emortal wrote: ↑Thu May 02, 2024 22:57
Fiorentina scores in extra time.
3-2 is not disastrous for Brugge, a win at home looks more than doable based on what I saw tonight.
Festival of mistakes by Brugge today. From goalkeeper playing volley-ball leading to 2-1. Goalkeeper giving a free corner. Onyedika getting 2 yellows within minutes. A player making a pass to the lateral stand. Defenders turning into stone on the late 3-2.
If Brugge plays like Brugge and not like North Korea, winning the return leg is more than doable.
FT 2-4. The difference is stark between the two teams off the ball. Villa lack shape, teamwork and aggression. With the ball they look quite good but Olympiakos defend in numbers with discipline, that's the difference. And the difference between them and West Ham, who make you fight for every ball and every inch of space and have already dealt with Olympiakos.
Villa need to come to the second leg with the mindset that it is the biggest game of the season and well prepared to fight for everything like West Ham would have been. There should be no need to think of prioritising the league, they now have a 7pt lead with 3 games left, 4 for Tottenham. Would take a big collapse plus Tottenham having a strong end to lose the CL place.
naaba wrote: ↑Thu May 02, 2024 23:02
Festival of mistakes by Brugge today. From goalkeeper playing volley-ball leading to 2-1. Goalkeeper giving a free corner. Onyedika getting 2 yellows within minutes. A player making a pass to the lateral stand. Defenders turning into stone on the late 3-2.
If Brugge plays like Brugge and not like North Korea, winning the return leg is more than doable.
Ikr!
Can you imagine how annoying this is to me as a PAOK fan?
Young goalkeeper slipped at least 4 times trying a long kick in the return leg in Greece in the QF.
But somehow he always managed to hit the ball correctly.
The CB duo were shaky and made mistakes in Toumba as well.
But they had the good sense to just send the ball out instead of trying fancy ball control in front of the CF.
Also, the full backs, wingers and midfielders (esp. Onyedika/Vanaken) were just flawless over 2 legs.
mspm89 wrote: ↑Thu May 02, 2024 22:52
Incredible that a team referred to as "the corpse of Olympiakos" by @Firnen at some points in the season is achieving this.
You have to remember that half the starting 11 changed in January, and the current coach (Jose Luis Mendilibar) arrived in February. The team drastically improved, and still had huge ups and downs (see the matches against Maccabi Tel Aviv). If you told the most loyal or fanatical Olympiacos fan before the KO matchs against Ferencvaros what would follow, they would think you're high.
naaba wrote: ↑Thu May 02, 2024 23:02
Festival of mistakes by Brugge today. From goalkeeper playing volley-ball leading to 2-1. Goalkeeper giving a free corner. Onyedika getting 2 yellows within minutes. A player making a pass to the lateral stand. Defenders turning into stone on the late 3-2.
If Brugge plays like Brugge and not like North Korea, winning the return leg is more than doable.
Ikr!
Can you imagine how annoying this is to me as a PAOK fan?
Young goalkeeper slipped at least 4 times trying a long kick in the return leg in Greece in the QF.
But somehow he always managed to hit the ball correctly.
The CB duo were shaky and made mistakes in Toumba as well.
But they had the good sense to just send the ball out instead of trying fancy ball control in front of the CF.
Also, the full backs, wingers and midfielders (esp. Onyedika/Vanaken) were just flawless over 2 legs.
Tonight I saw they are human after all!
It always makes me hold my breath when I see the back 4 of Brugge trying to find the footballing way out at the back.
Not the first time that they are not sharp and inaccurate with their passing...
a 2-2 would have been better but even a 3-2 is not a super disaster ( Fiorentina was good but not crushing good) although it does make things a bit harder for Brugge.
And have to say that the second Fiorentina goal was not the Brugge goalkeeper's fault. It all started with Meier who with his pityful clear attempt just gave the ball away to a purple player right out of the 16 box.
Club Brugge are 1-0 up vs Fiorentina. They scored after one of Fiorentina defenders broke offside line and Brugge player scored from a clear position. Fiorentina could equalise almost immediately but they wasted 1 on 1 and a rebound with no GK in the goal.
1:0 Brugge at the half, a great Vanaken ball makes the difference, the Viola unlucky their best shot came down a few cms away being a goal from the underside of the bar. Open game could go either way.
