www.9jafans.com - Nigeria’s #1 Football Blog

The outcomes of the first knockout round of the UEFA champions league was concluded today and the biggest casualty (by far) is the Los Merengues, Real Madrid. After spending $250 million, they failed to again reach the quarterfinals of the much coveted competition. To them, the season is already a massive failure due to this reality. With the likes of Ronaldo, Kaka, Cassillas,  Ramos etc, Madrid has no reason whatsoever not to be playing in the finals which incidentally would be taking place at their hallowed grounds: The Santiago Bernabue.

Milan were taught a football lesson by Manchester United that won’t be forgotten soon. They were undone by the speedily balding head of the most inform player in the world, Wayne Rooney. I mean the lad scored three headed goals against one of Europe’s most illustrious teams; it was a total demystification of the famed Italian ‘water tight’ defenses. Even the mercurial Ronaldo, the Coach of Milan had to call Rooney aside to congratulate him and wish him the best going forward. 

Meanwhile a week earlier, Arsenal had dismantled FC Porto to move to on in the competition. I’m very sure Lukas Fabianski must have heaved a sigh of relief after his team comprehensively defeated the former Portuguese champions. Fabianski had committed two blunders to gift Porto two soft goals in the first leg. You can’t really blame him; he was thrust into action when he actually was hardly prepared for such an onerous task.

Samir Nasri, a hitherto average player for the Gunners scored arguably the goal of the competition so far on the way to the 5-0 rout of the Portuguese side. Even the irrational Ivorian got on the act as he rounded the goalkeeper from a through pass from the little Russian to making the tie a whitewash. And so Arsenal against the thinking of some poor analyst qualified and Wenger is left purring.

The French gaffer immediate reaction was that of euphoria and as some would add; foolishness! He equated Manchester United and Chelsea to FC Porto and he would want to play them immediately never mind waiting for the pairings for the next round to be made first.  He would of course depend on Nicklas Bendtner; Arsenal’s hat trick hero. Only that it would be impossible for the Dane to score another hat trick in this season’s champions league. Enough of Wenger and his misplaced optimism

The mantle of completing a clean sweep to the quarterfinals for English clubs was then placed on Chelsea as they faced a highly motivated Inter Milan who have been on the decline in the past three weeks. They actually saw their 10 points lead at the top of the table reduced to just a point by AC Milan at the weekend. And are they fired up by the loudmouth next called the ‘Special One’? Mourinho even claimed that he dreamt that he scored the winning goal at the Stamford Bridge, a stadium where he enjoyed a lot of successes during  his three and half year sojourn in the premiership.

Chealsea however failed at the end as the great Cameroonian, Eto O Fils scored the winning goal to take Inter into the next round. It was a real heart break for a lot of Chelsea fans who must have believed that this is their time around to clinch the “big one”. Unfortunately, their former coach finally had his pound of flesh for his unceremonial exit orchestrated by the deep pocket called Abrahamovich some years back.

By Wednesday 17^th of March therefore, the entire eight quarter finalist have booked their places but not until Barcelona showed what a class act they are when they absolutely dominate Stuttgart at Nou Camp. Messi showed no mercy as he classically scored two goals on their way to a romp.

The draw for the quarterfinals was earlier made and Arsenal Versus Barcelona is arguably the tie of the round. Barcelona denied Arsenal the opportunity to win the only trophy that’s been elusive to the Club since inception. Could this be the opportunity to get their pound of flesh? Please follow my next write up on this!

Be Sociable, Share!

•