After this weekend's league games, the world's attention has focused on Spain. Because the second legs of the four semi-finals of the Champions League and Europa League were all held in Spain.
This week, Spain has become the focus of world football.
On April 24, the second leg of the Champions League semi-final between Barcelona and Chelsea started first.
In the first round of the match, Barcelona lost 0-1 away to Chelsea. Many people felt that Cosmos Barcelona, which returned to Camp Nou in the second round, was capable of overturning the Blues and advancing to the Champions League final.
The plot of the first half was in line with the imagination of many Barcelona fans. The home team scored two goals in a row and sent Blues captain Terry off the field with a red card.
Barcelona's total score was 2-1, and with one more player playing, many people thought that Barcelona would definitely defeat Chelsea and advance to the final.
Unexpectedly, the tenacious Chelsea scored a goal in stoppage time in the first half, bringing the total score to 2-2. They also scored an away goal, taking the initiative to advance.
In the second half, Barcelona got a penalty kick in the 49th minute, but Messi failed to score and was turned away by Cech.
In stoppage time, Chelsea scored another goal, and the two sides finally tied 2-2. Chelsea defeated Barcelona with a total score of 3-2 and took the lead in advancing to the Champions League final.
This made many fans who hoped that Real Madrid and Barcelona would meet in the final and stage the El Clasico on the Champions League final stage were extremely disappointed.
Moreover, Barcelona's two goals were scored by Busquets and Iniesta. Not only did Messi still not score a goal, he also missed a penalty kick.
In such a crucial battle, it would be okay if Barcelona won. But Barcelona lost, and then the number one superstar Messi failed to score a goal and missed a penalty kick.
Messi's performance became the target of criticism from many media and fans after the game, accusing him of being soft-footed at critical moments, unable to lead the team out of trouble, and only playing against weak teams, taking advantage of the situation, etc.
The humble and introverted Messi, as always, made no excuses and remained silent, letting the wind and rain from the outside come to blows, but he remained firm and motionless.
As a star, and one of the world's top stars, while enjoying huge fame and income, he will inevitably suffer more severe criticism from the public.
Perhaps Messi has already seen through all this.
Of course, in addition to Messi, Guardiola has also suffered a lot of criticism. Because Barcelona has not only lost the Champions League semi-finals, but also lost to Atletico Madrid and Real Madrid in the league, making the league championship hopeless.
After winning the Triple Crown in his first season as coach and then leading the team to an unprecedented six crowns in 2009, both the media and the fans have placed the highest expectations on Guardiola.
The six-time champion in 2009 and the five-time champion in 2011 is the best coach in everyone's mind. But once he encounters a setback, just like Messi, a bunch of accusations will come like a storm.
Maybe this is because it’s so cold at high places!
With high achievements, everyone’s expectations will be high and the pressure will be high.
The next day, April 25, it was the second semi-final. Real Madrid faced Bayern Munich at the Bernabeu at home.
In the first round of the match, Real Madrid lost 1-2 away to Bayern by a narrow goal. Originally, everyone thought that Real Madrid and Barcelona could meet in the final, but Barcelona was eliminated first.
Everyone’s confidence in Real Madrid is not that strong anymore.
The result is that I am really afraid of what will happen.
Although Ronaldo performed much better than Messi in this game, he did not miss a penalty kick and scored twice, helping Real Madrid defeat Bayern Munich 2-1.
However, the score between the two sides was 3-3, with the same number of away goals, so it had to go into overtime.
Both sides failed to score in overtime and were forced to have a penalty shootout.
As a result, in the penalty shootout, both goalkeepers Neuer and Casillas performed at the goalkeeper level. Ronaldo, Kaká, Kroos, and Lahm's penalty kicks were all saved by the goalkeepers.
But Ramos failed to withstand the pressure and kicked the ball away. Bastian Schweinsteiger scored the key winning goal.
In the end, in this top European derby, Bayern Munich defeated Real Madrid 3-1 on penalty kicks with the same total score, and joined the blue team Chelsea in the final.
The venue of the Champions League final is the Allianz Arena, the home stadium of Bayern Munich. Bayern Munich will have a huge home field advantage and is bound to win the championship.
The elimination of both Real Madrid and Barcelona disappointed many media and fans who hoped that the El Clasico would be staged in the Champions League final.
Especially the Spanish media, which boasted about how strong La Liga was before the game, now feels so hurt.
Everyone can only turn their attention to the Europa League.
Atletico Madrid and Valencia are in a civil war, one team will definitely advance to the final, and Atletico Madrid won 5-2 in the first leg, so there is almost no suspense.
