Will Atlético interrupt Tuchel's unbeaten run?
Thomas Tuchel's start at Chelsea was exemplary.
When he took over as head coach, the North London team was in a fever.
Meaningful games were replaced by faceless ones, the defense made mistakes of inexplicable nature, which led to the loss of points, and the cohesion of the team was continually broken by the players' dissatisfaction.
It took the German one and a half months to put things in order - during this time Chelsea have never lost.
10 out of 12 meetings took place in the Premier League, and now, before repeating Maurizio Sarri's record for the duration of an unbeaten debut series, the German specialist has two more to resist.
However, much more important for Tuchel is the victory over Atlético in the first leg of the Champions League playoffs.
After all, his team scored the ball in a foreign field and kept their own goal clean.
For the current Chelsea, which allows only two shots on target on average per evening, this is a colossal backlog.
And an excellent springboard for reaching the quarterfinals of the tournament for the first time since the 2013/14 season.
Since then, the “aristocrats” have had a chance to do it four times in two-series confrontations, but have invariably stumbled (three draws and five defeats in total).
However, home matches at the European arena in the knockout round format have always turned into a test for Londoners.
As soon as one of the representatives of the top continental championships turned out to be rivals, Chelsea invariably missed.
In the top 16, this streak has already lasted six matches (since February 25, 2009).
And better than under Tuchel, there will probably not be a moment to interrupt it.
Moreover, Atlético in England seems to forget how to play football.
During the evening at the island stadiums, the team from Madrid strikes only 3.5 shots on target - and this is too little to catch Eduard Mendy, who has gained excellent shape, by surprise.
And the tactical manipulations of the mentor Diego Simeone, who is always cautious in big matches, impoverish the attacking power of the Spaniards.
Remember at least the first match against Chelsea: in it, Atlético, acting without the ball, sent six players to the defense at once!
While on someone else's alignment did not strike at all.
Tuchel, however, is also a fan of wisdom - and this is not always a plus for the team.
For example, over the weekend, Kai Havertz played the entire match against Leeds as a striker.
And since the meeting ended with a score of 0: 0 (the team of Marcelo Bielsa did not finish matches in 19 rounds in a row in a draw!), We can conclude that the German failed to cope with the task.
In addition, rotation in the middle of the field now and then unsettles only Londoners who have played well in the interactions.
Nevertheless, on Wednesday, the latest experimentation will serve Chelsea well.
After all, the key attacking midfielder Mason Mount and his potential replacement Jorginho will miss the meeting due to the bust of yellow cards.
And Tammy Abraham and Thiago Silva will not perform due to injuries.
Atletico has no one on sick leave.
But that hardly makes the red and white favorites.
First, their opponents will be a team that does not miss five meetings in a row (and seven of the last eight).
And even with the longest of the uninterrupted unbeaten run in Europe.
And secondly, with the organization of the attack, even in optimal combinations, Simeone's team is in trouble.
Take the past round Examples, where Madrid's expected goals (XG) system have scored 1.82 goals in the away meeting against Getafe.
In fact, they could not upset the outsider even once.
The opposite example is the match against fellow countrymen from Real Madrid at the beginning of the month, when an early goal from Luis Suarez promised victory.
But in the 88th minute, a defensive error due to fatigue resulted in a goal by Karim Benzema.
The swing of volatility and instability is the essence of Atlético's season.
Because of this, only four points remain from the promising gap in the national championship, and 0: 1 in the first match against Chelsea threatens the Spaniards with a departure from the Champions League next evening.
Moreover, the main scorer of the team, Luis Suarez, has not distinguished itself in the away matches of the Champions League since September 2015.
How many times will Bayern Munich upset Lazio at home?
A week ago, Lazio striker Ciro Immobile finally received the Golden Boot award for the top scorer of the past season in the European leagues.
And that was the best news for the Romans in the spring.
After all, even the victory over Crotone in the last weekend round did not really work out to be happy: having scored the team that closes Serie A three times, the team of Simone Inzaghi conceded two goals.
Moreover, from not the most stellar Nigerian Nwankwo Simi - for the first time in his career, he brought the score to a dozen goals per season in the elite.
If we add these accurate shots to the three similar ones performed by Juventus and throw in a couple more from Bologna, then March is most appropriate to call catastrophic for the defenders of Lazio.
After all, such a low efficiency of their actions led to the departure of the Romans from the European competition zone in the national championship.
And the terrible match at the Stadio Olimpico against Bayern in the 1/8 finals of the Champions League practically nullified the chances of qualifying for the next stage.
After home 1: 4, any team in the return leg would have had a difficult time, and the Romans are now not in the best condition.
Not only is the team on the decline (before the meeting with Crotone, Inzaghi's players lost in three Serie A matches out of four), but also the best team on the continent in rivals at the international level.
In it, Robert Lewandowski does not calm down, who between the matches with Lazio, hammered six goals in three meetings of the Bundesliga - and came out on the second place in the list of the best scorers of the tournament in history.
Next to him, Serge Gnabry and Leon Goretskaya caught the scoring courage, having scored a total of five times in the same segment of the national championship.
And even the fact that seven matches in a row at the Allianz Arena Manuel Neuer does not leave the field “dry” Munich does not bother.
When the team's average performance is over 3.5 goals per night, defense can really be neglected.
268 - @lewy_official (@FCBayernEN) scores his 268th Bundesliga-goal drawing level with Klaus Fischer - only Gerd Müller has scored more goals in Bundesliga history.
Hunt.
# SVWFCBpic.twitter.com / BVhuPjCo5b
- OptaFranz (@OptaFranz) March 13, 2021
The only hope for the Romans to provoke a sensation remains a quick goal and an equally rapid development of success.
However, in the current Champions League, if they had time to do anything before the break, it was to miss it - this happened in all the away matches of the tournament.
In addition, on a visit, they lost four of their last five meetings.
And according to this trend, Allianz Arena is not at all the best choice for the next voyage.
It could have made the life of Italians a little easier if the rivals were under-tuned, but Bayern midfielder Leroy Zane breaks this hope too:
“You have to be well prepared for any Champions League match and tune in properly.
We all understand that the duel with Lazio is not over yet.
Suppose we won the first match 4: 1, but a ticket to the quarterfinals is not in our pocket yet.
Lazio is very strong, and if we do not take this game seriously, then irreparable things can happen. "
The German mentor Hansi Flick also speaks of the desire to achieve success in the return match.
According to him, the team is on the move and is unlikely to slow down, given the fact that it will play at home, and the victory will further increase self-confidence.
Although where else to increase this confidence, if in the first match against Lazio one of the main stars of the evening was Jamal Musyala, who at the age of 17 made his debut in the knockout round of the tournament, scored there with an accurate shot and became the second most youthful scorer in the playoffs tournament?
With such a reserve, Flick can rotate the composition actively and painlessly.
Even losses in the person of Manuel Lazzari and Luis Felipe will affect Lazio seriously - and significantly limit the combinational system of Inzaghi's team.