Bayern Munich CEO Oliver Kahn sparked controversy following he smiled at the result of the Champions League draw, following the Bavarian team faced Barcelona.
Oliver Kahn, the legendary Bayern goalkeeper who was present in the draw, has the right to smile, following the Bavarian team achieved the biggest loss in Barcelona’s history when they crushed it 8-2 in the quarter-finals of the 2019-2020 Champions League, then the two teams met in the group stage in last season’s edition. The Bavarians won the two matches, 3-0.
It is remarkable that even Yaya Toure, the former remorse of Barcelona, who drew the lottery, was resentful when he withdrew the name of the Catalan team along with Bayern.
But Barcelona supporters have their own opinion, as this is the best chance for revenge, as their squad has terrifying names, which Bayern and other European teams should fear.
By virtue of the presence of Bayern Munich in the first level and Barcelona in the second, the draw resulted in their falling into the same group, the third, which will be fiery with the presence of the Italian Inter as well, while the Czech Viktoria Plzen will be the weakest link.
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And the coincidence wanted to put the Polish striker Robert Lewandowski, who moved to Barcelona this summer, once morest his former team Bayern, who left him following defending his colors since 2014, and crowned him as the top scorer in the German League six times in the past seven seasons.
There is no doubt that the memories of the 2019-2020 meeting, which was held in a one-match gathering system in Portugal due to the Corona virus, will be present, when the Bavarian club achieved a historic result 8-2 on its way to the sixth title in its history at the expense of the French Paris St. Group H, next to the two-time champion, Juventus, to face his former wing, Argentine Angel Di Maria, who recently joined the Turin giants.
The group of the Parisian club dreaming of the title, led by the trio of Kylian Mbappe, the Brazilian Neymar and the Argentine Lionel Messi, and under the supervision of a new coach, Christophe Galtier, and Juventus also includes the two-time champions Benfica and the Israeli Maccabi Haifa.
“We are really happy to be here, to start this competition…This season, we give 200 percent in every game, in every training,” said Qatar’s PSG president Nasser Al-Khelaifi. We give everything we have game following game, until the end.”
“We don’t know where we will go (in the Champions League), but it is certain that everyone wants to go … as far as possible. The goal is to win every game, to stay focused and cool. I think this is very important.”
And regarding the team’s experience with its new coach, Galtier, who succeeded Argentine Mauricio Pochettino, Al-Khelaifi said, “We feel that something has definitely changed. It defined our team’s style of play, something has changed. But it’s only the beginning, we have a lot of work to do and a lot of things to work on. Only three matches have passed (in the local league) and the season is long.”
Easy group for the title holder
As for Real Madrid, which won its fourteenth title in the competition last season at the expense of Liverpool, it appears on paper that it is facing an easy task following it came in Group F alongside Leipzig of Germany, Shakhtar Donetsk of Ukraine and Celtic of Scotland.
As for his runner-up, Liverpool, who won the competition 6 times, the last of which was in 2019, he came in the first group with Ajax Amsterdam, Napoli of Italy and Rangers of Scotland.
“The first thing to say is that we are facing a real challenge,” Liverpool coach Jurgen Klopp said in a statement to the club’s website. All these clubs have quality… I can say that they all have a chance (to get the two group tickets to the final price). But the good thing is that we also have the opportunity and so it is logical to say that we are looking forward to the challenge and to test our fortunes.”
And signed Manchester City, the English Premier League champions, in Group G, along with Sevilla of Spain, Borussia Dortmund of Germany and Copenhagen of Denmark.
Like Lewandowski, the Norwegian striker Erling Haaland, who moved to Manchester City this summer, will face his former team, Borussia Dortmund, who also faces former players in his ranks who are currently defending the colors of the Premier League and Seville, namely Ilkay Gundogan and Denmark’s Thomas Delaney.
Dortmund coach Eden Terzic commented on the draw, saying: “We are looking forward to this group very much, although we certainly did not get the easiest teams… We played well once morest City and Seville not long ago and the performance was close. Copenhagen, as the Danish league champion, is also a challenge.”
“In this group we will once more see former Dortmund players such as Haaland, Gundogan and Delaney. We are really looking forward to seeing them.”
After winning the Italian league title for the first time since 2011, Milan hopes to regain something of its continental position that enabled it to win the Champions League seven times, the last of which was in 2007 at the expense of Liverpool, which dropped the Italian team in the famous 2005 final on the stage of the final of the current season, “Ataturk Olympic Stadium” Stadium” on penalties, following the English team was behind in the first half by three goals, before Steven Gerrard and his companions returned from afar to equalize 3-3.
The Lombardy team was signed in Group E alongside Chelsea, Austrian Red Bull Salzburg and Croatian Dinamo Zagreb, while Group D includes the “European League” champion Eintracht Frankfurt, Tottenham Hotspur, the 2019 summer, Sporting Portugal and Marseille, which remains so far the only French team to win the competition title in 1993 at the expense of Milan.
And the date is renewed for the second season in a row between Porto and Atletico Madrid, who signed in the second group, alongside Bayer Leverkusen, the very struggling German locally, and the champion of Belgium, Club Brugge.
With the World Cup in Qatar being held in the winter, the group stage program will be compressed, with the six stages taking place over two months, as the World Cup from November 20 to December 18 forced the European Union to hold all matches within nine weeks, starting from September 6.
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