| Europe's
Premier cup competition (ha ha) is covered in a
haphazard manner by Sky Sports, Channel 5, and of
course Match of the Day, with home legs appearing
on Sky one week, and then away legs on Channel 5
or Match of the Day another. To be fair, the BEEB
got it right last season, successfully showing
the majority of Liverpool's run in the
tournament, even they did split one game between
BBC ONE and TWO because the kick-off was at 7pm
and it would mean cancelling doom and gloom in
East London and Charlie 'Ray Parlour' Dimmick
with a fascinating water feature. This year, Sky
have snatched all home games by Leeds and
Chelsea, leaving the BEEB and C5 to fight over
Ipswich Town and Aston Villa's expected short run
in the competition, with the odd Leeds away tie
on C5 where they get beat by Maritimo (ha ha).
Wed 08 May 2002 UEFA Cup Final Feyenoord 3-2 Borussia Dortmund Dutch team Feyenoord restored some pride to the Netherlands after the national team's failure to qualify for the World Cup, with victory in this five goal thriller to rival Liverpool's success in last year's UEFA Cup Final. The deadlock between the two was broken when veteran Kohler was dismissed for bringing down Tomasson in the area. Van Hooijdonk scored from the penalty spot, and doubled Feyenoord's advantage seven minutes later. Dortmund fought back hard, and were awarded a penalty themselves after the break, Amoroso scoring. Tomasson restored the Dutch advantage three minutes later, but Koller scored again for the Germans in the 58th minute to set up a tense finale. (20/04/02) UEFA Cup Final: Feyenoord v Borussia Dortmund- Whatever Ever Happened to the Tractor Boys? This years UEFA Cup Final will be contested by Feyenoord of the Netherlands and Borussia Dortmund of Germany on Wednesday 08 May 2002 (LIVE BBC TWO 19:30). To get this far, the two sides had to defeat Italian rivals Inter Milan and AC Milan respectively over two legs. An away goal in the first leg and a 2-2 draw at home was enough to see Feyenoord through against Inter, and Borussia Dortmund did enough in the first leg to see themselves through beating AC Milan 4-0 at home, despite losing 3-1 in the return match. But what happened to our glorious British sides that were strolling through the competition last we saw them? Predictably, a 1-0 first leg lead by Ipswich Town against Inter Milan way back in November wasn't enough to see them through, as the Tractor Boys were beaten 4-1 in the second leg making a 4-2 aggregate. Celtic went out at the first time of trying as they joined the Cup in Second Round after being eliminated from the Champions League. Here they lost 5-4 on penalties to Valencia at home after levelling the aggregate score at 1-1. Rangers made it as far as the fourth round where they were beaten 4-3 overall by Feyenoord. Leeds who had stuttered throughout the tournament as a shadow of the team who made the Champions League Semi-Final the year before, were eventually undone by an away goal by PSV also in the fourth round back in February (05/02/02) New Look UEFA Cup set for 2003 Europe's top clubs including Rangers, Celtic, Manchester United, Arsenal, and Liverpool; have agreed to UEFA proposals to restructure the UEFA Cup, cutting the number of clubs entering the competition from 96 to 64. The new look UEFA Cup will begin with a preliminary knock-out round, and the remaining 32 clubs will then enter a group stage akin to the Champions League. There are to be 8 groups in all, containing 4 clubs each, who will play each other home and away. Clubs that finish first and second will progress to the quarter final stage, which will retain the two legs of present, as well the semi-final stage. In recent years, teams who have finished 3rd in the Champions League first group stage, have dropped into the UEFA Cup. However this will no longer be the case under the new structure. The changes are likely to come into force for the 2003/4 campaign.
Thur Nov 22nd
The Tractor boys took on the mighty Inter Milan and thanks to a late Alun Armstrong strike, take a goal advantage into the away leg in Italy. For once Ipswich dominated the play at home, and may have felt they could have wrapped up the tie with at least another goal. So how are Ipswich's prospects in the away tie? We may never know as Channel 5 have beaten the BBC to the away coverage. Oh bollocks!
Thu Nov 1st At exactly 8:30pm, all three Engliah sides looked like they were going out of the UEFA Cup. Leeds UTD were drawing 5-5 on aggregate to UEFA Cup minows Troyes. Chelsea who had conceded two late goals away to Hapel Tel Aviv, went a further goal down at Stamford Bridge, meaning they'd need to score four to go through. And in Sweden, the hero of the first leg, Ipswich goalkeeper, Matteo Sereni put the Swedes in front early in the first half, when they shot a distance and Sereni had the ball fly through his hands and into the back of the net.
