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Some cracking games this week, Barca/City and Bayern/Arsenal. Can't see past Bayern and Barca wins. Pellegrini has said he'll attack Barca and I say do so at your peril. This may not be the Barca side from 2010-2012 but its still a very very good side with players in form currently, namely Fabregas, Sanchez and with a returning Messi back in the goals. There's a chance that if they go in with two strikers that they could get torn to pieces. I think against Barca you have to play a 5 man midfield. They keep the ball too well and will just pass their way through you.

Game went the way I thought it would. Bayern trying to pass it in the net and United playing for their lives.
Fair result.

Soldier_Of_Fortune wrote:

Hammersmith harrier wrote:We won't know until the final whistle, hell your lot somehow won it in 2005 so nothing is for certain.

If that Liverpool team was playing Bayern tonight, I would favour Bayern to go through.

all i can say is that if united are the bench mark then liverpool would have shredded Bayern tonight,

Bayern never have been a great team v english opposition- welbeck gave them infinite issues - imagine what liverpools front 4 would have done

been shredded to pieces? I'm sorry I don't think theres a team in the world that beats Bayern in a fire fight..

The Special Juan wrote:This is Mourinho-style football at it's finest (or worst, depending on your viewpoint)!!

Yes Mourinhio at its best. If they had held out to the 1-0 it would have been Pulis. So Not bad from united - but they could have done better

kingraf wrote:been shredded to pieces? I'm sorry I don't think theres a team in the world that beats Bayern in a fire fight..

maybe - but if both went at it- we are talking both defences shredded

Bayern were better last year. More clinical and direct. Players possibly more hungry too.
They are still good, very good, but look more beatable. No team has one the competition twice in succession. Big ask for Bayern as good as they are.

Liverpool are currently one of the best in Europe. I wouldn't rule them out against anyone on recent form.

The problem with Bayern, is unlike Pep's previous project, they don't have a focal point. A proper forward, hell, they don't even have a false nine, just Robbery and Muller floating about looking for a defender to embarrass.

If I am going to be honest I just cant see united going through, Bayern are clearly too good- I love the fact United played well tonight. They didn't let themselves down at all. 

HOWEVER really not sure about big lumps trying to play the tica taka. Bayern are better more direct- yes they have touch- but they ant utilising their pace or strength. Yes it clearly wipes the floor with the rest of the bundes- but even just at uniteds level it doesnt really work.

Bayern last year were passing longer - more direct with faster runners, taking more shots.. and a better team.

Real madrid or chelsea to win

I'd love it if Munich won... Bavaria is my favorite province in the world, so I suppose I've become a de facto fan, a bit. They should beat Chester, but I do worry about how they deal with Real's pace, or Chelsea's tactic, which in all likelihood will be smash n grab... that said, they probably demolish barca again

They don't look comfortable playing that way do they Mysti, a lot of their domestic dominance has been down to Dortmund falling apart. There have been rumblings that the likes of Kroos and Schweinsteiger aren't happy with the new direction of the team, it's not particularly German.

As far as i'm concerned you need to be versatile as a manager, you can't move to a new team and try to replicate what you previously did. You need to base the tactics around the players at your disposal and get the best out of them not the other way round.

Kross really didnt look good tonight. I wouldnt be suprised if he does go tbh. He looks more like a PL player to me- not too comfortable with knocking it about

400 of there 600 odd passes were just passing back and forth to each other barca style. They didnt threaten.. 

Germany at there best , and add bayern to that as well have never cared for possession.

The last time England lost a competitive game in full time v Germany -England  had more possession , Germany played rush style counter and smashed us to bits

Still though, if nothing else, at least it highlights how ridiculously versatile Phillip Lahm - easily the best Right Back in the world, probably the best LB, and on his way to best Holding mid, I suspect he has a 40-goal season, and 15-clean sheet season hidden in there.

The thing is they have better holding midfielders in the team than Lahm and he's a far better right back than Rafinha. The more I think about the game the more I think we could have done more to hurt them on the break.

Superb performance by United tonight, full credit to them and Moyes. Unlucky not to win it. Great goal by Bayern though!

I don't think they do. Lahm is obviously a much better alternative than Rafinha as a fullback - but you look at a holding midfielders job - I don't think they have a better passer than him at DM, I certainly don't think they have an equal tackler, or anyone equal in terms of coverage or football IQ.

kingraf wrote:I don't think they do. Lahm is obviously a much better alternative than Rafinha as a fullback - but you look at a holding midfielders job - I don't think they have a better passer than him at DM, I certainly don't think they have an equal tackler, or anyone equal in terms of coverage or football IQ.

its all about possession for bayern- who can keep and retain, not tackle, possession = best form of defence for them

But they expect to be able to get through every team enough to beat them by loads- and yet they like barca before them have allways struggled v PL teams.

You give a Pl team the time to get back- and they will get back. Its that simple.  And there is allways a chance they will hit you on the break.

