- Feb 13, 2006
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Has Giovinco been injured? I really thought he was going to have a good season this year but haven't seen much of him.
Has Giovinco been injured? I really thought he was going to have a good season this year but haven't seen much of him.
Yea, can't believe I thought Juve could possibly challenge Inter this season. Having said that Napoli played really well 2nd half and Zaccheroni went defensive at 1-1 when he took of Del P and he paid for it in the end.
If Napoli get 4th and we manage to I really wouldn't want to play them in the qualifier.
With less than a month of the season to go, Inter Milan find themselves still on course for a superb treble which, if achieved, would be the ultimate case of Jose Mourinho coming, seeing and conquering before returning to the Premier League. I can't argue with the man's credentials if he manages it but for the time being I remain unconvinced by this Inter side.
On the domestic front they've done their very best to throw away a league title that should have been wrapped up weeks ago as AC Milan and Juventus blooded new managers and Roma made a dreadful start to the season under the much-maligned Luciano Spalletti. Their easier run-in may well see them pip Roma but on the evidence of Friday night's unconvincing win over ten-man Juventus , achieved courtesy of a moment of brilliance from the world's best full-back Maicon, they're labouring to wins rather than dominating. In the Champions League, they were outstanding on one occasion this season, that win at Stamford Bridge, but the self-proclaimed "Special One" was facing the very team he built so I wasn't too surprised to see him out-manoeuvre Carlo Ancelotti. Aside from that performance they've got the job done by hook or by crook but for my money they've never looked like real pretenders to Barcelona's European throne.
Barcelona meanwhile will have to make do without Andreas Iniesta and former Inter star Zlatan Ibrahimovic for both legs and, whereas the former is a huge loss, I suspect the absence of "Ibracadabra" is something of a blessing in disguise. For all of the Swede's undeniable talent, I'm yet to see him be a match-winner on the biggest stages. He strikes me as a player who could be overawed by the occasion and find returning to his old club too much. He was pretty ordinary when the two met at the San Siro in the group stages.
I've never really got my head around why Jose Mourinho sets up his sides defensively when at home in the first leg of Champions League knock-out ties, as if not conceding is more valuable than winning. My suspicion is he'll do it again, the 0-0 scoreline when these two met in Milan back in September and the knowledge that the average total goals make up in SF first legs since the 1999/0 season is just 1.7 goals/game makes the 1.8 on offer about under 2.5 goals too good to miss and that's my best bet for this match.
If anyone is going to get on the scoresheet at anytime on Tuesday night it's likely to be Lionel Messi, who has passed the 40-goal barrier for the season and has eight in this competition alone. The problem is that at odds of around 2.0 you're paying a serious premium to find out if he's about to make it nine.
A final word for Inter's talented, young striker Mario Balotelli. Think of all the different reasons you've seen a footballer booked for over the years and he'd be able to say "check" to most of them. In seven Champions League outings this season he was booked once and sent off (for two bookings) at Rubin Kazan. In Serie A, his record is even "better", booked 10 times in just 18 starts and sent off once. He may only get 20 minutes but that should be enough time to find some way of getting his name taken in the referee's notebook.