Nicky Bandini on a bad night for Roma which saw them looking down the barrel of a Europa League exit at Leverkusen next week, while Atalanta are well in the tie against Marseille heading back to Bergamo.
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[00:02:05] And the other day you've had Patrick reporting live from the Jewish stadium
[00:02:10] in Birkhamon and tonight for the first leg of the Euroflex semi-finals
[00:02:15] you get me reporting from my headsteering multi-screen experience at home.
[00:02:20] I'm afraid.
[00:02:21] Yeah, really sort of fascinating and slightly overwhelming night
[00:02:24] to try to keep track of all of the three Italian clubs in European football
[00:02:32] all at once or kicking off at the same time.
[00:02:35] I was multi-screening but generally even when you multi-screen football
[00:02:41] you have to sort of focus a bit more on something than others.
[00:02:44] You always have one game on the big telly, don't you?
[00:02:46] Which for a lot of the night was the Roma against...
[00:02:51] against Biaidu because it left a decent game.
[00:02:54] Towards the end as that game started to seem like it settled into a more clear partner
[00:03:00] with more focus on Marseille against Atlanta
[00:03:03] then the moment that I finished I switched over
[00:03:05] and with quite amazing timing onto the big telly went
[00:03:08] and Barron's earlier scoring,
[00:03:12] Fiorina's winner against Club Brugge.
[00:03:15] I think it would be unrealistic for me recording this right,
[00:03:20] this voicemail right at the end of the games
[00:03:23] to give us detailed analysis or breakdown of all these games.
[00:03:27] This is very much just going to be the first impressions,
[00:03:31] the sharp impressions and I'll start with the Roma game
[00:03:34] just because that was the one that probably had more of my attention
[00:03:38] for most of the night.
[00:03:40] Really disappointing outcome, certainly.
[00:03:44] I think that another of us was very curious to see where the Roma could
[00:03:47] stand up to this Levekusen team.
[00:03:49] I think there was different degrees of optimism.
[00:03:52] When we're talking back to the day,
[00:03:55] there were players in this lineup we weren't expecting to see there.
[00:03:58] When it was Patrick and I throwing ahead to this game
[00:04:00] we thought that Lukaku wasn't into playing this game
[00:04:03] but didn't expect Mr. Sormorne to get out
[00:04:05] and those players were there,
[00:04:06] although perhaps also not delivering it their best.
[00:04:10] Lukaku did have the one perhaps best chance at the game for Roma
[00:04:15] now and now when he hit the lead work
[00:04:18] but a smalling involved in the calamity
[00:04:20] that led up to Levekusen's first goal.
[00:04:23] And I have to say, at the time you looked at that
[00:04:26] and thought, oh gosh what a terrible goal to concede
[00:04:29] and especially having come quite soon after that opportunity
[00:04:33] for that opportunity for Lukaku.
[00:04:39] It felt like a bit of a hammer blow
[00:04:41] to really just give that goal away to Florian Mertz
[00:04:44] but the longer the night went on,
[00:04:46] the more you just felt well.
[00:04:48] They couldn't very justify
[00:04:51] there had been a different outcome to this game
[00:04:53] than Levekusen would have been.
[00:04:54] Markedly better than the Roma
[00:04:56] over the course of 90 minutes.
[00:04:58] It was actually sort of one of those fascinating tricks
[00:05:03] that I really started to feel like
[00:05:05] Levekusen had complete control of the ball
[00:05:09] and when I was checking the numbers at the end of the game
[00:05:10] actually Roma had more than 50% of the ball
[00:05:13] but that really just showed how the ball was being used
[00:05:15] and how effectively Levekusen were just keeping Roma at arm's length.
[00:05:20] They thought Roma were a bit too ragged in their press.
[00:05:24] They were just, it felt like in general,
[00:05:26] a step slower to the ball
[00:05:28] all over the pitch than Levekusen
[00:05:30] and they certainly felt like were tactically outmaneuvered.
[00:05:34] First up front was a surprise choice.
[00:05:36] That wasn't necessarily what people expected to see
[00:05:39] from Shabby Lonsworth,
[00:05:40] by him notionally leading the line
[00:05:42] but in practice very much was a false line situation.
[00:05:46] We saw that it's dropping often into that space
[00:05:48] just behind the attackers
[00:05:50] at the number 10 role that looked at the Tlequatis 0
[00:05:54] and that movement everywhere.
[00:05:58] The fluidity of Levekusen, the energy of Levekusen,
[00:06:02] I think it was a really sharp reminder that we are talking about
[00:06:07] a team that has produced on a different level this season.
[00:06:09] Of course there's going to be this temptation
[00:06:12] and perhaps inevitable desire from some people
[00:06:18] because you can't talk about anything at a role mind
[00:06:25] and what happens this season without some people wanting to bring it back
[00:06:28] to that conversation about Jose Mourinho.
