Never Tell Me the Odds

By: Richard | September 28th, 2009

Hello to everyone I’m Rich and new to The Offside. Introductions aside lets get down to business and talk about the upcoming match at the Bernabeu. I follow both teams pretty evenly but I desperately want to see Marseille come away with points on this trip. Lets face it, if we want to keep our dream in Europe alive we need to get something from this bottom line. Looking back at our first CL match against Milan, we were a team still struggling to find our footing. Arguably the only part of our squad that had come together was our back four. Lucho was still coming off injury, Morientes said it himself that he was nowhere near 100 percent, and Brandao was simply running around the pitch knocking into people. Flash forward to our past game against Valenciennes, and I firmly believe that this team is as prepared as it can be to face Los Galacticos. Here’s why its important to remember that this is our first loss. It was bound to happen and its not as if we didn’t put up a fight. So now we have that off our shoulders we can fully concentrate on Madrid.

What plagued us in the beginning of the season was our inability to score goals (does anyone remember the horrible draw against Rennes?). Weeks ago Niang was the only one at the team scoring getting very little outside help. Now players like Lucho and Morientes seem in form and even Brandao is contributing (albeit with assists but its baby steps with Brandao). From the Madrid point of view this is a side that scores often and plenty. I’m going to be a realist here and say there is no way we can go punch for punch with this team. What I’m saying is we can’t play to their style,if we do then it’s over (cough cough Zurich). For you boxing fans out there think Ali vs Foreman, for those unfamiliar I’ll explain. When the two fought Foreman was the clear favorite, he was younger and stronger than Ali. Yet during the match Ali literally put himself up against the ropes allowing the stronger Foreman to continuously hit him, in fact Ali welcomed the barrage. After rounds of being on the defense and taking hit after hit, Ali countered ferociously. The exhausted Foreman having wasted all his energy, could do little to stop the counter resulting in Ali’s surprise victory.

Transform that to football terms – if we play a defense oriented game against Madrid, abandoning the 4-3-3- that Deschamps loves in exchange for a 4-2-3-1 we can achieve a tie and perhaps even victory. Allow Madrid to play into a defensive trap so to say, does anyone remember Chelsea last year at Camp Nou? Same principle simply frustrate the hell out of them defensively. Let Niang play alone up front, we know he has the speed and versatility to handle it. Putting Brandao in say in a 4-4-2 will be a waste, he will be outclassed by the likes of Albiol and Pepe I guarantee that. Our usual back four of Bonnart, Diawara, Heinze, and Taiwo will suffice. For our midfield have Lucho play AMF, Mbia and Cisse play the defensive role. On the sides have Cheyrou take the left side while giving Valbuena the right. I opt for Valbuena simply for his speed and play maying abilities over say Abriel or Ben Arfa.

Analogies and skepticism aside this is going to be the hardest match we have played the entire season. Agree or disagree but Madrid is perhaps the best team in the world right now. It will take all we have and then some to get a good result. When we went against Milan we were the underdog. Yet there was a minority that said Marseille may draw or even even win. The mood now though is that we have no chance to pick up jack squat. With so many expecting nothing from us we literally have nothing to lose. So lets make some headlines come Wednesday and surprise the football world. Play to our strengths and we just might come away with something.