CL Group H: Juventus - Sevilla - Lyon - Dinamo Zagreb

[Dragonite]

Comments about the teams, predictions…

[nogomet]

Dinamo Zagreb lost this weekend their first home league match since 31 July 2010. That ended their streak of 103 consecutive home league matches without a defeat. They are trailing Rijeka by 1 point ahead of their big clash in Rijeka next weekend. And in this shaken state they need to travel to Lyon and try to somehow end their record-breaking streak of 16 (!) consecutive away defeats in group stages of both Champions and Europa league.

EL 2010: Villarreal - Dinamo 3-0
CL 2011: Lyon - Dinamo 2-0
CL 2011: Ajax - Dinamo 4-0
CL 2011: Real Madrid - Dinamo 6-2
CL 2012: Dynamo Kyiv - Dinamo 2-0
CL 2012: PSG - Dinamo 4-0
CL 2012: Porto - Dinamo 3-0
EL 2013: Ludogorets - Dinamo 3-0
EL 2013: PSV - Dinamo 2-0
EL 2013: Chornomorets - Dinamo 2-1
EL 2014: Celtic - Dinamo 1-0
EL 2014: Salzburg - Dinamo 4-2
EL 2014: Astra - Dinamo 1-0
CL 2015: Bayern - Dinamo 5-0
CL 2015: Olympiacos - Dinamo 2-1
CL 2015: Arsenal - Dinamo 3-0

That's 0-0-16, goals scored: 6, goals conceded: 47

Last time they didn't lose away from home playing group stage football was in November 2010 when they beat Club Brugge 0-2. And Lyon is their only chance of preventing going all the way to 0-0-19, because Sevilla and Juventus are one of the most difficult away games you can find in Europe. Lyon are also in poor form as they lost to Dijon and Bordeaux back-to-back, with 7 conceded goals in total.

Can they do it? Mathematically, it should have happened already.

[bermuda3eck]

Juve15pts or more
Sevilla
Lyon
Zagreb 0pts

Sevilla and Lyon fights for 2nd

[Malko]

1) Juventus 2) Lyon

[BurningStorm]

1. Juventus 14
2. Sevilla 9
3. Lyon 6
4. Zagreb 2

Dinamo two draws at home against Sevilla and Lyon.

[AlanK]

I haven't liked the "new" Sevilla under Sampaoli thus far; I have my doubts about Sevilla in the CL this season. That said, if they can do things like they did on Saturday, when they turned the game around against Las Palmas in the last five minutes (to include added time), they could be very dangerous. Will it be back to the EL next winter This may depend more on Lyon than on Sevilla. And on Sevilla's capacity to get some points on the road--they've been very poor away from home in LaLiga the last two seasons, and they didn't exactly shine on the road in last year's CL campaign--0-0-3; +3-8 Of course, they were in a MUCH harder group . . .

[og2002gr]

Juventus: a top 6 team (maybe top 4?), they should win most of the groups. They look stronger than last season and they have a much easier group than last season. Anything less than 1st place is a failure.

Sevilla: they failed last season against Manchester City and Juventus and hardly saved 3rd place. This time they will have as opponents two teams that finished last in their groups last season. Even if they lost their "lord of the EL rings" they remain favorites over Lyon. Bad thing is they are not going to win EL this season..

Lyon: their group wasn't bad last season but they finished last. This season, the group is more difficult but they can feel safe at least for 3rd place. Sevilla is not a giant and they should fight as another top french team (Monaco) did against another sub-top spanish team (Villarreal).

Dynamo: fourth place is inevitable. Can they at least repeat their shock of last season? Sevilla and Lyon are not Arsenal.

1. Juventus 75%
2. Sevilla 60%
3. Lyon 50%
4. Dynamo Zagreb 15%

[Dragonite]

Juventus spent a lot of money in Benatia, Daniel Alves, Pjanic, Lemina, Higuaín and Pjaca, but they got almost as much from Pogba, Pereyra, Morata, and the tap dancer Zaza.
This will be their fifth consecutive CL participation; they had some brilliant moments, like reaching the final in 2015, but they also had some disappointing moments, like not advancing from the group stages in the previous season.
Even last season they experienced these extremes, defeating the group winner Manchester City twice, and then not being able to defeat the group’s worst team Borussia Monchengladbach a single time.
Sevilla was the other team in that group, and they’ll face them again this season. The other two opponents, Lyon and Dinamo Zagreb, seem easier than Manchester City and Borussia Monchengladbach. So Juventus should advance again.

