Real Madrid vs Lyon Liveblog

What a game!!!

I watched the entire game and I believe that if we go into the second leg with the same attitude and commitment, we will be victorious. I am so scared of the yellow card stuff. I'm tempted to think that it may prove to be our main problem in due course.

Some highlights from the game:

I got the formation right and i guess Bassam got the scoreline right :)
Senor Perez's reaction was crazy.
Benzema's reaction was after the goal was class.
Benzema was sublime yesterday and played precisely the way he used to while playing for Lyonnais. Dribble past defenders and score.
Di Maria was poor. He had one absolutely top notch chance and was sad he did not even make the keeper work.
Our defense gave up during one crucial moment and that led to the goal. I wonder whom was Pepe marking?
We were unlucky! Two shots hit the bar and post on the inner side. Any other day they were goals!
Ramos on a yellow. I hope he does not make dash during the second leg and leave us reeling with 10 men for the entirety of the game. This is not la liga but the UCL. When under pressure we all know how Ramos cracks up. Hope he stays calm!

I imagined Perez going "That's my boy!" after Benzema's goal.

Props to you for getting the formation right. De Maria had TWO chances (one on the first half which the keeper had to save). Florentino's reaction says a hell of a lot about his love for the team and fondness for Benzema. I think, Ramos was at fault for their goal, playing Gomis on side, but I need to see it again.

We were unlucky as you say. This was a classic away performance, which any team would have been proud of. We held out in the first half, and although Lyon piled on the pressure, they didn't create many scoring chances. Then we came out much much stronger in the second, Lyon were on the ropes for most of the half and we should have taken a 0 - 2 lead really. Ozil was excellent in the second half, so was Pepe, Alonso, Lassana and of course Benzema.

Lyon had to subsitute their 3 star players; Bastos, Gourcuff, and Delgado. That says it all.

And Mou introduced a new formation, 4-4-2. Pretty late on in the season but i guess he has seen it fit to get this rolling and catch the teams by surprise! But imo this would work great if we have Ade on the field.. his height would come in handy for the crosses that come in!

Oh and I know that it's a little bit blasphemous to say this, but Iker has been stinking ass lately, to be honest. He lack sharpness, and at 29 years of age, you'd think that he must have gathered some experience at least, but no, he makes mistakes one would expect from Antonio Adan. The goal we conceded today was partly the fault of the defense, but Iker should have at least tired to close him down quickly. That's what an experienced goal keeper would have done.
I don't know where the problem is from. Taking the captain arm band has not added much to his goal keeping abilities. Maybe it's the pressure of being captain and gk at the same time? I just don't understand. I'm saying this because if his form continues, the National team might play a Raul/Guti on him, strip him of the captain band, and stop calling him up for matches.
I'm worried about Iker, honestly speaking. Hell, I'm worried about too many things, jeez

yeah, I don't know what's up with him?? I felt much secure in the Levante match when Adan was keeping posts! :P

i think he was trying to protest a handball (i think the ball touched gomis' arm before he took the shot) but yeah, he should have stopped the ball first before protesting. he could have easily saved that... if he tried.

i think he was trying to protest a handball (i think the ball touched gomis' arm before he took the shot) but yeah, he should have stopped the ball first before protesting. he could have easily saved that... if he tried.

if you guys ever get the chance you need to check out the mourinho interview he did in revista de la liga on sky sports absolute quality! This is the interview real madrid tv should have done

Do you have a link to the revista ?

lol Andres, did your youtube channel get banned again?

Lol yea it sort of did , the chnnel still exists but im banned from logging into it , so i created a new one.
I uploaded the Lyon game there BTW

what's the link to the lyon game?

Click on my name

awesome. this is where i can find castilla games as well?

I will be posting all the game in a post for Castilla.