Obviously them playing Citeh was a different kettle as they were down to 10 men early and haven't got that PL mentality and tactical awareness . They like PSG, madrid and liverpool want to hit the team hard and fast and dont really have other options. And to be fair thats exactly the way bayern used to play. Press hard to win back but then hit hard and fast

Moyes got his tactics spot on tonight, one player let him down and its one player who game him so much at Everton

Fellaini is not good enough to operate in the role we want him to. He spends the whole game looking around but doesn't really do much more, he can't win aerial battles which should be his strength and he's really really slow, borderline glacial. Made no attempt to get back for the goal when he should have been tracking Schweinsteiger. Next week I'd love to see Kagawa starting behind the striker and Fletcher in for Fellaini, other than that I'd operate the same team, obvs with Evra coming in for Buttner (who I was really surprised with tonight)

While I don't agree with the red, seeing Pep whinge about a dive when he has Robben on his team is laughable, thought the official was quite poor overall, never a high boot if a defender has to stoop to try and win a header so I thought Welbeck was very unlucky with that one, although should have done much better when one on one, I think even if the chip had beaten Neuer the defender running back could have cleared

Buttner has looked pretty decent every time he's played in fairness Gazzy, looks more comfortable putting his defensive duties first unlike Evra.

i know fellaini will cop the most abuse, but a certain 300k a week player was abysmal the only thing he did was have a heavy touch to get a player sent of

not sure about everybody getting carried away with our performance, it was a everton type performance very direct. 1-1 is a good result for any away side, still got a chance but still massive under dogs. feel more like it was a missed opportunity, wellbecks first have stood and he should have scored a second. if we had a lead to take then i might get exicted

have to say buttner was excellent, kept robben quiet

Buttner was great last game as well.

Well to be fair compelling Rooney did provide the assit and the ball for welbecks 1 on 1.

defensively sound as well.

even in his poor games he is still influential. But he was playing deep

Yeah I was impressed by him tonight, I'll hold my hands up and say I was worried he'd get torn to shreds but he was really composed I thought

Fellaini won 1 of 7 aerial duels......1 ruddy header. The guy has zero presence, very surprised if we don't call it a day with him in the summer as he doesn't work in that position, comes to something when fans sat around me would rather see Cleverley play ahead of him

hardly think it was some great assist, it was more great play by wellbeck to even get on the end of it. the defender was a big favorite to get on the end of it

i just know fellaini will get shed load of abuse for his performance when one of our best players in the biggest game was awful will get away with it

After the season we've had i'll take the positives in anything, it was a good team performance and I for one won't be badmouthing any of the lads.

I don't understand why anyone needs to have a pop at fellani. As bad as people might think he was. When has he been much better?

Rooney played ok for me.

the worst player for united was giggs first half. Not his fault. Just too old against this team. Kagawa improved united alot and the second half was a much closer contest in a footballing sense

Granted its not his fault we paid so much, but at the end of the day he's going to be picked out as a result of the fee, I would think if we sold him we'd be lucky to get what Everton paid Leige for him

If moyes wants to prove to me that he can cope at this level he needs to stop playing fellani and get rid. Simple as that.

if he does that.. And can admit fault and learn then he is half way there.

I thought Manchester United showed a lot more passion than I had before, and Moyes deserves praise for setting them up quite well to hurt Bayern, a bit more composure on the ball and I think they could have hurt Bayern earlier. The problem is that I think 0-0 going to Munich is better than 1-1, which essentially means Bayern have a goal advantage until United score which will be even more difficult away from home (despite their form this season.)

Bayern weren't at their best and I got the feeling during the game that they expected United to roll over, they were tapping it around almost waiting for United to make a mistake, and to their credit they didn't. Can't see anything past a Bayern win in Munich though, they won't make the same mistake again and I think will attack with a lot more pace. 

Fellaini was awful, constantly giving the ball away, the only positive effect he had on the game was that he helped at set pieces with his sheer presence. He's not good enough for Champions League level at all. Rooney was okay but I think tonight showed one of his main issues which is that he's not disciplined enough, he's constantly running everywhere so he's often not in great positions, particularly when United want to break at pace. A lot of the time he'd be in United's box with Fellaini and Giggs ahead of him.

Pique is out for a month but doctors say Costa's injury is light. I really hope so as otherwise Atleti's league and, to a lesser extent (by merit of the fact they were only ever a fool's hope), champions is down the toilet. Still can't get over that strike by Diego.

It was the type of game Moyesball was made for. No expectations, sit back and defend primarily.

That Moyes can coach a team to do that has never been in doubt. Whether he can play an expansive game to open up lesser teams is.

I love how United are being congratulated for the style of play last night. A certain London club would have the football community calling it anti football but that certain London club probably wouldn't have conceded either.

To be brutally honest, that London club got the same responses. Stop crying wolf at every opportunity.

For as many people applauded the style there was a lot of people came out of the woodwork to slag off Chelsea.

And if United win the CL playing that way every game I'm sure they will get slagged off too. Plz stahp

Every game? Please, it was two games.

Crimey wrote:
... The problem is that I think 0-0 going to Munich is better than 1-1, which essentially means Bayern have a goal advantage until United score which will be even more difficult away from home (despite their form this season.) ...

Yes, very much so. For all the talk that United played better than expected and didn't get walloped as some feared (or even hoped!), 1-1 at home is still a bad result in a two-leg European tie. 0-0 would have been considerably better for United as they then would at least have been starting completely level in Germany - now as well as having to avoid defeat over 90 minutes, they also have to score. I'm far from convinced that Moyes and his team will be able to do both.

It's probably a statement on how far United have fallen that last night's result is being seen as a triumph for them in some quarters.

Moyes would have loved last night, playing small club vs big club (well, average team vs very good team). He had years of that at Everton. Trouble is, it's Man Utd.

Ferguson's European teams of the last few years have hardly been the best have they? There was very little difference between United's performance last night than the ones United managed against Barcelona since 2009, the only difference is that United managed to get a result. Ferguson would have approached the game in the same way.

Well there was that time he played 4-4-2 v Barca and got destroyed

also cant remember having 25% possesion at home against any team under fergie

rather embarrassing statement of moyes managerial ability that united fans are so happy with a 1-1 at home, cant say im ready to accept were everton just yet

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