Manchester City better off without Yaya Toure and five things we learned from the Champions League group stage
COMMENT: The English champions are among the last
names in the hat for the knockouts but their influential midfielder has
not contributed positively to their campaign
By Peter Staunton, Carlo Garganese, Paul Macdonald and Reda Maher
LEI
MNC
The Champions League group stage is concluded. The identity of the 16 teams destined for the knockout rounds is now known.
Champions Real Madrid are safely through along with Barcelona and Atletico Madrid but there was no such luck for Athletic Bilbao.
Liverpool, among England's teams, were eliminated while Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester City go forward.
German clubs achieved a clean qualification sweep with Bayern Munich, Borussia Dortmund, Schalke and Bayer Leverkusen all going through.
Serie A is represented only by Juventus while French Ligue 1 sides PSG and Monaco are also in the pot. Rounding things out are Basel, Porto and Shakhtar Donetsk.
Here are five things we learned from the Champions League group stages...
| City better off without Yaya Toure |
Manchester City won only two matches in the Champions League group stage. Both were achieved without Yaya Toure. While the Cote d'Ivoire captain is lauded as the centrepiece of the Abu Dhabi United Group's billion pound investment, there is a serious argument to be made that City are better off without him for European games.
Manuel Pellegrini, it was said, was without four key players for their well-executed 2-0 victory over Roma at the Stadio Olimpico on Wednesday. Vincent Kompany, David Silva and Sergio Aguero were the high-profile injury absentees while Toure was counting the cost of a three-match ban, picked up for violent behaviour in the home defeat against CSKA Moscow.
The Chilean has been curiously reticent about playing both Fernando and Fernandinho together in the centre of City's midfield but was forced to do so in the absence of Toure. His reward? City's most controlling midfield display of this Champions League campaign.
The two Brazilians complement each other well in a dynamic that leaves no room for Toure. The 31-year-old is not willing or mobile enough to affect the game consistently from the centre of midfield while Silva and Aguero surely occupy the offensive slots in City's first-choice line-up.
Toure can dominate Premier League matches and mask overall poor performances with goals but the same is not true in the Champions League. Is he undroppable? City fans should hope not.
| Basel hit the big-time |
Drawn in a group with Real Madrid, champions of Europe, and a Liverpool team who came so close to winning the English Premier League, Basel could have been forgiven for thinking that it would not be their year in Europe.
Nonetheless, they earned four points against a diminished Liverpool side and a place in the knockout stages was secured against the odds. It is a remarkable achievement to finish ahead one of the richest clubs, relatively speaking, in world football.
Basel have a plan and it is working; they have reached this stage without a billionaire backer or oil money. They are reaping the rewards of a long-term strategy that has seen them dominate the domestic landscape and hold their own against the continent's best.
Their fabled youth system has turned out over 40 players for the first team in the past 15 years including Yann Sommer, Xherdan Shaqiri and the cream of the current crop, Fabian Frei. Those who excel in the first team are sold off at monumental profit, like Sommer, Shaqiri and Granit Xhaka.
Their scouting network is functioning better than many of their most esteemed rivals. Players like Fabian Schar, still with Basel, as well as Mohamed Salah and Aleksandar Dragovic are brought in and sold on with the money re-invested back into the squad.
The perennial Swiss champions are light years ahead of their domestic rivals and are setting a template for big fish in small ponds all across Europe.
Their football, this season under Paulo Sousa, has been attractive and fearless, while a new generation including Schar and Mohamed Elneny is coming to the fore.
Basel and their loyal support in St-Jakob Park do not have the talent to dislodge the European super-elite but even making the last 16 is a terrific outcome. And who knows, with a favourable draw, they might count themselves among the top eight clubs in Europe. It would be well deserved.
| AVB exposed again |
When Andre Villas-Boas was appointed as Chelsea's new manager in the summer of 2011, he was immediately hailed by the British press as the 'new Jose Mourinho'. Having previously worked under the 'Special One', AVB arrived in London with a big reputation.
