The show is on!

The 2010-11 Champions League started today with some exciting matches, but let us start with the boring ones: Manchester United was unable to score against Glasgow Rangers in the only goalless draw today, while FC Copenhagen are happy that they opened by defeating Rubin Kazan 1-0 on a late goal.
The defending champions of Inter Milan opened with a 2-2 against the Dutch champs of Twente, while Tottenham also managed to get a 2-2 against Werder Bremen in Germany. Olympique Lyon defeated Schalke 04 1-0, while Benfica defeated Hapoel Tel Aviv 2-0 in Lisbon.

But I think the most interesting matches involved the Spanish sides.
Valencia has been away from the Champions League for two seasons, and were to return by playing away against the Turkish champions of Bursaspor. Valencia has started the Spanish league with two victories, and have looked solid in spite of the sale of their two stars this summer, David Villa (to Barcelona) and David Silva (to Manchester City) the club has looked solid and some of its new players, such as Aritz Aduriz and Tino Costa have looked very solid. Indeed, tonight they looked frightening as they completely demolished the Turkish champions: a 0-4 away victory is something to notice in the CL, and both Aduriz and Costa scored. Valencia is starting the season well, and we can only know they continue!
Barcelona fell to Hercules this weekend, and when Panathinaikos went ahead in today's match in the Camp Nou, some people surely felt a crisis, but only for a couple of minutes; Barcelona, and in particular Lionel Messi and Xavi were spectacular. Brilliant passes and combinations will surely be giving nightmares to the Greeks. Messi's goal for 3-1 was brilliant, but so was Dani Alvez 5-1 goal, after a brilliant pass by Messi. Also, David Villa scored his first CL goal in his Barcelona shirt, and Barcelona is surely looking frightening after today!
But at least the show has started!

Champions League 2009-10 Qualifiers

Panathinaikos and Atlético Madrid played a marvelous 1st leg qualifying match for the Champions League, which was a great preview for the CL. In Athens, Atlético Madrid showed its attacking force and with goals by Maxi Rodriguez, Diego Forlán and Sergio "Kun"Agüero, won a very useful 3-2 against a Panathinaikos side that will surely be a qualitative asset in the Europa League (or of course, in the CL if the manage to get a highly improbable two-goal victory in Madrid!).

After watching such quality from these two teams, any football fan would have to wonder why in the world either Atlético Madrid or Panathinaikos have to be out, when either FC Copenhagen or Apoel Nicosia will be there... In their dead-boring 1st leg match FC Copenhagen won 1-0 at home, and I think anyone should only watch the 2nd leg match if they have sleeping problems.

Not many people have been noticing that after Real Madrid and Manchester City, Olympique Lyon have been the team most investing in new players this summer, after losing some of their former stars, Juninho and Benzema. And some of these new players showed that Olympique Lyon is again a team to count on this season: Lisandro Lopez, Miralem Pjanic and Bafe Gomis all scored in Lyon's 5-1 victory against Anderlecht. It will surely be interesting to watch the French team this season!

Arsenal won an important 0-2 away victory against Celtic in Glasgow, and the youngsters will again be facing a season in the CL, where they can surely defeat anyone on a good day.

Sporting Lissabon and Fiorentina tied 2-2 in Lissabon, in a match where the Portuguese were left with ten men after Simon Vukcevic was red carded because he took his shirt off when celebrating his equalizing goal to 1-1. Still, Sporting managed to go ahead, before Gilardino equalized to 2-2 for Fiorentina, giving them a good result before the 2nd leg in Italy.

Otherwise, a number of other teams seem well on their way to the Champions League after important away victories in their 1st leg qualifiers: VFB Stuttgart (defeated Poli AEK Timisoara 0-2), FC Zurich (defeated Ventspils 0-3), Debrecen (defeated Levski Sofia 1-2) and Maccabi Haifa (defeated Red Bull Salzburg 1-2).

The Champions League is underway, and after a summer without football and watching a great match tonight, I cannot wait for it to start!

Michael Laudrup to Panathinaikos?

Michael Laudrup has always been one of my favourite players, and as coach, first in Brøndby and then in Getafe, he has also proved a highly qualified football personality.
Since announcing his leaving of Getafe a few weeks ago, there has been widespread speculation of where he would be coaching, and he has on-off been connected to Benfica, Sevilla and FC Barcelona. I have no idea how serious these rumours have been, but now it seems confirmed that Mr. Laudrup will be going to the Greek club, Panathinaikos, replacing the Portuguese José Peseiro.
While I think many fans would have liked to see Mr. Laudrup in one of the bigger clubs in Spain or England, Panathinaikos will no doubt be a challenge: the Greek fans are passionate, and there is great competition in the league which for the last four seasons have been won by Olympiacos (must be mentioned that the Greek league has been a pretty one-sided affair since 1997: Olympiacos has won every year, with the exception of 2004, when Panathinaikos won their last title).
There is no doubt that Mr. Laudrup will be under pressure to bring Panathinaikos back to the title, and that will be a challenge I wish him the best of luck with!