I know nothing about French football. I should say that from the off. I also have very little interest in the Champion’s league normally, because I find it frankly boring, with practically the same teams involved every year.
But obviously, I’m taking more notice this year and have been watching the games.
I’ve come to the conclusion that while some sides are very good, it seems to me that many are overhyped. Or is it just that we’ve excelled in our previous qualifiers? It’s a very subjective thing, but I don’t think we’ve looked very good in our games, the Bayern one apart. Mind you, I don’t think we’ve looked very good for most of the season, but the reality is we’re still very much in the mix.
That’s not to say I think Monaco are rubbish. I don’t think much of Ligue 1, a few teams apart but they do have a few decent sides, of which Monaco appear to be one. They’re a very young side, the third youngest in their league, but reading around tells me they’re very tenacious. They’ve made the most tackles, ball recoveries and second-most interceptions of any team in the French top flight. They’re also fourth in the table. So definitely no mugs then, although I should probably add that they’ve been on a poor run of late.
Hence it would seem it’s by no means going to be easy. My lack of European football knowledge makes it a bit tricky to give an opinion, but I can have a guess or just give my feelings.
And while I don’t want to jinx us, I do think we can get something from this game. A win wouldn’t make us mathematically certain to qualify automatically, but it would put us in a very strong position and however you look at it, that would be some achievement.
A draw obviously wouldn’t be as good, but you’d have to think that with our last game being Celtic at home, we would still be in with a very good chance
And that’s what I’m going for.
We always look like we’re going to concede, although it seems we’re looking to address this weakness, with a young full back, Andreas Garcia announced as having been signed from Levante just this morning and a central defender being in the offing who will replace Diego Calos who is apparently going to Fenerbache, if Wolves can’t persuade him to join them.
Squad news and John McGinn remains out with injury. He’s also looking doubtful for the Celtic game. Amadou Onana limped off against Arsenal on Saturday and is also very doubtful. Ross Barkley and Pau Torres are both injured and Diego Carlos is suspended, which is probably academic anyway, if he is indeed off to Turkiye. New signing Donyell Malen isn’t eligible.
As for Monaco, it’s all a bit vague but from what I can see, they have several players coming back from injury or illness, with Denis Zakaria, as well as Aleksandr Golovin who was ill, Christian Mawissa and Wilfried Singo all available and it appears they’re practically at full strength.
So if Monaco are going to get one goal, logically we’re also going to get one. In which case, could it be Duran who gets it? My guess is yes he will. The big question there is will he start or come on as sub?
Either way, that’s my prediction. A 1-1 draw.
UTV!
Why have two centre forwards in the pitch and not kick one ball up to them!
Pathetic
Awful display. We’ve given them the ball so many times
Just giving the ball away constantly.
I’m sorry, but we are bleeding terrible.
Again.
I’d be fuming if I’d paid for this absolute gash.
It’s all too slow and just plain boring!
That tells you Rodgers Off and rightly so . Worst game I’ve seen him play .
Is the this pitch weird? The ball is spinning off the turf…
Bollocks. Bollocks. Bollocks.
A piss poor performance. Duran and Watkins on the pitch at the same time clearly doesn’t work. Strange that the ineffective Bailey was taken off and we got worse. Moving Rogers to the right side didn’t work either. Like I said before, we can’t keep gifting the opposition a goal with the first effort.
That was really poor!
We couldn’t pass to each other
We couldn’t play one good corner
We couldn’t adapt to their style
We over play at the back
Without Torres playing out of the back we need a rethink- Konsa and Mings are not up to it
I thought Buendia showed something and I would keep around
Bailey has reverted to his first couple of seasons – useless
Now have to beat Celtic to be in top 8. Not sure we will win that one if we keep pulling performances es like this out the bag.
Far be it from me to ask questions of Emery but withdrawing Tielemans to a deep defensive position dented our creative play – I said this would be our undoing.
Why not start with Bogarde alongside Kamara and keep Tielemans in an attacking position. Can’t fault Buendia tonight but he doesn’t have the range of passes and he’s short of match practice.
