Treats all round next week if the second-leg matches in football’s Champions League are as compelling as the first. Chelsea and Rangers, each playing in Spain, are at serious risk of elimination, but Liverpool and Arsenal should be in the hat for the quarterfinals. Liverpool, a goal down, may lack a front-line scorer but a coherent, fluent midfield and the importance of being earnest should ensure another heady night at Anfield and satisfactory progress in defence of the title they won so seismically last summer. Arsenal’s glistening win against pallid Real in Madrid might well have revived their entire winter. They simply can’t blow it now, surely. Chelsea and Rangers are in desperate need of more than press-conference optimism next week. Glasgow’s Blues have done royally to get so far; London’s Blues are not only up against a Barcelona side packed with assertion, style and swank, but themselves seem suddenly peaky and browned-off for all their out-of-sight lead in the Premiership.
Chelsea’s Portuguese manager Mourinho has been the year’s backpage bill-topper. When Chelsea led last week soon after a clumsy defender was sent off before the break, there was something of the recklessly cavalier young Napoleon in Mourinho ordering further attacks instead of shutting shop and barricading the advantage. Barcelona would happily have settled on caution to eke out a possible draw, but once they twigged Mourinho’s cheek, they woke with a passion. It was terrific. If you include a couple of bang-to-rights penalty appeals, they could have won by six or seven. I can’t wait to watch again next week the 18-year-old Argentinian Messi, an entrancing talent bound for greatness: low-slung like his dazzling compatriot Maradona and with the straight-lined gundog sniff for goal of a Greaves or Law.
Comments
Join the debate for just £1 a month
Be part of the conversation with other Spectator readers by getting your first three months for £3.
UNLOCK ACCESS Just £1 a monthAlready a subscriber? Log in