[NoSkillz]

Wed. November 3, 2021

UEFA Champions League - Group Stage
CSKA Moscow (0-1-2, 1 points, 4th) vs. Dover (1-2-0, 5 points, 2nd)
CSKA-Peschanoye, Moscow, Russia

Betting Odds: CSKA Moscow: 4-5 (Favourites) Draw: 2-1 Dover: 3-1
Past Meetings: 0W 1D 0L

This is pretty much a must-win game for Moscow, as they are languishing at the bottom of Group F. They continue to run away with their league, as they hold a seven point advantage on Spartak Moscow with three games left on their schedule. This is the weakest opponent in our group and it would be great to get a win here but they played us very tough a few weeks back at home to earn the draw.

With Andrea Rocca hurt, Mancini will come into midfield in his place. We'll go with two strikers up front and Giorgos Gesios will once again get a chance to contribute. I'm going to start with a control mentality to try to get an early lead and can revert to a counter attack later in the game.

Dover: 4-4-2 Control
GK - I. Wilke
D - R. Gaucho, P. Tjiuoro, R. Hamon, S. Loucif
M - A. Bamba, Mancini, N. Cairney, G. Bolis
S - S. Andrea, G. Gesios
Bench - Y. Sylla, J. Kuciak, C. Contreras, S. Spall, S. Nasri, K. Kalfas, Z. Bardi

Moscow is in a flat 4-4-2 formation. I reinforce that this is a winnable game and pull aside Gesios, Cairney and Mancini to tell them I have faith in them, as all three have only "good" morale right now.

3' - UGH. We lose possession at midfield and they work up the left side. A cross comes into the box and Paulus Tjiuoro AGAIN is outworked for the ball and it's a sliding Lamine Thiam, the Moscow striker, putting it into the net for the quick goal. A second consecutive game where we give up an early one. CSKA MOSCOW GOAL 0-1

7' - Moscow almost score again off a corner, as Wilke makes a spectacular diving stop off a header.

17' - We are looking terrible…very disjointed with no flow to our game.

Nothing but shots from distance. HORRIBLE!

HALFTIME - They hold 56% of possession and outshoot us 11-5 (2-0 on target). We're generating NOTHING. I peel paint in the dressing room and tell the players I expect a result here and want no excuses. I'll narrow up our formation a bit in a sideline shout as well, as the field is narrow.

46' - We get our first chance of the game, as Gesios sends a great through ball to the usually reliable Shanon Andrea. He's in all alone and shoots WOEFULLY WIDE. WTF?!

52' - I switch to a counter attack mentality due to the narrow field.

55' - Gianluca Bolis is hurt and needs to come off. Kostas Kalfas is in.

58' - Mancini with a yellow card.

67' - Still nothing. My God. Moscow get a shot from distance and Wilke makes a great save.

70' - Wholesale changes. Zoltan Bardi comes on for Shanon Andrea and Samir Nasri is on for Mancini. We move to Overload.

73' - Yellow card for Renato Gaucho.

75' - We're finally showing some urgency with our ball movement and pressing. Zoltan Bardi gets off a shot from the edge of the area and Akinfeev, the Moscow keeper, makes a save.

76' - Salim Loucif with a yellow.

78' - Ingo Wilke makes a SENSATIONAL diving stop off a free kick.

81' - We move swiftly up field and Kalfas gets the ball into Bardi. His quick shot is turned behind the net by Akinfeev, setting up a corner. We do nothing with it then Gesios gets a yellow card. God. Gesios will be suspended in his next match for yellow card accumulation.

Nothing again.

CSKA Moscow 1 - 0 Dover
Goals -
Assists -
Man of the Match - Bakary Sako (CSKA Moscow ML - 7.4)
Other Dover Notables - Ingo Wilke (7.1), Salim Loucif (7.1), Paulus Tjiuoro (7.0), Renato Gaucho (7.1)
Attendance - 23,236

Can we miss Wayne Rooney this much?? Does his influence effect our game to this extent? We simply can't score and we're in big trouble in Champions League play now, as we'll definitely need a win against Schalke by the looks of it if we're to advance to the next stage. Our last twenty minutes saw us hold most of possession but Moscow just stayed back and gave us nothing. We ended up edging them on possession, holding the ball for 51% of the game but they outshot us 18-11 (5-2 on target). I tell the team I'm disappointed in their efforts.

-- Barring a complete collapse, Barcelona is through to the next round, as they defeated Schalke. Moscow moves into third place with the win over our club but I'd still say things are between us and Schalke for that coveted second place position.

-- As indicated above, Giorgos Gesios will miss our next Champions League game against Barcelona due to yellow card accumulation.

-- Gianluca Bolis will miss a couple weeks with a groin strain.



U18 Team Update

-- We defeat Oxford 1-0, with striker Eddie Robinson scoring our only goal.



-- We have a Sunday match this week against Everton and that allows us to watch some Saturday contests. There are some incredible scores in these games: Chelsea beat Tottenham 4-3 in a wild game, Man City THROTTLES Aston Villa 6-0…and this is a Villa team that was in third place in the league until that point! Even better, mid-table Newcastle DESTROY Southampton 7-1 (!!), the same Southampton team that held us to a draw at Crabble Athletic Ground earlier this year. We're still fourth on the table but even a win won't propel us any higher, as we're three points back of 3rd place Sunderland and they have a much better goal differential than us.



Next Up

-- We try to get back into the win column against struggling Everton.