My other gripe is starting with Bailey – had that been Ramsey, at least one of the chances Bailey had would be in the back of the net.
Bailey had better find some form or he’ll be polishing his backside on the subs bench. Malen has to start against West Spam.
Nice to see the Prince at the game even if we couldn’t produce a royal show.
All is not lost – it’s an easy equation – beat Celtic.
Shit that if we don’t finish top 8 we’ve only got ourselves to blame how disappointing against a team that hasn’t won for ages
Was their pitch a mix of turf and stitched plastic? They said beforehand it was very heavily watered. The ball was spinning off all of our players all night.
We use Duran better when we invite pressure and Duran sprints from the half way line. Monaco were extremely compact. We had no space.
Our direct corners were awful. Should have gone short. Still a totally shite evening.
Awful performance, starting to think our glorious leaders is a bit of a one trick pony only capable of one size fits all football?
I stick by early comment, they were shite, around a half decent championship side and there to be blown away but no tippy tappy, tippy tappy, sideways backwards, repeat.
Boring boring boring.
Their goal came from 2 howlers, Mings under-hit pass and a crappy stop from Emi who should have caught the ball or palmed it over the bar.
Mings was joined by other defenders who discounted any chance their telegraphed pass could be intercepted. Mings was shot of confidence by half time.
We pay McPhee to sort out corner routines. Yet we encounter a keeper who comes to claim the lofted corners and we do not try any short corner routines having seen the first two.
Poor performance!
Said it for ages – we have players who ain’t top 4 class I could name um but too many to mention
Unai needs to show um the Bologna game – we moved the ball so quickly they couldn’t lay a glove on us
We are predictable , slow laboured build up – I get it , keep the ball etc etc
However MOVE THE BALL around quicker , you never know
How many times did their keeper catch the ball with ease from our corners? We didn’t seem to learn anything and why didn’t MacPhee try something else? We seem to get a decent amount of corners in our games but with very little coming from them. Also free kicks around the box doesn’t get me excited. Time for a new set piece coach probably worth a shot.
I read that Carlos is off to Fenerbache according to Fabrizio Romano. We need to act quickly now with a replacement. Can we get another winger in to challenge Malen and offload Bailey while we can still get a snickers and a packet of crisps for him? I’ve had it with the guy. He is a little flake who gets brushed off the ball without any resistance. When you have a coach who likes possession football, the last thing you want is a player who loses the ball practically every time. He’s lucky that Philogene didn’t offer any competition for that position.
So, so pissed off. We could be 2nd.
Mings did fluff but made some killer blocks.
Hate to say it, but it was mess tonight. Where was our focus and fight? This is the Champions League FFS! We fought to be here!!! And we treated tonight like a Zenith Data Systems game…
We need that new blood in urgently, just to shake things up. Even though there are very few players in our squad who are poor, we need something to fire us up.
Results not to bad clinging on in eighth before tomorrow’s games should absolutely kick ourselves if we don’t get top 8 need a good win next week
Watched the Holy Trinity show about the Arsenal game and while doing so the memory jogged back several months. “All showboat but no end product”. Who is that? Buendia. On the ball tonight he probably played the disguised passes and beat his man better than any other Villan. But he has done that before – the rest of the team either cannot read him or stop running and watch, so he achieves no scores and no assists. As said by others, Bogarde on and Tielemans further forward as they finished at Arsenal might have fashioned a chance.
Not a great performance and similar to the Bruges game. The commentators said it and I agree, we were knackered. Unlike every other European FA, we don’t help our clubs in Europe by scheduling matches to give as much rest time as possible. Monaco played on Friday and so had a day’s more rest than we did.
Anyway, I think that Monaco probably deserved the three points. Although they’ve had a bad patch they are a good team and this was one I had down for a loss as soon as I heard the fixtures. If we can beat Celtic next week then we’ll still be in a good position.
My notion of CL success on our first go was to finish in the top 24 and then get into the last 16 via the play-offs which is still eminently possible.