Much huffing and puffing on both sides followed, until Ipswich were finally able to take control of the game thanks to a Mark Venus free kick, latched onto by a Hermann Hreidarsson header sending the ball into the back of the net. 1-1. Enough to put Ipswich into the next phase. The temptation must have been there to sit back. Not the tractor boys. Within minutes they were awarded an identical free kick, which again resulted in a goal, Marcus Stewart making it 2-1. Then Stewart put the tie beyond doubt just before the end.
Leeds managed to go the extra distance to make it 6-5 on aggregate, but for Chelsea there was no going back. Throughout the match the visiting side had no more than 3 shots at goal, while Chelsea crowded the Tel Aviv goal mouth for much of the game, only once finding the back of the net. And I'd tipped them to go all the way. GAAHH!!
It seems you can't write off Hapel Tel Aviv, and as Gay Lineker said
"It just goes to show, you can never write off the Tractor Boys. Can you Alan?"
"No!" -Alan Hansen, who just 90 minutes ago had, er, written off the Tractor Boys
Thu
Oct 18th Oh bloody hell, not again! To be fair Ipswich started brightly and pegged their Swedish opponents back in their penalty area for the first fifteen minutes. Unfortunately as far as Ipswich were concerned, they may as well have sent all their forwards home after that, as it was all Helsingborgs for the remainder of the game. On the face of it, it'll be the Swedish fans and one Sven Goran Ericksson who went home knowing they should have netted at least a 2-0 win. Here's what was said on the night "I don't want to be too critical, but their passing was abysmal" -Alan Hansen, at half-time "You're trying to interupt me. I wonder why?" -Mark Lawrenson, slightly sarcastically to Lineker, as Sven pops in for a chat "Have you always been a lucky manager?" -Lawrenson to Sven "They're good those Swedish coahes!" -Gary Lineker, it ends goaless, but the visitors were by far the better side Elsewhere, Chelsea fell to two late goals in Tel Aviv after going down to 10 men for much of the second half. Not the expected result. Leeds should've massacred their opponents Troyes who put out Newcastle in the Intertoto Cup Final, but conceeded two away goals to finish 4-2. Thu
Sep 27th Oh my God. I have never been more bored in my entire life, and I was actually spared from watching much of the match. For 90 minutes there was the most gutless and spineless display imaginable from both sides. A late Villa goal in stoppage time levelled the aggregate score at 3 all from the first leg, but the damage by Varteks had already been done. How both sides had conjured up such a high scoring game in the first leg is beyond me. Anyway, we'll be spared anymore of Villa in the UEFA Cup, and I doubt it'll be long before Varteks go out. ...possibly by on of this lot as Ipswich beat Torpedo 2-1 to go through. Leeds gave Maritimo a battering they'll never forget, and Chelsea's 2 goal brace succeeded in inflecting more pain on their first round opponents to win the tie 5-0. An early tip to go all the way? Thu
Sep 20th As is the way with these things, the second leg is to be screened by good old Channel Fuzz (or Channel 5, if your one of the few lucky people able to pick it up on analogue). Anyway, Ipswich's European dreams and unbeaten home record looked in tatters as soon as the 14th minute thanks to a soft Torpedo goal (a contradiction, surely). In the second half, wave after wave of Ipswich attack, and Moscow's inability to retain the ball in midfield, finally paid dividends on the 86th minute when Titus Bramble (Ipswich missing a penalty earlier). With enough time left to hit the woodwork twice, Ipswich could've and probabaly should've won the game. An away goal at least will be needed to ensure progress to the next round. Elsewhere Leeds went down a goal to nil against a lowly Maritimo side, Villa were beaten 3-2 at home, and in fact only Chelsea managed a win at the Bridge (3-0). (12/09/01) All UEFA Cup and Champions League games including the Ipswich game with Torpedo Moscow scheduled to be screened on Match of the Day on Thursday 13th, have been postponed in a mark of respect to the victims of the terrorist attacks in the US. UEFA chief executive Gerhard Aigner said: "The scale of this tragedy and the pain and sorrow which it brings should cause us all to reflect. "UEFA feels it is right that the European football family should respect the loss and suffering now being felt by those families who have lost their loved ones by postponing all UEFA games scheduled to be played this week. "On behalf of UEFA I would like to send our condolences and deepest sympathies to all those who are in pain as a result of these terrible events." (13/09/01) It has been confirmed that all UEFA Cup ties will now be played on the 20th September. Early on in the season, last season's UEFA Cup winners met the Champions League winners to decide who was the best in Europe, and the game was live on Match of the Day... Fri
Aug 24th So it was 3-2 to the Scousers in the SuperCup. See Sparky's ego grow even larger! Time and time again the German defence was ripped apart by Owen and Heskey, for Liverpool to go into the break three goals up. Bayern Munich obviously felt hurt enough to strike back in the second half, to make the score 3-2, but Liverpool go home with their fifth trophy in 2001. Can it get any better than this? |
(31/12/01) BBC Sport/Match of the Day in for the Champions League???