Champions League Review - Mourinho and Chelsea given hope

Mourinho and Chelsea refuse to crumble despite the invitation

Chelsea went ahead of Dynamo, just as they went ahead of Liverpool. When Liverpool equalised, Chelsea crumbled and their manager railed against the injustice of the whole world.

Mourinho flipped out when Diego Costa wasn’t given a penalty, which would have sealed the match, and then Dynamo equalised with 12 minutes left. The invitation was there for Chelsea - they could do as they have for much of the season and throw in the towel. They could sit back and try to hold on, or they could even self-combust and lose. It had happened before.

Instead, they relied on their leader for the season. Because however poorly Chelsea have played this season, Willian has taken responsibility and not let his performance level drop. He was man of the match before his goal, but he left everyone behind with his magnificent free kick. Like David Beckham’s against Greece, he took on a huge amount of pressure and delivered. Perhaps fortunate that the goalkeeper was caught out-mid jump, his success this season has been no coincidence. If Mourinho keeps his job, then he has Willian to thank for his early season contributions.

Arsenal might have improved, but Bayern are still Bayern

Arsenal did brilliantly for their 2-0 win against Bayern Munich recently, and there can be no disputes over the result. But it is nevertheless the kind of match that requires Bayern to play below their general standard, and for Arsenal to be uncharacteristically ruthless. So it went, and Arsenal had their victory.

As was expected, they simply could not resist Bayern’s quality, the one which will dominate better teams than Arsenal in the later stages of the competition. They had no chance, and with Gabriel’s poor defending, and the extensive injury list they have meant that their less-than-zero chance became so low it might have been Jose Mourinho’s general mood this season.

Arsenal now have to win their remaining matches and hope that the results favour them. They cannot be confident. More important is that they do not allow the disappointment of any failure to qualify to ruin what is their best chance of winning the league since the last time they blew a chance at winning the league. As for Bayern, they have to make sure that they finally play to their potential for the whole competition - which we can now legitimately wonder if they can manage.

Real Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain show the way for Cristiano Ronaldo’s retirement

When Zlatan Ibrahimovic knew that he was in decline, and when he was offered an absolutely ridiculous salary at PSG, he joined them. It helped that Milan were going nowhere, too, but he made sure that his qualities were on show, still. His strength and intelligence had not waned, and so he could simply remove players from his path with a shrug of his shoulders, and use his intelligence to exploit the space and mistakes of defenders who were only good enough for Ligue 1.

It worked. As PSG improved with their transfer market heft, and as the rest of the league stayed as mediocre as it had been for decades, he stood out. He scored over 100 goals in 140 games for them, and occasionally got the chance to show off in the Champions League. With his autobiography coming out at the same time, he achieved a kind of respect and celebrity that had eluded him at Barcelona, and in Serie A. Zlatan became a celebrity entity, and it was one we were supposed to enjoy.

However, at 34, he is no longer able to shine for PSG. With Angel di Maria, Javier Pastore, Blaise Matuidi and Marco Verratti around him, he can be carried and occasionally flicker into light, but their qualities and relative youth highlight the things he can no longer do. His move to PSG has been a success, but it can only help his image for so long.

Something similar is going on with Cristiano Ronaldo. As he drifts ever further into position as a central striker, and away from his own specific position on the wing, he still contributes goals, and given that the rate more or less matches the tally when he was at his best, the casual observer is carried along. The problem for Ronaldo, and Real, is that he is no longer quite as powerful, quite as quick and quite as effective. A brilliant player, yes, but not the brilliant player of his peak.

And so, the rumours have intensified. He flirts with other teams, he says that nobody knows the future, and PSG and Manchester United are on alert. Do not be surprised if one striker almost at the end of his career ends up being replaced by Ronaldo, who is just entering the end of his.

Manchester City’s qualification for the Champions League is now routine

Manchester City have lost to Juventus, but otherwise performed well in the Champions League. They’ve won the games that they’d be expected to, with relatively little difficulty. It’s unremarkable, but for City, that is progress. In the past with City there’s been disaster, humiliation and stressful comebacks. Now, they’ve just kept their head down and remained focused on the task at hand. It’s come at the expense of success in the league in the matches afterwards, but they remain in contention for the Premier League too. That City’s progress is so boring is an achievement in itself.

CSKA Moscow are not a special side

Well done to Wayne Rooney for doing the very least that he could have last night. Some stories have him silencing boo boys, but that ignores the sheer relief that United actually won a game, and that they actually scored a goal, which was at the heart of the boos. Those worries have not dissipated.

The time for an honest appraisal comes now - and it remains obvious that Rooney and United are struggling. In the past, United have failed to score goals because of a lack of ambition: deep-lying midfielders, wide players nowhere near strikers, and a deathly slow pace of play. Yesterday, they struggled for a different reason: incompetence. The pace was far quicker and the width of the pitch was used, but the quality of crossing was poor, Michael Carrick was wasteful in possession, and Rooney struggled with an open goal before he finally got the winner.

The fans are happy for the win, and United were improved compared to their recent struggles. But it remains nowhere near good enough in the long-term. Yesterday United’s travails, just like Rooney’s efforts, were the bare acceptable minimum.