Lost City win
Over the past ten years, Manchester City has consistently been on the list of the most talked about clubs in the world.
However, this season the interest in the "citizens" is especially high.
And the reason for this is not only the signing of the star Erling Haaland, who immediately began to hammer one ball after another in the Premier League.
While the league accuses their leadership of financial fraud and threatens with the most serious sanctions, the sky blues themselves are experiencing game problems that are reflected in the results.
By this time, they have already managed to fly out of the English League Cup, and in the championship they occupy only second place, behind Arsenal.
And in the group stage of the Champions League were not so convincing.
If a draw with Borussia Dortmund can still be explained, then the lack of goals in the confrontation with Copenhagen looks strange.
In addition, there is a clear shortage of personnel, which is extremely unusual for such a wealthy and thrifty team as City.
If the Spanish specialist still has a huge selection of high-quality performers in the middle and attacking lines, then everything is different in defense.
This is especially true for the flanks.
Kyle Walker was on the right, while either nominally central defender Nathan Ake or midfielder Bernardo Silva had to go to the left.
And this despite the fact that at the same time in Bayern, Joao Cancela, rented for six months, is on fire - once one of the team leaders, who suddenly felt like a stranger in Manchester.
Perhaps, during the trip to Leipzig, Silva would again have to try himself as a lateral, but the circumstances did not work out.
Star Kevin De Bruyne fell ill, which created a hole in midfield.
It was Bernard who was called to close it, and Ake came out again in defense.
However, it was not the Portuguese who organized the goal against Leipzig.
In many ways, this was done by the hosts themselves, whose negligence was exploited by Jack Grealish, Ilkay Gundogan and Riyad Mahrez.
The Englishman intercepted the transfer of Xaver Schlager and addressed the ball to the German, who, in touch, threw it to the Algerian.
City's winger, who broke into the penalty area, hit the touch and left Janis Blasvich out of work.
It was impossible to call Leipzig's performance in the first half a failure.
Only 26% possession, one shot on target (and even then only in stoppage time) and only 0.06 expected goals (xG) against Manchester's 0.6.
The only positives could be attributed to success in containing Haaland, but this could not be called solely the merit of Marco Rose's wards.
Rather, it is partners deliberately ignored the star striker, allowing him only seven times to touch the ball.
But after the break, Leipzig changed.
The hosts began to use the flanks more actively and find gaps in the City defense over and over again.
And the reason for this was the release of Benjamin Henrichs to replace.
By creating additional pressure on the vulnerable left edge of the opponent's defense, the Germans "killed two birds with one stone."
They forced Grealish (one of the best in the away team in the first half) to come back more often and thus concentrate less on attack.
They also diverted attention from Timo Werner, who was furrowing the left curb.
And it has borne fruit.
In just six minutes, they created three sharp episodes and could well come out ahead, to be more precise, the same Henrichs and Andre Silva.
City were taken aback under the pressure of Leipzig, and only recovered a little after the score became equal.
The "Bulls" played a corner, and Yoshko Guardiol, who came into someone else's penalty area, hit Ederson's gate in a high jump.
True, Ruben Dias helped the Croat to hang in the air, whom he used as a support.
But unlike the meeting with the participation of Juventus and Nantes, the referee did not react to these actions of the football player and counted the goal.
The awakening of "Manchester" was short-lived.
The guests organized a couple of good attacks, which ended with the "shots" of Gundogan and Silva, but then they began to parody the game of the Spanish national team at the World Cup in Qatar.
Wards of Guardiola rolled the ball across the field and hardly thought about moving forward.
Perhaps they were waiting for the mentor to intervene and make at least one change, but he never did.
City played a draw with Leipzig and made us once again think about their prospects in the current Champions League draw.
Leipzig defender Joshko Guardiol scores against Manchester City
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© Lars Baron / Staff
The Lukaku Factor
The confrontation between Inter and Porto, in theory, seemed to be one of the most unpredictable in the 1/8 finals of the Champions League.
After all, it was almost impossible to single out a favorite in it.
Even though the composition of the "Nerazzuri" looked more impressive, but it was not worth writing off their opponents.
In the current draw of the tournament, the "dragons" have already demonstrated that they are able to compete with the European giants, the first place in the group with Atlético, Bayer and Brugge became confirmation of this.
And in the first half, the Portuguese looked no worse.
The wards of Sergio Conceição were not inferior to their opponents either in terms of the game or in moments.
They responded to a powerful long-range “shot” by Hakan Chalhonoglu and a header by Alessandro Bastoni after a set piece with a dangerous hit by Marko Grujic, followed by finishing off Wenderson Galeno.
However, the most discussed episode nevertheless took place in the Porto penalty area, when Matteo Darmian collapsed on the lawn in a collision with an opponent.
It seemed that after the video review the chief referee would point to the point, but he did not even approach the monitor and subsequently almost provoked a brawl on the field.
Srdjan Jovanovic gestured to continue the game, but the whistle did not work.
And this uncertainty was almost taken advantage of by the Porto players, who tried to quickly put the ball into play from out of bounds and organize an attack.
Inter players didn't like it very much.
First, they firmly stopped Otavio, who had rushed into the breakthrough, and then entered into a confrontation with other members of the team.
Passions broke out on the field, but it did not come to a fight.
After the break, the opponents continued to exchange attacks, but Porto was closer to the goal.
They responded to a good shot by Nicolo Barella from an acute angle and a cross from Romelu Lukaku, who left the bench, with a series of attacks, during which only the incredible rescues of Andre Onana helped Inter maintain an equal score.
During one of them, the goalkeeper first prevented Zaid Zanuzi from scoring, and then miraculously reacted to finishing off Mehdi Taremi.
And it doesn't matter if the Iranian was offside at that moment or not.
But all the efforts of the “dragons” were crossed out by the removal of Otavio.
The midfielder kicked Chalkhanoglu in the leg and received a second yellow card, leaving his partners in the minority.
It is all the more offensive that he earned the first in that very episode with an out.
And in the minority, Porto faltered.
In the 86th minute, the defenders did not keep track of Lukaku and allowed the Belgian to first hit with a header after Barella's cross from the flank, and then manage to finish off himself.
The Nerazzurri snatched the victory and secured a minimal advantage before going to Portugal.
Inter striker Romelu Lukaku
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© Emilio Andreoli - Inter / Contributor