Exciting Match Ups in Wednesday's Champion League Ties

There is some exciting soccer to watch this Wednesday, September 29th. The two games I'm most interested in are Rubin Kazan vs. Barcelona and Valencia vs. Manchester United.

Rubin Kazan are champions of the Russian League and a notorious thorn in the side for Barcelona. During last year's league phase (of the Champions League), Rubin beat Barca at home and played to a draw in Russia. The Russians play tough defense, face jet-lagged opponents and are more comfortable in the cold weather of Kazan. It was snowing in Tuesday's photos of practice.

I see Rubin giving Barcelona trouble only to go down 1-2. The blaugrana will get there act together despite starting with Messi on the bench.

Perhaps more exciting, or at least more high scoring should be the match between Valencia and Man U. This should be a fun display of attacking soccer. Valencia currently lead the Spanish league and are playing incredibly well despite selling stars Villa, Silva and Marchena. They're currently undefeated with 4 wins and a draw.

Manchester United is a perennial performer in the Champions League. They've struggled a bit in English League play but are still running second. Look for them to step it up on Wednesday, especially if Rooney is healthy.

Prediction: Valencia 2 - Man U 3

Here are highlights from a preseason match from last year between Valencia and Man U.

Auxerre 0 - Real Madrid 1, Quick Impressions

I have yet to get a chance to watch the all of Tuesday's Auxerre - Madrid game. What I did see, showed an interesting line-up change.

Mourinho, had Xabi Alonso playing as a single pivot or defensive midfielder while Khedira and Lass Diarra were pushed farther forward on the left and right respectively.

That's interesting because Mourinho usually prefers to play with 2 defensive midfielders. So far this year that's been Xabi Alonso and Khedira. Usually, they are accompanied by a media punta, or attacking midfielder in the Schneider mold - this year usually Ozil and occasionally Canales.

Given Khedira and Lass Diarra's defensive bent, I was curious to see how their connection to the front line was. The verdict: not awesome. Madrid was clearly winning the battle in the midfield in the first half but they were not creating a lot of clear scoring opportunities.

I saw that Ozil came in for Benzema in the second half. I hope to see how that worked out later tonight.

Who do you think Mourinho should line up in the midfield?

Sevilla Fires Antonio Alvarez

Sevilla president, José María del Nido has fired Sevilla's coach Antonio Alvarez. The dismissal took place following Sevilla's 0-2 loss to lowly Hercules.

Alvarez took over last year after serving as assistant coach Manolo Jimenez, who was fired for lack of results late last year.

Alvarez guided Sevilla to victory in the Copa del Rey last year (King's Cup) but failed in the early-season Spanish Supercopa, the classification phase of the Champion's League and the early games of the league.

Sevilla has a superb roster, let's hope the newest coach can guide them to greener pastures - and more goals.

Levante 0 - Real Madrid 0: Yawn. Snore. Do You Miss Pellegrini Yet?

After 5 League games, mighty Real Madrid has scored a measly 6 goals. Despite spending over 300 million Euro in transfer fees the last two years, despite having "The Special One" as a coach, the Merengues are providing a very unappealing image this year.

In Madrid's favor, they have created numerous scoring chances this year. Ball possession is much higher than it was last year and San Iker (goalkeeper Iker Casillas) has done so little work that he could sit in goal and eat churros y chocolate if he wanted to.Madrid defense has been stellar. They've allowed 1 goal in their 5 games and haven't looked in serious danger all season.

Real's defensive success can't seem to get rid of the poor taste left by their resultadista play in the league. This is not the Champion's League. Fans don't want a series of 1-0 victories so that the team can move on to the next round of play. The Madridistas want breathless, end-to-end action that showcases the speed and skill of their playmakers - and results in lots of goals.

Those fans that remember last year's team will remember that Madrid had already scored 16 goals in their first 5 games. A goal per game average of 3.2 instead of the sad 1.2 gpg/avg. Last year's Pellegrini team didn't look like they were dominating the majority of games they played but they scored a shocking 102 goals. Everything went in. No matter how much you bring up traditional referee favoritism of Madrid (find Rafa Van der Vaart's volleyball goal and you'll know what I mean), this was a potent offense that was a lot of fun to watch.

I'm beginning to wonder if Mourinho is capable of guiding a team to play successful offense. Thus far this year, Real have taken 105 shots on goal with only 5 going in. They lead the league in that regard with superstar CR7/9 taking the individual honors for futility in front of goal with 41 shots and two goals. Higuain has taken 15 shots with 1 finding the back of the net.

I hope that los Merengues can figure things out quickly because I watch the Spain's La Liga to see exciting, attacking football. If I wanted to watch a scoreless draw that is only broken by a debatable penalty, I'd watch the Italian league. Mourinho is an indisputably hard worker - hopefully his work will pay off soon. Until then: there are still Mou goals needed.

See the poll at the bottom of the page. Until then, here's a clip from last year's Real fun.

Athletic Bilbao 1 - Barcelona 3: A Hard Fought Victory In the Cathedral

Athletic de Bilbao is known to have one of the most impassioned fan bases in the world. The Bilbaino faithful regularly fill their home stadium, known as La Catedral (The Cathedral), to its 39, 670 capacity; so it was no surprise to see a see of red and white, replete with flags, banners and probably their fair share of kalimotxo when Catalan giant F.C. Barcelona came to town. Rain and inclement weather does not stop these fans.

Unlike many teams in the Spanish league, Athletic (under Joaquín Caparrós) does not assume an ultra-defensive position in the face of Barcelona's imposing attack. The Lions of Bilbao contest the game from start to finish and Saturday's match was no exception.

The red-and-whites attempted to win the battle in the midfield, pressuring Barcelona and not giving their team time to pass at will. Barcelona may have had more chances early on in the game, but they did not show their usual dominance.