I'm happy that everybody sounds optimistic about our chances of qualification. I'm a little bit too discouraged by that scoreline to really go into any tactical talk, but Caracoleo said something about how winning this tie against Lyon is more important than any quater final tie we may have because it helps us overcome a psychological hurdle that has ruined us for 6/7 years now. I was really sad to see Lyon equalize that goal because honestly, one away goal does not make that much difference considering that all lyon has to do in our home is score one goal too, and the pressure is back on us.
Kaushik, you were right, Benzema was the right man for the job
Bassam, you see what I said about playing Marcelo as a winger? It takes away all the advantages he has as an attacking left back. When he's an attacker, he's less effective.
I agree with Zizou, I wouldn't be too pissed that Mou went for Arby instead of Marcelo because with the way Lyon played us in the first half, Marcelo might have committed one of those his blunders and put us on the back foot.
I read zonal Marking's review, but I only agree with them to an extent. Arbeloa ruined our attack more often than not? Hell yeah, but we were safe defensively on the left. I still think Mou should have gone with the trivot, but since he had been studying Lyon for months before this game, I assume he went for the best option.
You see, with Real Madrid, there is no home advantage. Honestly, sometimes I feel that there's more pressure playing at home than away because it doesn't really take much for the Bernebeau faithfull to go silent, or worse still, whistle at the team. I never count on home advantage with this team because quitel frankly, there's none. If this thing is really a curse, then I'm afraid they'll hold us to a 1-1 draw at home, and beat us on penalties. The pessimism flowing through my veins at this point is quite overwhelming for just one man. Somebody please counter this comment with some positive words of encouragement.

Statistics shows that players have more energy and confidence at home. I am sure that Ozil will be a different player and Leon players will not be so calm playing in Madrid. Their defenders will make mistakes but we'll have to convert our chances. Kaka and Marcelo should start replacing Ramos and Di Maria. We have better players. They don't have player like CR7. So, you can relax now.

wow, keep the positive words coming. I'm loving them.
I agree linp, Ozil seems to have more confidence at home, and so does the rest of the team. And unlike last year when we had to score goals to qualify, this year, we don't have to (even though it's important for us to score), so the players should be relieved of some pressure.

well we have won all of our home games this season and dropped a few points here and there so i'd like to think that we play better at home , how is that possible if there is no home advan.tage for us.
so dont give up so easily i can assure you that well play much better there than we did today .

Thank you Andres. You see, what bothers me is not the fact that we're going back home with a 1-1 draw, but the fact that we are going back home with a 1-1 draw in the round of 16 of the Ucl. That's what gives me the shivers. I really hope we can break this supposed curse, if any because it's really limiting us to mediocrity. Our recent records in the Ucl doesn't make us any better than CSKA Moskow.
But I agree with you, the home advantage should count for something.

Xabi ran 11,499 km today , he was the Madridista who ran the most , Di Maria came in second with 11,125 , Ramos third and Carvalho 4th

11,499 KILOMETERS
Almost the diameter of the Earth, but not quite

Though most of us here would accept 1-1 before the game, I think we're dissapointed because of the manner we drew it.. Saint Iker was bad, first half was piss poor, and the gap from top 4 and bottom 4 rob us of a win again last night.. If we're playing good, and the goal really unlucky, then it'd be okay, I think..

Guys, so I made this picture. Hope you guys like it.
http://img811.imageshack.us/i/...

I also noticed that Leon played a more disciplined system in the 1st half. Once they lost the ball, they have everybody back in their half, inviting our players to move up. Once they won the ball back, they had so much room to counter. I am sure that they'll use the same game plan in the return leg.

Labomba i do agree with some of Zonal markings review. Arbeloa/ Ronaldo isn't a good partnership for the reasons they said i agree, although i still think Mou was right to play Arbeloa, because Marcelo isn't up to Cl standards of defending, and surely taking into account how important it is for us to get past this round ( if say we are in this position next year and we get past this round this year then there will be more room for expansive football) but we must get past this round first so Arbeloa was much safer even if it did limit Ronaldo's influence.