In another semi-final, Athletic Bilbao lost 1-2 away to Sporting Lisbon in the first leg, which was exactly the same as Real Madrid's 1-2 away defeat to Bayern in the first leg.
Therefore, many Spanish media and fans have focused their attention on the match between Athletic Bilbao and Sporting Lisbon, hoping that Athletic Bilbao will reverse the situation, defeat Sporting Lisbon and advance to the final.
In this case, La Liga can successfully lock in the championship and runner-up, and regain the humiliation in the Champions League semi-finals.
The influence and attention of the Europa League cannot be compared with that of the Champions League. Therefore, the two semi-finals are not held in two days like the Champions League semi-finals, but start at the same time.
At 20:45 in the evening on April 26, 2012, with the referee's whistle, the second leg of the 2011/2012 Europa League semi-finals Valencia vs. Atletico Madrid and Athletic Bilbao vs. Sporting Lisbon started at the same time.
Start.
With a three-goal lead, Simeone would naturally not attack Valencia. Instead, he sent out a 4321 Christmas tree formation, and the three midfielders were all defensive, forming a wall in front of the back line.
The wall makes Valencia insurmountable.
Moreover, Simeone also asked the players to retreat significantly, actively shrink the defense line, adopt intensive defensive tactics, and engage in defensive counterattacks.
With a three-goal lead, Atletico Madrid can squander it as they please and win the game at the minimum cost.
With such defensive tactics and lineup configuration, let alone Valencia, Real Madrid and Barcelona are helpless, and Messi and Ronaldo are in despair.
In the attack, Falcao serves as the lone forward, and Joan Chen and Adrian serve as the double forwards. Only three of them can intimidate Valencia's entire defense line.
If Valencia dares to press the entire defense to participate in assists, then Qiao Anchen and Falcao will make them feel what it means to be desperate.
In fact, the progress of the game was just as everyone expected.
Valencia, which was three goals behind, had no choice but to attack aggressively. However, facing the threats of Falcao and Joan Chen, they did not dare to attack with all their players, so they had to leave someone in the backcourt to defend.
As a result, Valencia was inactive throughout the game. Even at home, they were unable to break through Atletico Madrid's defense and score even a single goal.
On Atletico Madrid's side, Qiao Anchen, who had already increased his "Messi-Matthews Extraordinary" to 96 points, was killing everyone. As long as he got the ball, he would make crazy breakthroughs, even if two or three people surrounded him, it was useless.
After Messi's breakthrough, he may still be unable to score due to shooting skills. Just like in the previous Champions League semi-final against Chelsea, Messi had many successful breakthroughs, but the problem is that all the final shots were rejected by Cech.
outside the goal, including penalty kicks.
But Qiao Anchen's game is different. After he completes the breakthrough and gets the chance to shoot, his perfect shooting skills can achieve the best effect on his goal frame. As long as the goalkeeper is not a top goalkeeper like Cech and performs exceptionally, then
How is it possible to prevent Qiao Anchen from scoring a goal?
This is exactly the case.
In this game, Qiao Anchen scored a hat trick in the 23rd minute, 39th minute, and 57th minute respectively, and also assisted Adrian to score in the 65th minute.
If Simeone hadn't replaced Qiao Anchen in the 70th minute, he might still have scored.
In the end, Atletico Madrid defeated Valencia with a score of 5-2 in the first round, 4-0 in the second round, and 9-2 in the two rounds and advanced to the final.
Qiao Anchen ranks first in the Europa League scorer list with 13 goals, and with only one final left, he has basically locked up the Europa League Golden Boot this season.
Unless Falcao can score more than a hat trick in the final and not allow Joan Chen to score.
Judging from the performance in this semi-final, that is almost impossible.
The crazy performance of three goals and one assist also allowed Qiao Anchen to win 200,000 starting points, 1 assist, 100,000, 3 goals, 600,000, winning prize 400,000, best on the spot, 400,000 = 1.7 million game experience rewards, and the total experience increased.
Up to level 37, 1.96 million/20 million.
In the other semi-final, Athletic Bilbao lived up to expectations, defeating its opponent 3-1 at home, defeating Sporting Lisbon with a total score of 4-3 over two rounds, and joining Atletico Madrid in the final.
With Real Madrid and Barcelona both eliminated in the Champions League semi-finals, Atletico Madrid and Athletic Bilbao finally gained face in the Europa League semi-finals and successfully met in the final, locking the Europa League champion and runner-up in La Liga.