In the previous season he had won an historic treble with Porto, becoming - at 33 - the youngest coach to win a European trophy in almost 50 years. Unlike Mourinho, though, his career since leaving his home country has been one failure after another.
He lasted just eight months at Stamford Bridge. AVB received a second chance to prove himself at Tottenham but, despite boasting plenty of talent in the squad, he failed to qualify for the Champions League in his first season.
Together with technical director Franco Baldini, he then blew the €100 million Spurs received for Gareth Bale on a string of flops. After a disastrous start to the 2013-14 season, he was soon given his marching orders by chairman Daniel Levy. In March of this year, AVB took over the reins at Zenit.
Topping the Russian Premier League is no real achievement for a club - bankrolled by Gazprom - that has splashed out outrageous sums on the likes of Hulk and Danny in recent years. The real acid test was the Champions League, yet AVB failed to progress from the weakest of all of this year's groups as Zenit finished below two average Monaco and Leverkusen sides.
After each failure AVB has always had an excuse. At Chelsea, he blamed player power. At Spurs, he blamed members of the board and even the media. Who will he blame now? The excuses have run out.
| Finishing fourth in La Liga a curse |
Three of the last six Champions Leagues and six from the last 11 Uefa Cup/Europa Leagues have been lifted by Spanish teams, but despite their general dominance of European competition an Achilles heel has developed in recent years, one that has befallen Athletic Bilbao in 2014-15.
The Basque side were already out before their final group-stage fixture, a fate also suffered by Real Sociedad with just a single point last season and Villarreal with one less in 2011-12. The common denominator here is finishing in fourth spot in La Liga, an achievement but also, seemingly, a curse.
Villarreal not only exited Europe piteously, they were relegated the same year. Sociedad's campaign was an unequivocal disaster, a worryingly poor standard that seeped into their league form and leaves them now with David Moyes in charge and in a relegation battle. Season 2012-13 pitched Malaga against the elite, and although their deeply unfortunate quarter-final exit to Borussia Dortmund bucked the underperformance trend, the subsequent European ban and financial disarray have restored the club among Spain's also-rans.
Athletic's squad hasn't had the depth to compete with intensity and their overall level has dropped. They are now a club in limbo. Valencia, Sevilla and Villarreal are likely to scrap for fourth this season, but aside from the obvious financial injection, they may observe their predecessors and wonder if it's all worth it.
| Champions Route not fit for purpose |
On paper, it makes good sense. The league winners from Europe's lower-ranked nations are pooled into a play-off route that guarantees five relative minnows in the Champions League group stages. In theory it adds to the diversity of the competition and, in an age where supporter bases and talent pools are globalised, the little guy has an opportunity to mix it with the big boys.
But the 2014-15 edition of Europe's premier club competition was devalued by the presence of these teams, all of whom acted as group whipping boys. Here is how they finished:
Malmo – bottom of Group A; 3 points
Ludogorets – bottom of Group B; 4 points
APOEL – bottom of Group F; 1 point
Maribor – bottom of Group G; 3 points
BATE – bottom of Group H; 3 points
Some put in more encouraging performances than others, particularly Ludogorets, who finished just one point behind Liverpool in a very difficult group topped by Real Madrid and Basel. However, the Champions League is supposed to be about Europe's best facing the ultimate challenge on the biggest stage. The gruelling, extended nature of the play-off system is rendered moot if the end result is a selection of teams averaging less than half a point per game.
What is the solution to this riddle? Shutting out Europe's smaller leagues altogether would be a travesty of fairness and opportunity; immediately pitting these little champions against the likes of Arsenal and Porto would be harsh. One answer would be to pair the 10 final round 'champions' with the final batch of 'league' entrants in the final qualifying round. The minnows would have time to build up a winning run and match fitness, and the bigger clubs would feel the pressure of knowing there would be no excuses.
Perhaps only one or two would make it through – but at least they would be fit for purpose, unlike the current system.
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