Sevilla has a new coach, and a lot of new players.
They used to have a perfect CL group stage record – always advanced and always won the group. No need to talk about pre-group or post-group CL matches, where they looked a lot worse.
Last season that perfect record ended, but their 3 EL’s in a row eclipse that. Even winning one EL is a huge achievement, winning three is unbelievable.
Will they return to the EL in December, to try to win it for the fourth consecutive time?
They have no excuse to fail in this group. Last season they were competing against Allegri and Pellegrini, experts in advancing from CL group stages. This season there is no Pellegrini, only some Génésio and Kranjcar nobodies leading their harmless teams. Sevilla must finish top 2.

Lyon used to be a strong CL team that would be a serious threat to Sevilla and Juventus.
But those days are over, in the last four/five seasons the Lyon became a kitten.
Their elimination against APOEL in the 2011/2012 CL last 16 was the first of many embarrassments, there were also eliminations in the CL playoffs against Real Sociedad in 2013, against Astra Giurgiu in the EL playoffs one year later, and last season they finished bottom of their CL group.
And like CSKA Moscow, what have they done about that? Apparently not much… I don’t see any signs that this season there will be an improvement.
Maybe they won’t be last because they have another awful team, Dinamo Zagreb, in their group, so between these two awful teams one will stay alive until February…

Dinamo Zagreb will play a group stage for the tenth consecutive season. Will their campaign end in December for the tenth consecutive season?
Dinamo Zagreb never goes further than the group stages, not even in the EL.
Last season they finally interrupted their winless streak but still finished last. Can they finally survive until February now?
I don’t think so.
Their success against FC Salzburg in the CL playoffs was more about FC Salzburg’s incompetence than Dinamo Zagreb’s merit… Plus, some of the players that helped Dinamo Zagreb doing it, like goalkeeper Eduardo and midfielder Rog, already left and weren’t properly replaced, teenagers will take their places and Dinamo’s kids are not that good.
If Dinamo Zagreb wins one match again it will be already a success. If they finish third it will be a miracle, they should build a Kranjcar statue to celebrate it.

Prediction
1. Juventus
2. Sevilla
3. Lyon
4. Dinamo Zagreb

[max_m]

So already one small surprise in 1st round. Sevilla drew with Juve in Italy. With much luck, but point is point. Dinamo Zagreb wasn't so bas as the scoreline shows. They had 2 crossbars and one very good chance, so it could easly finish 3-1 or even maybe 3-2, but Lyon was overall a better team. Next round will be interesting.

[Lyonnais]

And like CSKA Moscow, what have they done about that? Apparently not much… I don’t see any signs that this season there will be an improvement.

well, with the exception of Umtiti sold to Barça, we managed to keep our players and this is not that bad.

I haven't liked the "new" Sevilla under Sampaoli thus far; I have my doubts about Sevilla in the CL this season. [...]Will it be back to the EL next winter This may depend more on Lyon than on Sevilla.

Let's face the truth, Lyon are just the outsiders. This would be a very pleasant surprise if Lyon could do it at the expense of Sevilla but at that moment there is no reason to expect an upset. Lyon are less experienced and probably talented than Sevilla, the start of the domestic season is difficult with huge troubles in the back line (7 goals conceded versus Dijon and Bordeaux!) and the last but not the least we already have a long list of injured players among other 5 French international players who are our best players (Lacazette, Fekir, Jallet, Valbuena, Grenier).
The next Sevilla-OL will tell how much Lyon can believe in their chances but again from a French perspective any good result in Sevilla would be a delicious upset.

So already one small surprise in 1st round. Sevilla drew with Juve in Italy. With much luck, but point is point. Dinamo Zagreb wasn't so bas as the scoreline shows. They had 2 crossbars and one very good chance, so it could easly finish 3-1 or even maybe 3-2, but Lyon was overall a better team. Next round will be interesting.

agree.
No need to say that the point caught by Sevilla at the Juventus Stadium doesn't increase Lyon chances for the qualification.

[Dragonite]

And like CSKA Moscow, what have they done about that? Apparently not much… I don’t see any signs that this season there will be an improvement.

well, with the exception of Umtiti sold to Barça, we managed to keep our players and this is not that bad.

Isn’t it?
Why do they want to keep players that lose against Real Sociedad, Astra Giurgiu, Gent, etc?

