Barstool’s Champions League Preview – The “Let The Quarterfinalpalooza Commence” Edition
Sam’s Soccer Safe Space For Stoolies
Hi haters,
Welp, the field has been whittled down to eight clubs. Are they the eight best clubs? Maybe not. Are they the eight most deserving clubs? Absolutely.
The current odds for each are as follows:
No big surprises there, with Juventus’ comparatively long odds relative to, say, Dortmund being the direct result of (a) not having any Babyjesus’s on their team and (b) being matched up against Messi/Suarez/Neymar. But we can dive into the details in a minute. First let’s take a moment and enjoy a little masturbation for the soul:
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CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
This full schedule for the home-and-homes coming up this week and next:
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TUESDAY’S PICKS
Juventus [+160]
Barcelona [+170]
Draw [+225]
Wow. This is about as good as it gets. Many of you might recall these clubs playing in the UCL final a couple years ago, and there are a lot of stylistic similarities between then and now. Barcelona goes balls to the wall and usually relies on MSN to overpower opponents, whereas Juve takes a more measured approach.
In other respects though this time around will be very different than in the spring 2015. In that game Barcelona came in as the dominant squad on paper and looked the part on the field, controlling most facets of the game and forcing Juventus to find a way to frustrate the Catalans, pinning their hopes on being able to nick something on the counter – and it almost worked. The 3-1 final score line was not representative of how closely the game was fought.
Put simply: Juventus is probably better than they were then; Barcelona is definitely not as good as they were then.
The one place where Juventus has taken a step back is in the midfield due to the losses of guys like Paul Pogba (pre-United version) and Arturo Vidal, but Fatboy Higuain gives the club a force up top that they were sorely lacking last time. As for Juve’s defense, its Juve’s defense. They are like Gardetto’s – they’ve been so good for so long that you sometimes forget how great they are.
As for Barcelona, you can look at the comeback for the ages against PSG in one of two ways: 1) they are now the team of destiny (sorry Foxes) and will ride the wave to yet another Champions League title… or 2) the Parisians exposed them for having more holes than usual before collapsing in epic style.
I am firmly in the second camp on this. A player like Andre Gomes wouldn’t even sniff the field for Barça teams of old, and injuries on the right side to Aleix Vidal and Rafinha has left weaknesses on both edges. What’s more, Busquets’ suspension (assuming Mascherano doesn’t get the start) leaves the team will be without a notorious flopper but also some necessary grit in the middle of the field. Iniesta, for all his genius, just doesn’t bring that to the table.
And if there is one thing you can count on it is that Higuain will be hungry. That boy is always hungry*.
Juventus to win 2-1.
Fun fact: two players who have yet to score on one another
*except when playing for Argentina, as if that needed saying
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Dortmund [-170]
Monaco [+400]
Draw [+375]
One team has a young player that other teams are fawning over and are busily scraping together every last nickel they have to buy this summer… and the other has Kylian Mbappe. (And if you think I’m talking about [the other] Mousa Dembele you can go F your own B.)
Joshing aside these clubs are the poster-children for youth systems and scouting. Both do more with less year in and year out than almost any team in Europe, perhaps the world, though at the same time they are perennial selling clubs where the Bayern’s and PSG’s (among many, many others) stop by every summer to restock their war chest of ridiculous talent. Somebody is going to pay a gazillion for Mbappe this summer, and somebody else is going to pay almost as much for Dembele, and Liverpool is going to buy Pulisic for buttload (source: every Liverpool fan). And that’s just sort of par for the course for these teams. It’s pretty ridiculous when you really think about it – both the amount of talent Monaco and Dortmund hemorrhage on an annual basis and the fact Liverpool think they are gonna get CP10 (I hope).
Anyway, the Juve/Barça game is going to attract 90% of the attention but this game is going to be where the action is at. Whereas the first leg in Turin will likely end up being a rather “restrained” affair, Dortmund and especially Monaco are allergic to boring games. The French side has scored 88 goals – EIGHTY EIGHT – in league play, which is more than any team save for the aforementioned Barcelona. If you’re scoring as much as a team with Messi, Suarez and Neymar (even if its a JV league) that is still pretty damn impressive.
The big question then is whether BVB’s defense can handle it. Watching them crumple like Big Sean after a wind sprint against Bayern last weekend was not a pretty sight. The Babyjesus may (eventually) be able to walk on water, but he can’t play defense and offense at the same time.
Point being: if you have been riding that Over Train (Choo Chooooo) to riches all season in the Champions League – and it has been pretty lucrative of late, I’m told – you’d be a damn fool to hop off now. This one should have goals galore, especially since Monaco’s best defender Tiemoue Bakayoko is suspended for the first leg.
Should be a crazy game but after all is said and done I’m going 3-3 draw.
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Boom, briefest Champions League blog ever posted on barstool SPORTS today. More UCL tomorrow. Stay woke. #Blessed
PS- why does nobody talk about this?
Holler,
Samuel Army