da betcris： There may be no European action in the various club competitions this midweek, but there’s still plenty to look forward to: the French League Cup and a full Serie A programme in midweek will make for an excellent alternative to this week’s EFL Cup action, if you can pull yourself away from Europe’s finest exports. That is, Jurgen Klopp v Mauricio Pochettino and Pep Guardiola v Jose Mourinho.
da leao： There was a lot of action this weekend across the various European leagues, too, as Europe’s current finest did battle across the continent.
There was drama in Spain and Italy, as well as intrigue and upsets in France and Germany. So far, it’s been a season like no other, and every single European league has seen the script torn up so far: and there’ll be plenty more to come.
This week’s Euro Roundup is reminiscing about how good Philipp Lahm looks in traditional Oktoberfest garb and wondering why it ever left Munich. Much like Pep Guardiola…
Germany
We usually start at the top of the table, but five of the bottom six teams in the Bundesliga at the moment are household names. From Wolfsburg, Schalke 04 and Werder Bremen – who have all played in the Champions League in the last decade – to Hamburg who have actually won the competition before, the Bundesliga’s competitiveness below the Bayern Munich and Borussia Dortmund top two seems to be creating some huge casualties.
Schalke are the only team in the bottom six to actually win at the weekend – two goals from Nabil Bentaleb (…) helped seal three points against Mainz.
In fact, we might even be able to add that top two to the list of casualties, if this season continues in the same vein as it started.
Bayern Munich’s last few games have led some to speculate that losing Pep Guardiola and replacing him with Carlo Ancelotti may have seen the champions lose a bit of their intensity. That’s been the case over the last few weeks with a European defeat to Atletico Madrid followed by league draws against Eintracht Frankfurt and Cologne in successive weeks. This time they made no mistakes in dispatching of a toothless Borussia Monchengladbach 2-0 with ease, however. Four of their last five goals in all competitions have been headers – maybe it’s just taking time for Ancelotti’s new ideas to filter through.
Borussia Dortmund, on the other hand, needed an injury-time Christian Pulisic goal to save their blushes away to minnows Ingolstadt – the other, non-household named side making up the bottom six in the table. A 3-3 draw was the best they could do on a weekend that saw Thomas Tuchel’s side drop to sixth place in the standings.
Dortmund are undergoing something of a transition after losing Ilkay Gundogan, Mats Hummels and Henrikh Mkhitaryan this summer, so maybe they’ll come good in a few weeks. In the meantime, Cologne, Hoffenheim, Hertha Berlin and unbeaten Bundesliga newcomers RB Leipzig all sit between Dortmund and Munich – so maybe the league is becoming much more competitive after all.
France
The biggest game of the weekend in France was undoubtedly the biggest game in any French footballing weekend: PSG hosted Marseille in French football’s Classique.
As Rudi Garcia took charge of Marseille for the very first time, he set his side up in an organised fashion – he came for a 0-0 draw, and in that respect, it was a 10/10 performance from the south coast side.
The game started as it meant to go on, but a mixture of PSG’s toothlessness in front of goal and Rudi Garcia’s side’s firm defensive organisation kept the game to a 0-0 draw in front of a baying PSG crowd.
It was the first 0-0 between PSG and Marseille since 2006, and only the 15th 0-0 of the entire Qatar Sports Investment era in all comps – after 239 matches. It was just one of those games for PSG against a side who did nothing but defend for the entire game.
That result was enough to keep PSG in the Champions League places – France only has three – but they remain six points behind table-toppers Nice and two behind Monaco. That means the top three managers in the league are the only three managers who are not French.
Arguably, however, that wasn’t the biggest upset of the weekend. Lyon’s 3-1 defeat to Guingamp was significant not just because it keeps Les Gones in 10th place in the league, 13 points behind Nice, but they also lost a home game when they were leading at half time. The last time that happened was on 28th May 1981, when Lyon were 1-0 up at half time and lost – coincidentally – 3-1 to Auxerre. Spooky.
Italy
Another week in Serie A, and another week where Juventus are top of the league. But this time, their lead at the top is smaller than it was last week – down to just two points right now.
And that was thanks to a 1-0 defeat to a resurgent AC Milan side who look like anything but an AC Milan side. They are young and fresh-faced with 18 year-old Manuel Locatelli scoring the winner, and 17 year-old Gianluigi Donnarumma making a stunning save right at the death – both players have 35 years of age between them, though we’re used to an AC Milan team averaging 35 years of age for the entire squad!
That was Juve’s second defeat of the season – and their second loss at San Siro. The last defeat came at the hands of Inter, but since then things haven’t been so rosy for the Nerazzurri.
Beaten again this weekend by Atalanta, and to a backdrop of their captain Mauro Icardi’s stand-off with the Inter ultras, it looks like time might be up – after only a few weeks – for manager Frank de Boer.
What all that means for the league table is that AC Milan are only two points off Juve, as are Roma. The resurgence of the capital club, too, is putting pressure on Juventus, and also puts pressure on Napoli, who have dropped to fourth place – not only were they supposed to be title rivals to Juventus, they could find themselves battling Roma and Milan for the final Champions League place. Italy could get very interesting.
Spain
Not only do we have a new leader in La Liga, but we also have an impossibly bunched-up beginning of a title race – the top five teams are all separated by three points.
Atletico Madrid sat atop the pile before matchday nine started this weekend, but defeat to Sevilla means they now find themselves in fifth place. Tight doesn’t begin to describe it!
The only reason they fell so far, however,r was because all their immediate rivals won their games. Sevilla, conquerors of El Cholo’s men, moved into second thanks to a stunning performance from Samir Nasri, and a goal from Steven N’Zonzi – perhaps a few Premier League rejects is all you need to beat Atleti.
Our new leaders, though, are REal Madrid, who beat Athletic Bilbao 2-1, thanks to a late goal from substitute Alvaro Morata after Karim Benzema’s opener was pegged back by the Basques. If you can’t rely on Cristiano Ronaldo to score your goals, then you may as well rely on Benzema and Morata.
Maybe the most entertaining game of the weekend, though, was Barcelona’s last-gasp victory over Valencia – upsetting two of the biggest tropes in La Liga over the last few months. It took a last minute penalty to see off Valencia – a team that have serious difficulties scoring penalties beat the keeper who saves more than he concedes. Since when was a scored penalty a turn-up for the books?
And we can’t mention La Liga without mentioning the goal of the weekend: Kevin-Prince Boateng’s emphatic finish to a stunning team goal from Las Palmas in a game they lost to Villarreal.