In the 34th minute Athletic's Amorebieta was shown a red card for a nasty challenge on Iniesta. Despite going down a man, the rojiblanco's kept fighting the good fight and looked good at the beginning of the second half.


Just when the Athletic looked best, Barcelona broke the scoreless draw. A beautifully quick touch by David Villa left Seydou Keita alone in front of goal. The Mali international scored easily. 


Then in 71st minute Xavi looked to have sealed the game with an oddly bouncing shot from outside the area. With a 2-0 lead, and a man up, Barcelona was sure to win right?


There was still plenty of excitement left. David Villa was shown a red card in the 83rd minute, Athletic scored to cut the difference to 1 and then, just when Athletic looked to have the last-minute momentum, Barcelona's Sergio Busquets finished the game off with a pretty strike into the upper-left corner.


So far this season, Barcelona's front line has been dominant - with Messi, Villa and Pedro (or Bojan) each making the score sheet by the end of the game. With Messi out, it was Barca's midfield that made the difference with Keita, Xavi and Busquets animating the game and putting the ball in the back of the net.


This was a true battle between two great sides with even better fan bases. If any conclusion can be drawn from this game, it's that I want to see a game in San Mames before it's abandoned for a newer, bigger stadium in 2013 or 2014. Enjoy the goals.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic: Ballers Over Thinkers

In educated circles of Europe, Soccer players aren't held in very high regard. The stereotype is much the same that American football players enjoy: they're thought of as strong, unintelligent, louts. I have no desire to debate the accuracy of these opinions. However, their is one player who is doing an excellent job of embodying these stereotypes. His name is Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

Zlatan was born in Sweden to a Bosnian father and Croatian mother. His football career has taken him to Ajax, Juventus, Inter, Barcelona and now Milan. When on form, he's capable of some of the most amazing, acrobatic goals you've ever seen. Few players are as good at breaking scoreless ties as Ibra - as he lunges past defenders with a long, flexible stride.

Yet lately, he's been making headlines as often for his actions off the field as on. In Barcelona, he seemingly couldn't adjust to coach Josep Guardiola's scheme.

His agent, Mino Raiola, painted European sports journals with one bombastic statement after another, assuring the Guardiola wasn't as perfect as people thought, that coach had problems with himself and that it was more likely Guardiola would leave Barca than Ibra.

As Ibra left Barcelona at a firesale price, he made numerous statements to the media calling Guardiola such hurtful names as "Philosopher." Apparently, thought is not valued in Zlatan's camp. 

Now on Milan, Ibra continues to make headlines. Check out the first video below, where Ibra kicks his teammate. He's yet to release a good explanation for his actions. His teammate, Rodney Strasser, didn't seem happy about it either. If it was a joke, it went over poorly.

On Wednesday, Ibra el Ogro began to endear himself to his new fans. He scored 2 goals to lead Milan to a 2-0 victory over French squad, Auxerre.

Then just in case you were beginning to like this guy, he got into it with Champion's League winning coach and current commentator Arrigo Sacchi. Sacchi said that on Ibra's first goal, he wouldn't have scored if he didn't have size 47 feet. It sounds like he intended it as a compliment, "Hey Ibra, you're really big, perfectly adapted to delantero" or something like that.

Ibra took it as an opportunity to rip into Sacchi, saying that some people talk too much and Sacchi is one of those people. When the lead commentator said Sacchi was trying to give him a compliment, Ibra let him know that he didn't appreciate him saying that Ibra wouldn't fit in at Barcelona. The exchange goes on for a while. It wasn't comfortable television.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic is an awesome soccer player - but I wouldn't want him on my team. The fact that he's left every squad he ever played for with an argument leads me to believe that he's incapable of getting along with people - morale poison for any team that signs him. That he's the Terrell Owens of European soccer. But hey, what do I know. Judge for yourself, watching the awesome videos below.

Wednesday's Champion's League Match Predictions

There are some exciting matches coming up today. I think Real Madrid vs. Ajax and Bayern vs. Roma should be two of the most fun.

Real Madrid vs. Ajax prediction: Madrid 3 - Ajax 1. Mourinho's squad hasn't played pretty football yet this year. Most of the time they seem to be lost on the pitch: what do we do, who should we pass to, how do we create offensive football? Despite the questions, they simply have too many players of exceptional quality.

Higuain leads the line with German star Mesut Ozil playing the role of 10 or attacking midfielder. CR7/9 is off to the right and the slashing Di Maria takes the left wing. Khedira and Xabi Alonso will function as a double pivot, bringing the ball out from the defense, giving order to the team and supplying the speedy forwards. And the defense is talented too, with Marcelo making attacking runs on the left, Pepe and Carvalho at center back and Arbeloa filling in nicely on the right. Madrid has too much quality to lose.

Add in the fact that they're playing at home in front of fans eager to see their "Galacticos" win and I have to believe they'll be motivated.

Ajax won't even have their biggest star: Luis Suarez (yes, he of Uruguay-Ghana handball fame) is out.

Ajax will score the early splash-of-cold-water goal only to fall to Madrid's comeback.

Bayern vs. Roma should be a fun match too. Bayern played in last year's Champion's League final and won everything they could win in Germany. They were dominant in the Bundesliga.

Roma had an impressive season, too. After replacing coach Luciano Spalletti with Claudio Ranieri they won an impressive 24 straight league matches. They pushed eventual Italian league leader Inter all the way to the final week and almost pulled off the upset. They were also strong in the Italian Cup, finishing as runners up to Inter yet again. 

I haven't followed these teams to much, so I won't hazard a guess on how they'll play. Just watch (if you can) and enjoy.

Here's some eye candy to keep you busy until game time.