[00:06:30] There's going to be some people who can trust this last season
[00:06:33] and Roman knocking by a Levekusen out of the Europa League
[00:06:38] in May and how effectively Roma
[00:06:43] without creating that much,
[00:06:46] without having anything like as much of a ball
[00:06:49] and really having barely any of the ball across the two legs
[00:06:52] were able just to neutralise Levekusen
[00:06:54] and restrict their options.
[00:06:56] I think you have to take a step back and acknowledge
[00:06:58] that what Javier Lonzo has done and the team,
[00:07:00] he's got drastically different to what Roma face last season.
[00:07:06] This is the best team in the Bundesliga.
[00:07:08] You see why it has been on this now nearly 50-game unbeaten run
[00:07:13] for a reason because they do play really high quality football
[00:07:16] and I think absolutely it would be right to frame it
[00:07:20] and ask this game more about what they did right
[00:07:22] than about what Roma got wrong.
[00:07:24] But at the same time, this is a series of Chronicles put cast
[00:07:27] and you can find that content on German football elsewhere.
[00:07:30] So yeah, I think the point at which we can frame it,
[00:07:37] I think probably most interestingly from our perspective
[00:07:40] as Italian football specialists,
[00:07:44] it's just to say that D'Arcy,
[00:07:47] one of the first times I feel like since he took over the job,
[00:07:50] really looked like he was outmaneuvered and out of thought.
[00:07:54] I think a lot of people expect him to see Mono face up front.
[00:07:57] So even the choice right away with the first starting was surprised.
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[00:08:31] No surprises.
[00:08:33] At Bed 365, we don't do ordinary.
[00:08:36] We believe that every sport should be epic.
[00:08:39] Every home run, every hit, every inning, every play
[00:08:42] from the moments that are legendary
[00:08:44] to the ones that fly under the radar.
[00:08:46] See for yourself when you sign up today
[00:08:48] and get $150 in bonus bets when you bet just $5.
[00:08:52] Whatever the sport, whatever the moment,
[00:08:54] it's never ordinary at Bed 365.
[00:08:57] 21 plus only must be physically located in Virginia.
[00:09:00] Gambling problem called 1-800-GAMBLER
[00:09:02] terms and conditions apply.
[00:09:04] At Bed 365, we don't do ordinary.
[00:09:07] We believe that every sport should be epic.
[00:09:10] Every home run, every hit, every inning, every play
[00:09:14] from the moments that are legendary
[00:09:16] to the ones that fly under the radar.
[00:09:18] Whether it's a walk-off grand slam
[00:09:20] or a base hit to center field,
[00:09:22] whatever the sport, whatever the moment,
[00:09:24] it's never ordinary at Bed 365.
[00:09:28] 21 plus only must be physically located in Virginia.
[00:09:31] Gambling problem called 1-800-GAMBLER.
[00:09:34] It just felt like there was an opening part of the game
[00:09:39] where both teams were feeding each other out.
[00:09:40] It wasn't necessarily that move completely tricked Roma
[00:09:46] into disaster right away,
[00:09:48] but the longer the game went on,
[00:09:49] the more it just felt like the control was totally with Levicuzin
[00:09:53] and the changes that Delasi made weren't able to bring that back.
[00:09:57] He took off, Rick Carstop just after the hour,
[00:10:00] Carstop of course, his pass really,
[00:10:02] together with Smolling,
[00:10:05] his loss possession was what led to the first goal
[00:10:10] for Levicuzin, but in the middle of the pitch,
[00:10:13] again, even with a fair amount of the ball,
[00:10:15] it just felt like there were no real clear ideas
[00:10:18] for Roma, how they were going to bring that ball forward,
[00:10:20] whereas on the other side you had Grinaldo Stanisic
[00:10:23] so effectively advancing possession down the flanks.
[00:10:26] It just felt like Roma didn't have a good idea,
[00:10:29] it didn't have a good plan beyond the perhaps
[00:10:32] Mourinho familiar plan.
[00:10:36] And I'm saying that slightly harshly
[00:10:38] because we are talking about the sad end of Mourinho's
[00:10:41] tenure rather than some of the better moments of
[00:10:44] just trying to get the ball to the bar,
[00:10:45] and hope he's going to do something.
[00:10:46] And it felt like that was the limit of Roma's ideas at times,
[00:10:51] especially along the game went on to the second half.
[00:10:55] It's not necessarily over, a two-nil bound,
[00:10:58] I think it's worth reminding ourselves that Levicuzin,
[00:11:04] in the last round of this competition,
[00:11:09] trailed two-nil at home to Carabag,
[00:11:11] in fact they can see the second goal in that tie
[00:11:14] at a point when they were even a man up on Carabag,
[00:11:16] so it is possible to give this team, I think defensively,
[00:11:19] they are not totally impregnable.
[00:11:22] And again, Roma, they had their half chance in this game,
[00:11:27] perhaps more than a half chance in that
[00:11:29] in the case of the Caracu one,
[00:11:31] but it's going to have to be a drastically better
[00:11:33] performance in this and I'm not certain
[00:11:36] where that's coming from.
