redshade » Wed Apr 11, 2018 12:21 am wrote:This is awesome guys this is what we have been waiting for the glory days back in europe. Can't believe it Semi final of the champions league fek yeahhh!
About the match, first half was probably one of the most nerve racking matches I've watched in recent times. I was just waiting for City to pop in a 2nd or 3rd. Had City led 2-0 at HT i think the complexion would have completely changed. However we defended well at the back with a solid display from TAA and Robbo.
All we needed was 1 goal to kill them off and thats was happened. As soon as Salah scored City were finished, deflated, spermless!
Firmino goal just put a nice sting to the tie.
Lads there is something special going on and gut feeling says no6 is on its way.
It should have been 2-0 tbh, Sane's goal was a perfectly good goal and as you say we would have been in real trouble at that point because we were really floundering.
What I would say though is that even if City would have been 4-0 up on the night 1 goal would have still been enough to see us through, early on we were defending because we had to but the moment City would have got their noses in front I'm sure the dynamic of the tie would have completely changed, I'm sure they would have been the ones defending and we would have been the ones throwing the kitchen sink at them.
Given we have scored 9 goals in our last 3 games against them if we would have needed a goal I reckon we would have got it because I don't think City are set up to defend leads, I don't think it's something they are particularly good at.
Another factor is how badly we played in that first half, yes City were impressive but we were literally struggling to do the basics, we couldn't even execute simple 5 yard passes, players were miss-controlling the ball, shanking clearances, the keeper was flapping at things....the lot.
Even if it would have went to 2-0 there was no way that we were going to play as bad as we did in the first half, people are just assuming that the second half was going to be an extension of the first, I don't believe professional players could possibly play that bad for 90 minutes, the moment we stopped making silly mistakes City didn't look quite as good.
Don't get me wrong Lady Luck was on our side over the 2 legs and goals do change games but we showed more than enough over the 2 ties in fact over all 4 games against City this season that on a head to head basis we are a match for them. It was always going to be tight, Guardiola alone has spent half a billion quid on that team, we were always going to need the odd decision to go our way to get through.