A Quarter Final Draw

Before anyone dreams of playing in the 63,000 ticketed Madrid stadium that belongs to Athletico Madrid for the Champions League Final, they must first navigate two more rounds of the competition in order to play there.  After today's Champions League draw the fans of Manchester City and Liverpool have the most to smile about.  While City did not want an English team, at least that English team was neither neighbours Manchester United or Lancashire rivals Liverpool.

Ordinarily a Spurs fan can watch today's draw and know that their team will be disposed off by a very well financed and paid Manchester City side,  but the X-Factor in this game will be the 62,000 tickets for the first leg at Tottenham, which will be the first ever European tie to be played at their costly but gorgeous new stadium that replaces White Hart Lane.  That home-coming will give the Tottenham players a mighty lift to finally playing at their new home ground.

The key to the 1st leg game is two fold, Spurs need two goals and even if they get those two goals, they must not concede at home.  The moment that City score, that all important way goal will loom very large, especially since Tottenham are not expected to win at Manchester City in the return leg the week after in mid-April.  What should concern City is that even if they win as they are expected to win against Tottenham, their next Premier League home game is Tottenham again. 

This means that Manchester City may win the battle but still lose the war and that war is against Liverpool about who will lift the Premier League Title.  For sure these quarter-finals prove one thing, that the Premier League is now undoubtedly the strongest league in Europe, with all four British teams progressing to the Quarter-Final stage.   The problem now is for the German federation who did not have a single one of their teams get into the last eight. 

All three German teams were beaten by English opposition, Shalke demolished by Manchester City,  Tottenham making short work of Borussia Dortmund and Liverpool winning emphatically away to Bayern Munich.  Now in the Quarter-Final stage one cannot underestimate either Barcelona or Juventus.  There can easily be a repeat final between these two juggernauts.  It can equally be a repeat of the 1985 final between Liverpool and Juventus which was tragic.