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With volcanic ash still spewing from the volcano in Iceland the skies over Europe are still cloudy, but airlines have run test flights and found no damage to their planes’ engines. This coupled with the ability to travel by train and ferry in Europe has caused UEFA to allow the matches in the Champion’s League on Tuesday and Thursday to go on as scheduled.
They are also trying to figure out what to do in the Europa League as they said in a statement:
When Valencia forward Juan Mata said that their Europa League tie against against fellow Spanish club Atletico Madrid would produce a significant number of goals, i was very skeptical. Considering the number of injuries and suspensions that both clubs faced a barren draw is what i had envisioned.
However, not only did the tie live up to its billing, it also set fans up for an interesting return leg fixture. A late David Villa goal salvaged a 2-2 draw for Valencia that gives the hope when they head to the Vicente Calderon stadium in a week’s time for the return leg fixture.
Tonight’s all Spanish Europa League quarter final fixture between 3rd place Valencia and 10th place Atletico Madrid should be an entertaining fixture considering the fact that both these teams are way off the pace in the La Liga title race.
Coming off yet another bad result over the weekend, Valencia will want to erase the memories of the 3-0 drubbing they received at the hands of Real Zaragoza. This is the second time in as many weeks that the club have lost 3-0 the first coming at the hands of Barcelona.
Attention shifts back to Europe’s second tier club competition with Fulham welcoming the Bianconeri to Craven Cottage for their return leg fixture of their last 16 tie. Juventus won this match 3-1 two weeks ago and they are in pole position to progress to the quarter finals.
Alessandro Del Piero was the mastermind of their victory and his performances have left Alberto Zaccheroni with no other option but to include him in his squad for tonight’s game. Juventus have had one of their worst seasons in a very long time. This has left the club fighting for a top four finish and a spot in the lucrative Champions League.
Let’s use our heads people!
There seems to be some confusion over what some people thought were harsh and uninformed comments about Fabio Capello. Listen, I know what a good Soccer mind is and that’s not at question. I know he won Serie A like 5000 times. I get it! Here’s the problem: What do we know now?
For example: Liverpool starts there Europa League campaign today. They saay they’re ready to breakout from this pathetic season. Do you believe them? I’m going with what I know…they’ll have a hard time.
Today I’m reading an article at MLSnet.com about Dallas committing to what the writer called “attacking” soccer. I like to call it “Soccer at warp speed”.
Let me give you some background. Soccer was the only sport I played as a kid and I played like a lunatic. We ran hard, we kicked hard, we tackled hard (I even once broke a kid’s leg slide tackling him. It was probably just bad luck our parts, but I wasn’t messing around and neither were my teammates.)
Tottenham‘s conquerors Shakhtar Donetsk took a big step towards the last four of the UEFA Cup after beating Marseille 2-0 in their quarter-final first leg. Tomas Hubschman set the Ukrainian side on their way in the first half and Rodrigues Jadson added a second after the break as Shakhtar continued their impressive run.
Shakhtar beat Spurs and CSKA Moscow in the last two rounds and looked superior to their visitors, who went into the game on the back of an eight-match unbeaten run in the French Ligue 1 which included six wins.
AC Milan were dumped out of the UEFA Cup after throwing away a two-goal lead in their last-32 second-leg clash with Werder Bremen. Having drawn the first leg 1-1 in Germany, there was some pressure on the Italians going into the return match. First-half goals from Andrea Pirlo and Alexandre Pato seemed to set Milan on a smooth path into the next round only for Claudio Pizarro’s brace to put Bremen through on away goals.
Ajax took a smash-and-grab win from their trip to Florence with a goal from Kennedy Bakircioglu giving Marco van Basten’s side a 1-0 win over last year’s semi-finalists Fiorentina. It had been one-way traffic for much of the night at the Stadio Artemio Franchi, but Bakircioglu’s 60th-minute strike against the run of play showed the home side the way to goal.
The Viola were unable to respond and missed a hatful of chances to leave them a mountain to climb in Holland next week.
Marko Arnautovic’s first-half strike earned Ajax’s Eredivisie rivals FC Twente a first-leg victory over an off-colour Marseille at the Stade Velodrome.
Tottenham boss Harry Redknapp had an entire team injured, rested or ineligible at the RSC Olympiyskiy for the first leg against the Ukrainian champions – and his makeshift side held on until 12 minutes from full-time before they lost 2-0 in the UEFA Cup last-32 clash against Shakhtar Donetsk.
Yevgen Seleznov opened the scoring with a header from a free-kick, then Jadson added a second with two minutes remaining.
Dean Parrett, 17, made his debut and the likes of Oscar Jansson, Adam Smith, John Bostock, Ryan Mason and Jonathan Obika could be called upon for the return leg at White Hart Lane.
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