[00:11:38] We found seem to see how Roma approach
[00:11:40] the weekend game against Juventus now,
[00:11:43] knowing that they need to turn this tie around
[00:11:44] in the second leg.
[00:11:46] Contrast to that, well perhaps not contrast to that,
[00:11:50] but certainly a different kind of game
[00:11:52] between Marseille and Atalanta.
[00:11:55] It's hard to talk about this game
[00:11:57] and not just go immediately to the obvious,
[00:11:59] which is Cermet Gascamica,
[00:12:03] the hope for all Italians now,
[00:12:05] I think going into the Euros,
[00:12:07] who wasn't even called up for the last eight-foot squad.
[00:12:13] So yeah, I wasn't even part of the squad in March
[00:12:20] for those games against Venezuela and Ecuador,
[00:12:25] but certainly we would hope to see him
[00:12:30] getting more opportunities with the form he's been in.
[00:12:34] And I think at this point, if you're asking me,
[00:12:36] so I'm just distracting myself
[00:12:37] taking something while I'm talking,
[00:12:39] at this point for me, I think you have to be very seriously
[00:12:43] if you're spellety considering,
[00:12:45] even if it's not what you expected to,
[00:12:47] thinking about whether this is going to be the guy
[00:12:48] who leads the line, frankly,
[00:12:50] and who's that first choice at number nine,
[00:12:52] because he's in such good form.
[00:12:53] And I don't think it would not be the first time
[00:12:55] we've seen a striker, in particular strikers,
[00:12:58] have a run up to an age tournament like this,
[00:13:00] but they've just got the bit between their teeth
[00:13:01] and carry that into international competitions.
[00:13:04] So brilliantly noted with the goal,
[00:13:05] although of course it was the reverse ball
[00:13:09] from Coop Miners that made it,
[00:13:11] what a sensational player,
[00:13:12] what an absolutely powerful creative force he's been for them.
[00:13:17] I think there wasn't that much else
[00:13:20] in what I saw of the Atlantic game that sparkled.
[00:13:24] It definitely felt like at times
[00:13:26] that defense was wide, wide open
[00:13:28] and if Albamian had been more efficient,
[00:13:32] Marseille could have turned this deficit into,
[00:13:36] the early deficit into a win
[00:13:37] and of course they also had the goal
[00:13:39] disloyal in the second half as well.
[00:13:40] So I don't know if luck is the right word,
[00:13:46] fortunate I think perhaps to,
[00:13:49] I think fortunate says it better than lucky,
[00:13:50] which is a subtle distinction to me and Portland one.
[00:13:53] And perhaps they're fortunate to get there, the draw,
[00:13:57] but I do think that bringing it back to Bergamo
[00:14:00] absolutely will still feel confident
[00:14:02] that they can win this time in the second leg.
[00:14:05] I think that was gonna be really fascinating
[00:14:07] to finally balance game going into the second leg.
[00:14:09] Very clear that Johnny Gasky has,
[00:14:11] I guess it's, I have,
[00:14:13] has done good things at Marseille
[00:14:14] and the energy in that team was impressive,
[00:14:17] but I don't think,
[00:14:19] I don't think beating this team at home
[00:14:20] is a tour beyond our strategy
[00:14:23] and I think the draw away from home
[00:14:24] not at all about results.
[00:14:26] So very much in the balance that one
[00:14:28] and perhaps the most fascinating
[00:14:30] of all the second legs of these ties.
[00:14:33] I saw the least of pure and team
[00:14:35] in the first game against Brugge
[00:14:37] and with apologies to the Europa Conference,
[00:14:39] the Superfans and I switched on,
[00:14:43] as I said just in time to see Enzo
[00:14:46] scoring the late winner for them,
[00:14:50] huge obviously to get that goal
[00:14:52] and to have that advantage going for second leg.
[00:14:55] Away goals no longer a factor
[00:14:57] so the fact they conceded twice not a big deal
[00:15:01] would certainly have been disappointing
[00:15:02] not to get the winner home
[00:15:03] with Brugge playing the last half an hour or so on 10 men
[00:15:09] and yeah, again I think very nicely
[00:15:12] put it to the second leg
[00:15:13] and if we want to talk about Italian strikers
[00:15:16] even Andrea Bellotti also not called up
[00:15:18] for the last international round scoring in midweek
[00:15:21] so some good news for the Italians
[00:15:23] even amongst a mix around for the Italian sides.
[00:15:28] Yeah, very much in the balance
[00:15:31] I was just the right side of recording
[00:15:34] seeing some quotes from Svilella
[00:15:38] from a goalkeeper saying in his fill out that he
[00:15:41] that did also have been turned the team are half time
[00:15:44] to not worry about over committing to the attack
[00:15:47] and to remember that this is only the first four quarters
[00:15:52] we're now another quarter later
[00:15:54] and of course the second quarter
[00:15:55] was not so good for Roma
[00:15:57] but still very much in your half time
[00:15:59] these ties and lots of what happened
[00:16:01] so looking forward to second legs