btw, something that popped in my mind just now..did any of u guys notice that on lyon's goal, the ball wasnt played where the foul was committed..ref wasnt even lookin

and i remember distinctly 15 min earlier alonso had a cross near the touchline and he too attempted to move the ball's position forwards..and the ref ran to him in SUCH A WAY!!man if i was near that pitch i wouldve just run to the pitch and punch that guy out..actually gonna do that to our alltime favorite barca player dani alves ;)

oh no, we have a whiney bunch of players with that hand ball, lets not start as fans. Unless they picked the ball up and threw it in the goal it was a fair goal, the amount of times our players kept kicking the ball away was just as bad.

so something to consider going into the second leg is that Lyon has never beaten us at the Bernabeu, though stats are meant to be broken

sry to point it out but a 2-2 draw wouldnt do us any good!! but i dont think that will happen :)

I dont even want to think about that scenario

Mou's home record is amazing.

Interesting game. I did not really catch much because my stream was so crappy. But I guess a draw is good but WE LOST THE BALL SOOOO Much. all we did is kick long balls and hope for the best. and especially after they scored , they looked more threatening. we looked like the weaker side in those minutes. Our attack was just so disjointed. We just relied on individual talent instead of team play. I feel like we don't have a plamaker linking everything together...maybe because I saw the match when marcelo was put in for ozil (?). I honestly feel like Kaka is the missing part of the puzzle. He is exactly what we need on the field; someone who can create interplay between our attackers in the attacking third. We just seem to rely on "rob and run".

i agree with you but who should be dropped for kaka?

I was saying that for the past few days. Kaka plays better in the midfield than Ozil. Ozil is not physical enough to play there against a defensive formation. He is much better on the wing where he has more room and can use his speed.

"He always has to say something because he can't admit his failures. The whole world knows how Mourinho is...he never recognises he is wrong." (Cristiano Ronaldo, 2007)

Deleted for being useless and just meant to stir up controversy.

Whoa! It's my evil twin from the Arsenal Offside! It's not Kari from BFB though

It seem you have a Doppelgänger.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D...

LOL suure it wasnt you Kari , wink wink ;-)

Detective Andres ;)

Hey! I only insulted your coach, management's decision making and enraged half the regulars on this blog the last time I came here; isn't that enough for you to take my word for it? :P

Besides we lost our CL match we really should have won, so I'm really in no position to troll any blog...

lol you're right , i dont know what i was thinking , how could someone who did all that talk crap and pretend it was someone else ?
J/k i believe you , there have been a lot of identity theft here lately .

thats coz he's never wrong :D
all the reply ure worth my friend

"We are more than a club. We even have our shirt Logo as UNICEF for charity. "

"Barcelona signs a 400+ million dollar deal with Qatari Foundation to be the sponsor on their shirt"

The times, they are changing. ;)

And my roommates comment goes to the waste basket as well.

DUDE!!!! You just replied !!!!!!

Roommate replied! And no he isn't a Madrid fan, just hates Barcelona lol

Ahem your roomate uh

Nothing gets past you Andres ;)

I know i know:-)

Really!!??? MOTM Di Maira for me. His work rate in the 2nd half was better than anyone's. Did you lot see him run nearly the whole length of the field to track back, then after the guy he was chasing passed the ball, he carried on and made the tackle. Ozil was so good on the goal aswell, although overall he wasn't as good as usual. The biggest let down for me was Khedira, i'd have to watch the game again but i didn't see him really do anything in the game.

This is a very good result. You can see me arguement now with how easy our games recently have been as this is the first real test in a while and we did struggle at times. But an away goal is priceless.

i purposely did not watch this match and scheduled a meeting (too nervous!) so i wouldn't be tempted to check scores. it is not a loss and an away goal is good. so good job. let's see how we do on the return leg.

Dude, you didn't watch it your team's champions league, ON PURPOSE!? Mothafa** you a du**a**

Zonal marking dot com have interesting review of match with strong reservations about not playing Marcelo

http://www.zonalmarking.net/20...

Put http stroke in front of this or go to Zonal marking dot com for match analysis bit.ly/eNFIvk

I didn't watch the game since i had lab, but the score seems really good. The away goal is always what turns out to be our undoing and we got one today. This puts us in the driving seat in the 2nd leg. An early goal on our home, and we are very safe. If we concede two goals at home, well, then we dont deserve to win.

