Champions League: Bayern edges Real

The first leg of the Champions-League semi-final saw Bayern München defeat Real Madrid 2-1. This probably puts the Spanish leaders in the drivers seat for the return match at the Bernabeu, although Bayern has a chance.

In general, Bayern pressured and had more possession, but Real was dangerous at times going forward. Franck Ribery put Bayern ahead after 17, and with Arjen Robben raiding down the right, Bayern had the edge. However, Real got the precious away goal from Mesut Ozil after 53 minutes. Basically a promising Bayern attack broke down when Schweinsteiger lost the ball, and an RM attack basically saw the visitors pass the ball around in the box as the Bayern defenders ran around aimlessly. Cristiano Ronaldo finally squared for an Ozil tap-in. For the rest of the game, Bayern pressed, but didn’t get much except Mario Gomez wasting some decent chances. He did get the last laugh though, as he got the winner right and the end.

In this form, Bayern clearly has a decent chance to get a result in Madrid, but I would expect Real to play more aggressively and attack. At times the München defense dicked around, and the RM attackers had some promising positions. In Madrid, they would probably follow through. Seems pretty clear that Bayern will not be able to catenaccio their way to the finals, and they’ll need to come out and attack Madrid like they did here, and hopefully not waste their chances. It would be nice for the Bundesliga to get some measure of revenge after the collapse of Schalke and Hannover in the Europa-liga against La Liga opponents. (Not to mention Dortmund and Luserksuen disgraceful CL performances).

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