Translated material
Italian robbery
Zenit lost in the debut match of the Champions League to Juventus
On the second day of play, a peaceful atmosphere reigned in the Champions League. Half of Wednesday's matches ended in a draw. Zenit could also take part in concluding peace agreements. However, Alessandro Del Piero's long-range free kick, combined with an error by goalkeeper Vyacheslav Malafeev, spoiled the St. Petersburg club's debut in the main European tournament and brought Juventus a 1:0 victory.Group "N". “This is a typically Italian victory: making the most of the fewest chances,” Zenit head coach Dick Advocaat commented on the result of the match in Turin. And his colleague Claudio Ranieri gladly agreed with this assessment. His Juvenuts, having returned to the Champions League two years after the scandalous exile to Serie B, proved that they have not lost their class, and veterans Buffon, Nedved, Trezeguet, Salihamidzic and Del Piero are still quite competitive on the European stage.
At the decisive moment, this advantage in class decided the fate of the match. Even though the “old lady” was a little clumsy on Wednesday, she closely followed her young opponent, not allowing Zenit to do too much. And when the chance arose to punish the guests for a loss of concentration, Del Piero used it one hundred percent: Malafeev was not ready for his long-range free kick in the 76th minute - 1:0. And although Zenit, which played fairly well, still had time to correct something, Juve’s players did not allow themselves the luxury of parting with the advantage they had gained with such difficulty.
In the second match of the group, Real Madrid did not allow themselves to relax in the match against the Belarusian BATE. As a result, both the eminent hosts and the modest guests, who set themselves the task of not losing badly, were satisfied with the score 2:0.
In Group E, the teams playing away were much luckier. Denmark's best team, Aalborg, for example, managed to do something that no one had been able to do in the group stage of the Champions League for two years - take points from Glasgow from Celtic's home stadium. The Celts stormed the visitors' goal almost the entire game, but they almost ran into a retaliatory strike. And even removing Beauchamp in 10 minutes. before the end of the meeting did not prevent Aalborg from getting a draw.
Villarreal also managed to return from visiting with a gift from Manchester United. Europe has not yet forgotten how three years ago the modest Spanish “yellow submarine” surfaced in the semi-finals of its debut Champions League. Then, by the way, Villarreal also started their tournament journey in Manchester, and also achieved a 0:0 draw with Manchester United. This time the Spaniards could have taken three points if Guillermo Franco had sent the ball into the net rather than the post in the second half.
In the central match of Group F, Lyon was happy with the draw with Fiorentina. Gilardino's double put the French champions in a very awkward position. To get out of it, the hosts had to give up the unspoken rules of Fair play - when Piquion scored the first return goal, he would have been offside if the injured Fiorentina defender had not been lying on the lawn for quite some time at that moment. Lyon managed to finish off the demoralized opponent, and if the hosts had been a little luckier, they would have taken a full three points.
Just like Fiorentina, Dynamo Kiev lost their advantage in the Group G match against Arsenal in the last minutes. Yuri Semin's team only needed a couple of minutes to break the long winless streak in the Champions League, which has lasted since November 2004 and now totals 14 matches. But in any case, now Dynamo looked much more serious than last year, when the Kiev team lost all six group stage meetings.