In reply to Andres on the other post about Trolls:

Because unlike the common belief, i am not that free to keep track of everything. Especially now with Corey on leave, we have to make up slack. So by the time that i come to an troll, you guys had already replied to them and the damage done. If you dont reply to them, i will gladly delete the comment.

The reason why i expect you, or the regulars, to ignore the trolls is not because you have done something wrong, but rather because i know you are smart people and im asking for you to ignore these idiots that post trash. Is it too much to ask for?

Well when you put it this way i cant do anything but agree :-) youve got my support in this.

haha you've judged Andres completely wrong Bassam.

I do agree with you, i still can't believe we have these conversations, been like this for years, we keep saying ignore them.

When is this troll above me gonna get banned lol

I think people are upset about the result since Lyon scored so late in the game. But I agree, we have the upper hand and honestly, if we dominated the match like you guys said, we should be fine at home. We should go out on all attack in the beginning especially and get those early goals. We get them and we're on.

By now, I hope Mou can also see that Kaka is a better CAM than Ozil and Ozil is a better winger than Di Maria. Ade is a complete garbage today. He couldn't even hold the ball. I was disappointed with Ikea also. He spilled the ball in the 1st half. For that goal, he didn't come out to challenge the player and hope for an offside call.

i hope he tries that selection often.

Very much agree on iker, horrible game today. On the goal, he was most disappointing. Why didn't he rush put and challenge the shot? If he cuts the angle down it would have been much more difficult. Instead, he was just. Hoping for an offsides.

we could we do about him? he keeps on making those silly mistakes each time and always apportion blames on defenders whenever he concedes a goal. he is very awful. what borders me is that the spanish and madrid media will never comment on it but would have if it was someone like kaka, benz, or any of the foreigners who made such mistakes

I watched the reply again. When the ball was headed over, instead of moving up he moved one step back to the goal line. After the ball was hit, he didn't make any attempt to stop the ball, he just raised his arm for offside. Ramos was the guilty party. He slammed the ball into the net again.

i think all you need is some insight from an non-madridista..i was so pissed at the end of the game until my friend reminded that if lyon wouldve scored first, all of us would say its a good performance..plus 1-1 isnt that bad come to think abt it..anyone of us wouldve gladly accepted such a result before the game

anyways, we were by far the better team..lyon dominated early on but never threatened casillas (except for that mistake he did) and we hit the bar twice and there was a penalty when the defender handballed cristiano's freekick (the ref sucked big time btw..how could he miss that..same guy who gave motta a red card when busquets acted like he was elbowed..and im not even talkin abt the 4th/5th ref who appear to be so useless at times)

i think we will play with caution in the bernabeu as lyon are forced to attack and i think we can score 2 goals and move on to the quarters.

HALA MADRID

Hola, I haven't posted in a long time but I wanted to pop in. I agree very much with Andrés, before the match a 1-1 or even 0-0 didn't sound too bad, but after the game was over I feel like Los Blancos wasted a win. I'm very much on pins and needles about the next leg because last year still scarred in my memory but whatever happens, Hala Madrid Por Siempre!

Welcome back texas

Go Texas!

Hey Texan :)

i would have gladly taken a 1- 1 before ths game kicked off , but now i cant help but feel that we threw it away , we could have won this match had outr players not decoded that the game was over at the 80th minute , what a shame . Mourinho was right when he said that this team was naive , it showed against Milan at the San Siro and it did once again today , Luck also wasnt on our side any other day that CR FK and that Ramos header would go in instead of hitting the post and bar respectively.
I am not going to be too downed by this though as it is eally hard to win away from home in the CL , at the Bernabeu i like our chances

Argh! There's no repeat of the match...grrr! Well it seems like such an unlucky scoreline. Shame we didn't win but guys, a 1-1 score does mean we have the upper hand. And Andres, I do so hope you are going to post this match online :) Well I was so looking forward to watching a repeat but instead..they're showing the stupid Chelsea match.

Click on my name Hehe:-)

Ill post it up in a couple of hrs

Thanks so much Andres :)