Zenit humiliates Bayern; Rangers win on spot kicks!

Advocaat poses for his statue design

With his typical aggressive gestures it was little General Advocaat who pushed his Zenit team in the UEFA Cup finals. Shouting, gesturing, whistling, anything that was needed. And it worked. After the match, the former Den Haag and FC Utrecht midfielder strut his stuff, knowing he will meet his former club Glasgow Rangers in the finals. And the 22.000 fans went ballistic, knowing they would have a chance, but not knowing they would trash Bayern Munich as they did.

In North West Russia, the politicians are considering a statue for Advocaat. A year and a half ago, he started in St Petersburg. He broke the hierarchy in the Russian competition by claiming the title and now a European title is at hand. And that for a club which had to play 2 (!) qualification matches to get in to the UEFA Competition! They went on beating Everton, Nurnberg and AZ Alkmaar in the group stage, which is a feat by itself. And then took care of the likes of Villareal, Leverkusen and Marseille to get to the semis.

Dick Advocaat never won anything in international football and was chastised as Dutch team manager in 2004 after the infamous Robben replacement.
He did win three national titles in three different countries (Holland with PSV, Scotland with Rangers and now Russia). Dickie can become the 12th Dutch coach to win a European cup.

Despite the 1-1 in Munich, Bayern was fairly optimistic before the match. They felt they owned this cup and were the deadringer faves before a ball was kicked. In the quarter finals, they had luck at their side against Getafe, coming back from 3-1 deficit in Spain. But the Germans were without a prayer from the start. After four minutes, Zenit led 1-0, through a set piece. Bayern was constantly running after the facts (Dutch expression) and allowed Zenit the opportunity to counter creatively towards a 4-0 beating. It was a masterclass and a football lesson.

Glasgow Rangers played a poor game at home against Fiorentina. With a defensive strategy, Ranger’s management didn’t want to open the game up too much for the creative Italians. In Florence, they needed the same tactics and luck to stay alive. And as happened before, the team that deserved to win but just squandered too many opportunities lost the match when the fat lady sang.

It was 0-0 after 120 minutes of football in Florence, despite opps for Vieri and Mutu and others, and penalty kicks were to decide who is to face Zenit in Manchester on May 14. A sour miss by Vieri made the difference (Rey stopped a Scottish penalty and his Scottish colleague did the same), when the old veteran mishit the ball… They’re still looking for it high up in the stands.

Fiorentina out. Rangers to meet Dick Advocaat’s Zenit.

Exciting stuff

Kahn hit Bommel again, this time for the defeat against Zenit