Snapshot: Messi Hair

By: Jan | October 3rd, 2007

Lionel Messi and Fernando Meira Here’s Lionel Messi fighting for the ball against Fernando Meira during Stuttgart’s Champions League match against Barcelona yesterday. Barcelona won the match 2-0. I only saw 10 minutes worth of highlights from the match, but going by the media response, it was a deserved victory, although Stuttgart had a couple of great chances at the end of the first half and the beginning of the second half. Who knows how things would have developed, had Stuttgart taken the lead against the run of play. For more in depth match impressions check out Kevin Fylan’s blog post over at the Reuters Blog. The more surprising result though happened in France, where the Glasgow Rangers beat Lyon 3-0. That means Barcelona and the Rangers sit comfortably on top of the group with six points each, while Stuttgart and Lyon share the bottom end with zero points each. Very difficult situation for Stuttgart who might hope (just like Lyon might do the same), that Barcelona wins their next two matches against the Rangers, while Stuttgart does the same against Lyon or vice versa. Otherwise, the next two matchdays will at least allow one of the two underachievers, to put themselves in a better position for the 3rd place and thus the UEFA Cup as a small consolation price.

Tonight, Champions League action resumes with Werder Bremen vs Olympiakos Piräus and Trondheim vs Schalke. And interesting news are coming from the Bremen squad list for the match, as it includes Tim Borowski, Torsten Frings and Boubacar Sanogo. Whether they’ll actually play isn’t clear yet though. What makes me a bit nervous is Tim Wiese’s injury, which means he’ll definitely miss the match tonight and his replacement Christian Vander, is neither known as a promising young talent, nor a keeper with a decent Bundesliga pedigree. Piräus might want to exploit that.