The last week of the UEFA Champions League round of 16 could be a game of drama as three of the four first legs have ended in a draw and LOSC are far from out against Chelsea.
Brought to you by Expedia, we take a look at this week’s highlights.
Suárez’s return to England
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A former Liverpool player, Luis Suárez is unlikely to enjoy much sympathy at Old Trafford if he joins Atlético at Manchester United. Unfortunately for the Red Devils, the Uruguayan is always in top form in the round of 16 when the stadium is not at all friendly to him.
Suárez scored twice for Barcelona in the 2014/15 round of 16 at Manchester City, and he was also able to celebrate for the Catalans against Arsenal the following year. Let’s see if he can now – after a small drop in performance – pick up on old times again.
Of course, Sébastien Haller is the absolute superstar at Ajax this season, as the former Frankfurter has scored in each of his seven games, eleven times in total.
But the Dutch have a few other highly talented players in their ranks, so far the traditional club has scored an impressive 22 goals in seven games. Playmaker Dušan Tadić and winger Antony, for example, who has already scored five goals, played a large part in the success. Should Benfica be able to take the two out of the game, Haller could perhaps be slowed down and that would be more than half the battle.
Roberto Baggio, David Trezeguet, Alessandro Del Piero, Cristiano Ronaldo… the Old Lady has always had great strikers in her ranks. There are now many indications that Dušan Vlahović could follow in the footsteps of his prominent predecessors.
Like Baggio, Vlahović came from Fiorentina and like the gifted pigtailer, the Serb hit the ground running. He has scored four times in six games since his January transfer.
In the first leg in Villarreal, the 22-year-old needed just 33 seconds to score, and he shouldn’t score much faster in the second leg either.
Mendy a (too) high hurdle for LOSC?
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Recovering from a 2-0 defeat in the second leg in Europe isn’t impossible, but it’s made more difficult when you’re up against a classy man like Edouard Mendy.
In his 18 Champions League games to date, Mendy has kept 14 clean sheets and has only been defeated once in his six games this season – in the only game in which he did not play, the Blues conceded three goals.
So Lille coach Jocelyn Gourvennec has his hopes pinned on his strikers Jonathan David and Burak Yılmaz, who have scored five goals so far this season.
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