Inter Milan 0 AC Milan 1 (Agg: 0-3) (abd)
Assuming today’s result stands, AC Milan have made the final four of this year’s Champions League, Tuesday’s clash at the San Siro having been abandoned when AC Milan keeper Dida (above) was struck by a flare thrown from the Inter fans’ end of the ground. Said incident comes days after ugly scenes at Livorno’s Serie A match at Lazio led to governemnt threats of closed stadiums.
(Drogba – flying towards a title or 2)
Bayern Munich 3, Chelsea 2 (agg : 5-6)
With the Blues muscling their way into the semi-final (and doing so with the suspended Jose Mourinho watching from the hotel TV) ,Henry Winter assails the Geramn club in this morning’s Telegraph.
All those observations by Oliver Kahn that English teams struggle overseas (rather ignoring a certain 5-1 result here) resembled mere hot air as Bayern attacks largely foundered on the twin rocks that were Carvalho and Terry. All those claims from Michael Ballack that he and his team, strengthened by the return of Pizarro and Roy Makaay, would score four were mocked by the outstanding Claude Makelele, who patrolled the area in front of Chelsea’s back four with intelligence and unremitting zeal.
Baverian criticism that Mourinho’s side relied overly on the long ball to Drogba rang hollow on the half-hour as Chelsea built stealthily towards goal. William Gallas made good ground down the left. Nothing hurried, nothing rash. Gallas took care of the ball, eventually slipping it inside to Cole. The small but perfectly in-form England international is the antithesis of the long-ball philosophy; here he dribbled along the edge of Kahn’s penalty box, ignoring a chance to go down when fouled before laying the ball off to Lampard. Why Martin Demichelis was not tracking such a deadly finisher from range is a matter for Felix Magath’s post-mortem examination.
The second leg of Juventus & Liverpool’s quarterfinal tie will be telecast tomorrow at 2:30pm EST on ESPN2.