I’m not saying that they all had to leave, perhaps there are a few good ones among them, but when they just got out of their worst ever CL campaign, and their “new” players are only six – reserve goalkeepers Mocio and Racioppi, defenders N’Koulou, Mammana and Diakhaby, and midfielder Rybus… plus a new coach Bruno Génésio…
Unless that Hubert Fournier was a complete retard, and the new coach will make Lyon’s players play 5 times better than last season, I don’t see how Lyon can improve significantly.

I know that Lyon has a better youth system than CSKA Moscow, perhaps they don’t have to sign much that their youth system will supply the main team with good players.

But growing like that takes a lot of time… and there are several examples in Europe of teams that were taking a step backwards to take three or four steps forward in the future, investing in its youth system… and 5-10 years later they are still with the “future will be bright” slogan and terrible results under this experience.
What about examples of someone that succeeded doing mostly this? I don’t know a single one.

[nogomet]

As of minutes ago, Zlatko Kranjcar is no longer the coach of Dinamo Zagreb.

Tonight Rijeka utterly humiliated Dinamo by beating them 5-2. The result is flattering to Dinamo, the difference should've been higher.

The team completely fell apart in September. They were unbeaten in whole July and August, both in Europe and domestic league, and qualified to Champions league. Then the national team break came, they sold three best players (Rog, Pjaca, Eduardo) and showed up in September unrecognizable. They haven't collected a point yet, and lost 3 back-to-back matches (Dinamo - Osijek 0-1, Lyon - Dinamo 3-0, Rijeka - Dinamo 5-2).

They now sit at third place in the league, trailing Rijeka by 4 points. In Europe they did what they came for, i.e. collected €15 million of the CL prize money. They have no further ambitions there and a single point in the group would be a wildly celebrated success.

[SteffenM]

As of minutes ago, Zlatko Kranjcar is no longer the coach of Dinamo Zagreb.

Tonight Rijeka utterly humiliated Dinamo by beating them 5-2. The result is flattering to Dinamo, the difference should've been higher.

The team completely fell apart in September. They were unbeaten in whole July and August, both in Europe and domestic league, and qualified to Champions league. Then the national team break came, they sold three best players (Rog, Pjaca, Eduardo) and showed up in September unrecognizable. They haven't collected a point yet, and lost 3 back-to-back matches (Dinamo - Osijek 0-1, Lyon - Dinamo 3-0, Rijeka - Dinamo 5-2).

They now sit at third place in the league, trailing Rijeka by 4 points. In Europe they did what they came for, i.e. collected €15 million of the CL prize money. They have no further ambitions there and a single point in the group would be a wildly celebrated success.

Might be tired, but wanna be sure I understand you.

Dinamo Zagreb does awesome.
They sell 3 best players, loss 3 matches and then fire the coach?

[nogomet]

Might be tired, but wanna be sure I understand you.

Dinamo Zagreb does awesome.
They sell 3 best players, loss 3 matches and then fire the coach?

Awesome is a strong word. True, they were unbeaten, but were lucky to avoid defeat many times (both Salzburg games, a couple of domestic matches as well). But at least they looked like a team. After the break, they've looked like a helpless bunch of losers.

[Lyonnais]

And like CSKA Moscow, what have they done about that? Apparently not much… I don’t see any signs that this season there will be an improvement.

well, with the exception of Umtiti sold to Barça, we managed to keep our players and this is not that bad.

Isn’t it?
Why do they want to keep players that lose against Real Sociedad, Astra Giurgiu, Gent, etc?

Well, coming back to summers 2013 and 2014 is not very interesting as the team has much changed. However, just for memory, the team who lost to Real Sociedad went afterwards in quarters of the Europa League (lost to Juve).
As far as Gent is concerned, yes, true it was an under-achievement and a humilation to finish at the bottom of the group. For different reasons, everything went wrong in the first 6 months of last season, including in L1 (we were 9th at Christmas time after the 1st-leg games). Things have changed dramatically after the coach was changed at Christmas time and the second part of the season was good, with sometimes some very good performances and we finished 2nd of the league that enabled us to qualify to the Champions League.
This to say that these players are also those who did this very good second part of the season.

know that Lyon has a better youth system than CSKA Moscow, perhaps they don’t have to sign much that their youth system will supply the main team with good players.

Yes. You sign an experienced player only if the academy cannot provide.
The academy of Lyon is known as the best in France, there is not much discussion about this (I would agree that the one from Paris is also very good but they have more troubles to integrate them in the A' team). Most of the current starters come from the academy (and the region!) and this is a huge pride for the club and their fans.
That's the reason why I said that keeping our players is critical. The best recruitment is above all not to lose your key players.