well for City, not only were they winning against 5-time European Champion, Napoli were still not winning and city rival Manchester United were on the losing side. All it took,though, was the flap of a butterfly’s wing on the other of the side of the continent to turn City’s champagne moment into a raging hangover. Rarely can beating Bayern Munich one of the juggernauts of European football taste so sour

The champions’ league group stages have in recent times felt like a slow march towards inevitability. The seeded teams have been afforded the opportunity to field their second string side from as early as match day four and it’s all too rare in occurrence that , match day six is an event anticipated with eagerness

 So, thank you Valbuena, Berezutskiy, Frei and others for making the UEFA champions’ league group stage worth watching all the way to the bitter-sweet conclusion

@gingerstiff