Dragonite wrote:Prediction
1. Barcelona
2. Manchester City
3. Borussia Monchengladbach
4. Celtic
Predictable group – after five rounds there was nothing left to be decided.
Even the Youth League group ended exactly in the same order!
Barcelona was almost perfect; their only flaw was losing in England.
Manchester City, apart from that home win against Barcelona, hasn’t much more to be proud of.
They had their biggest ever CL defeat when they lost 0-4 in Spain, also their biggest ever CL win when they won 4-0 against Borussia Monchengladbach… and then they could only get two draws against Celtic and another draw in Germany (worse than last season when they defeated Borussia Monchengladbach twice).
So far they spent €168.6M (CL biggest spender?) to finish second in their CL group with only nine points, and with a “genius” in charge, while last season, with “ordinary” Pellegrini, they won their group with twelve points and then went all the way to the semis.
So far the “genius” and €168.6M only gave them a result 25% worse compared to last season… Will it get better at some point or it will only get worse?
Is this a curse that Josep Guardiola has, after inheriting a CL winning Bayern and not winning it again in the next three seasons?
Borussia Monchengladbach at some point seemed like it would make this group interesting, but then they couldn’t defeat Celtic at home, while Manchester City defeated Barcelona, so the Borussia Monchengladbach vs. Manchester City match in round five, that could have been something, became something completely different.
Their CL campaign was still good though, they reached the EL last 32 round for the third time in the last five seasons. In their previous two times that was as far as they went. Will this time be any different?
When was the last time that they went further than that? 1995/1996, over 20 years ago… in the Cup Winners Cup – and to get there they only had to defeat some Sileks from Macedonia.
Now to do it again their path will be much harder: Young Boys, Celtic and Fiorentina.
Celtic had its second 0-3-3 in a row.
Last season they had it in an EL group with Molde, Fenerbahçe and Ajax, while this season they had it in a CL group with Barcelona, Manchester City and Borussia Monchengladbach – this time it wasn’t as bad as last season.
Plus, Celtic eliminated Hapoel Beer-Sheva, which seemed an ordinary thing at first, but considering what they did before and after that, perhaps it’s not that ordinary, and rather something that Celtic should be proud of.
Anyway, the 0-3-3 in the EL can’t be the yardstick.
This was their worst ever CL campaign. For the first time ever they couldn’t win a single match, the 0-7 defeat in Spain was also their biggest ever defeat in the CL history, and they are also in their biggest ever streak without a win (nine matches, the current six plus the last three from 2013/2014).
They shouldn’t let their “eliminating Hapoel Beer-Sheva” or “not losing against Manchester City” trees prevail over the forest.