Porto lost top scorers, Chelsea survived player brawl
Thomas Tuchel's great era at Chelsea ended last Saturday.
After the "honeymoon", which consisted of 14 matches in a row without defeat and only two conceded goals, the harsh life lowered the mentor together with the team from heaven to earth.
The penultimate Premier League team beat Stamford Bridge hosts 5: 2.
One can see in the failure a fatal coincidence: the early removal of Thiago Silva provoked the collapse of the game system of the capital's footballers.
Or believe Sam Allardyce, who insisted after the victory that special tactics had been developed for the opponent for three weeks.
And it was she who formed the basis of the sensational result.
However, the fact remains: the myth about the invincibility of the updated Chelsea is no longer there.
As well as the cloudless sky over West London: at the very first training session after the defeat, Antonio Rüdiger and Kepa Arrissabalaga fought.
So much so that the German was kicked out of class, after which he had to make an official apology.
For Porto, discord in the rivals' camp is great news.
After all, motivated and united by a common goal, the British cannot be beaten.
The Dragons are well aware of this: they have lost four of their last six meetings with representatives of the Premier League.
And on average, they conceded three goals per match.
In addition, the Portuguese remain the only team in the Champions League without registration in one of the top five European championships.
This does not seem to make them outsiders: the victory in the 1/8 finals over Juventus is a much more powerful argument in comparisons in the dispute.
But the problem is different.
Even elite rivals (such as, for example, Atletico Madrid), the team of Thomas Tuchel with the highest efficiency limited the attack.
The same Spaniards at the end of the previous stage reached an average of 2.5 shots on target per match.
And this is with João Felix, Luis Suarez and Yannick Ferreira-Carrasco in the attack.
“Porto” is not only not rich in star forwards, it will also be left without a couple of top scorers, Sergio Oliveira - Tarem Mendy, who miss the match due to disqualification.
There are also problems in the defense line.
Having 24 goals in passive after 25 rounds is already very close to the level of Braga, Santa Clara and Pacos de Ferreira, but not to Sporting and Benfica.
And against Chelsea it is definitely inadmissible to play defense in the way that Sergio Conceizau's team is used to.
The Portuguese pair are also considered outsiders because they have not made their way to the Champions League semifinals for 17 years, although they are regulars in the group stage.
Ironically, in 2004 they made their way into the quartet of the strongest teams in Europe under the leadership of Jose Mourinho, the coach who later led Chelsea in triumph.
Now at the head of the Portuguese is Conceição, who certainly hopes to repeat the success of his countryman predecessor.
To do this, he needs to defeat the Londoners: as history shows, as soon as Porto reach the semifinals of the continent's most prestigious tournament, the club will certainly win the trophy.
The Portuguese are also pleased with the choice of the arena by UEFA.
Due to restrictions, both quarterfinals will be played in Seville.
It was here that Porto won the UEFA Cup in 2003, beating Scottish Celtic 3: 2.
And once again, the “dragons” did not want to fly to England, because most often in the Champions League they were disappointed from meetings with local clubs.
However, now we are determined to break the tradition, which is confirmed by the club legend Vitor Baya: “We approach the confrontation with optimism and a desire to reach the semifinals.
We know the DNA of our team and our culture.
We can meet the requirements of matches of this scale. "
However, Thomas Tuchel, who took Paris Saint-Germain to the Champions League final last season, does not feel much reverence for his opponent.
If only because he inherited from Frank Lampard a team that plays excellently on the road.
Of the last 15 international matches outside Stamford Bridge, Londoners have lost only one.
Yes, and it was not shameful to lose, because in the return leg of the 1/8 finals of the Champions League 2020, the future winner of the tournament, Bayern Munich, took over the British.
In addition, Chelsea are extremely successful in Spain: the team has only one setback out of 13 recent trips.
Porto deservedly beat Juventus, with those two matches they made a serious claim.
Porto has a good combination of deep defense and high pressure.
They scored a lot and built a lot with Juventus.
This club has a rich tradition of winning playoffs.
This factor cannot be underestimated.
At the same time, we are confident that we are capable of passing Porto, insists Tuchel.
Bayern without Lewandowski and Gnabry, PSG without Verratti
On Saturday, Bayern Munich seemed to have solved the main problem of the season.
Having defeated Leipzig away, Hans-Dieter Flick's team broke away from the main pursuer in the Bundesliga by seven points and almost guaranteed the inviolability of their leadership position seven rounds before the finish.
But the quality of the champion's play left a very controversial impression.
And it's not just about possession of the ball.
Without Robert Lewandowski at the fore, completing the attacks was mediocre.
This was partly expected, because the Pole is a key player in the Munich system.
And therefore, over the past two seasons in the Bundesliga, he spent 94% of the maximum possible minutes on the field.
But on the other hand, the difficulties of replacing the forward in attack and the rearrangements caused by this situation have accumulated too many problems for the German champion.
Neither Thomas Müller, nor Leon Goretzka, nor Eric Shupo-Moting, who was put forward in the attack, did not really solve them.
But Serge Gnabry, who caught the coronavirus, will also miss both matches with the Parisians.
Problems with converting chances into goals for Bayern are fatal, because it is through active pressure on the other side that the Germans ensure their success.
This was the case in the Champions League final last year, when the team defeated PSG.
This is how events developed in the current season - since February 23, the team has won seven consecutive victories.
In the last dozen home matches, the Munich side distinguished at least twice in the evening.
And with Saturday's ball, Goretzka set a club record at all - 62 games from Munich did not leave the field without an accurate hit.
However, against the Ligue 1 champion, the usual pattern of action will definitely not work with maximum efficiency, even if Bayern have won nine of their last ten meetings against opponents from France.
One might get the impression that for PSG, circumstances are preparing an ideal site for revenge for last year's defeat in the final.
But the head coach of the team, Mauricio Pochettino, also has a reason for staff chagrin.
Due to the coronavirus, the match will be missed by Marco Verratti, a key performer in the center of midfield.
Its influence on the style of Parisians cannot be overestimated, since a footballer with the same high efficiency fulfills both his own and someone else's halves.
In addition, the Italian famously connects the main goalscorers of the team, Neymar and Killian Mbappe, which can be confirmed by analyzing, for example, the last seven away games of PSG.
In them, the champions of France won exclusively victories, including over such powerful rivals as Lyon and Barcelona.
True, the grand stumbled on Saturday.
Moreover, he lost at the home arena to Lille, the main competitor in the dispute over the national gold.
The minimal difference did not upset Pochettino as much as the quality of the team's play.
Only three hits on target out of 16 inflicted, the removal of Neymar in the end for unsportsmanlike behavior and substitutions that did not work at all are a combination of reasons that can ruin the life of any club.
And even more so the top, planning to break into the semi-finals of the Champions League by defeating the title holder.
Pochettino is alarmed by the lack of coordination in the actions of the defense.
In just one match out of five, PSG kept the goal intact.
Whereas Bayern, on the contrary, in the season never left the field without an accurate strike, thanks to which it remains undefeated in the Champions League.
The French in the current Champions League also decorate each match with a goal.
But is this a rational enough strategy - to challenge the Munich players to play in open football, the very team that won the tournament last season, winning each of the meetings held, and has not changed since then?
The fans will find out the answer in the very near future.