Champions League Final: United have done it again

The fourth final since 2001 which was decided in a penalty shootout and the funnny thing for the Germans is that those were two english clubs going at it after extra time. England always has the image of failing in a penalty shootout as they had done so very often in the past, especially on the national team level. But let's start from the beginning.
You can break down the match in to different intervalls. The first half was completely dominated by Manchester United who controlled Chelsea for most of the time and went ahead 1-0 on a header by Christiano Ronaldo (26') who scored following a very nice combination on the left side which led to a beautiful cross by Wes Brown. They should have gone up 2-0 only minutes later when Tevez (with a header) and Carrick (with a shot from 12 m) found their master in Chelase goalkeeper Petr Cech (35').
There really was nothing to see of Chelsea. The attack was taken out of the game by Manchester, Drogba, Joe Cole and Malouda didn't create any chances, the midfield wasn't in charge at all, although the german TV commentary always praised Michael Ballack for his efforts. The equalizer came as a bit of a surprise only seconds from half time. Lampard scored on a deflected ball (45').

But this all turned around as soon as the teams came out for the 2nd half. Now Chelsea was dominating the game, pressing Manchester back into their half and even striker Wayne Rooney had to help out in the defense. Chelase created a lot of chances and while the german TV commentary was all praise for Ballack one should not forget the efforts of the lone striker Drogba, who got close to scoring when he hit the post (78'). But there weren't any goals in the 2nd half so the game went into extra time. from there on the game got a little ugly, mainly because there were a little too many breaks in the action. A lot of players went down with cramps causing the referee Lubos Michel to stop the game very often. Still both teams were looking for their chances with Chelsea having the better ones, the biggest coming from Lampard who hit the crossbar (94'). There was turmoil in the 2nd half of extra time after some fighting on the field following an argument between Vidic and Drogba which saw the Ivory Coast international sent off with a red card (116'). But that was it, they were going to penalties.

Ronaldo was the first to miss and he did so with his very own arrogant style. When you shoot a penalty the run up to the shoot has to be one fluent motion, you are not allowed to stop in between. Now what do you think is Ronaldo doing? He stops half way to irritated Cech who the blocks the ball. I simply get annoyed when Ronaldo does something like that. He is such a talented player but I simply hate his arrogance. Chelsea should have won this had only John Terry scored. He was the last of the five Chelsea players to shoot the penalty and he only hit the post. Anelka then missed his chance and by doing so he was giving the tile to Manchester who once again are champions of Europe. Congratulations.

An exciting match which lost a bit of steam in the closing minutes and in extra time, but the will power of the players and the intensity was always there. The most annoying thing to me was the german commentary. It is a real nuisance to listen to those idiots talking about stuff they don't know anything about. Most of what they say is about sthings which are not taking place on the pitch. Hey, let's be honest, I want to hear a comment about the game, not about something which happened last evening in the players' lounge or whereever. German TV will never get this.
The other big story was Michael Ballack who is still waiting for his first win in a big final match. He lost with Leverkusen in 2002, he wasn't in the World Cup final that year because he was booked in the semi against Korea and now he lost with Chelsea. A friend of mine is really worried that this might affect his performance during the Euro 2008. I guess we'll just have to wait and see...