MagicManMata

I disagree. Our CL final team is not our full strength team, thanks to all those yellows and Terry's dumb red card. Since the FA Cup is also a trophy to be desired, we need to play our best available players for that match, which will include some of the suspended ones. When we play Pool in the league later on, that would be a good decent opponent to test our CL final team against, IMO.

This made me LOL. Muller is a bench player and wouldn't even be on the pitch for Bayern if not for the card situation. Also, Barcelona, not Madrid, have been the best team in the world for the past few years...until we beat them. And we didn't need pens to do it either.

TBH I don't see that Bayern will be the fresher side. There is plenty of time between now and May 19th, and Di Matteo will rest a bunch of our starters in the 10 days prior to the match, I'm sure. Our last important match before the Final is May 5th vs Pool, they play on May 12th vs Dortmund (who have beaten Bayern twice this season) in the final of the german cup, so if anything I expect us to be the fresher side going in to the match.

I think our defence will be just fine. And I'm sure the pairings will be tested thoroughly in the coming weeks. The only liablity will come where Bosingwa is concerned. Both him and Ferreira are mediocre. The give Robben a huge chance to secure himself some CL glory, against our right flank.

Right, swap Lahm with Rafinha then, it works even better? And Kroos-Schweinsteiger has been tried at the NT level, Kroos cannot defend well its true, but Schweinsteiger can. He is bumped to a more defensive role whereas Kroos is usually the one to kick start the offence from the DM pairing (like he has done with Khedira at the NT during Schweinsteiger's injury).

Not spectacular, but a good tackler and a very physical specimen. He starts for the German NT. Overall I rate him as a very good CB. Definitely several levels above a player like van Buyten.

Good thinking, and that might be what Heynckes goes with. What about a backline such as this: Rafinha-Boateng-van Buyten-Lahm I think that is the strongest they could do under the circumstances (niether flank is a glaring weakness). And starting Kroos up front means Tymo will play. Tymo is not a liability, but he is not top quality like the other 3 DMs. I think with your lineup, both the DM positions and the defence are weakened. Kroos plays a lot as DM for the German NT so some might argue that this is indeed his natural position.

If we win the CL (which we are one match from doing), I highly doubt the squad would be "dismantled".

We need to play at least one match with our "CL Finals Team", including subs and everything. This is not that match, as many of the lads will still be feeling it from Tuesday. Neither will that match be against Liverpool, as it is too important a game. But perhaps 8-12 days before the final we definitely need to play one of those Prem matches with our CL team to get the feeling for it. You know Bayern are going to do it in the BL...

Bayern will miss 3 players due to yellow cards: Badstuber, Gustavo, and Alaba. Gustavo is one of 3 excellent defensive midfielders playing for Bayern. The other 2 are Schweinsteiger (who is almost fully back in form) and Kroos. Gustavo missing means that Kroos and Schweinsteiger will be the 2 DMs in Bayern's 4-2-3-1. However, Kroos is Bayern's prefered #1 in the center behind the striker Gomez. Thomas Mueller, who was a sub in the RM games, will fill that role as the CAM behind Gomez. This means that the 2 defensive midfielders will still be first choice, and the CAM will be a second choice (but a good one at that), so overall Bayern's attack and midfield will get very slightly weaker for the final. Their D is another story. Badstuber and Alaba form half of their backline, which is good, but very thin on the bench. Watching my fair share of Bundesliga and Bayern this year, it seems that Rafinha might be sub choice #1 and van Buyten would be after him. This would mean playing Phillip Lahm on the left, where he is slightly less effective. Buyten is prone to errors if pressed and Rafinha is mediocre at best. Alternatively, if Lahm is kept on the right, we may see Contento or even Breno (who is terrible) hit the pitch. Either way, Bayern's defence, which is their weakness even at full strength, will be considerably weaker for this match. That is good news for us, as we are missing some key players of our own. However I believe our team is the deeper one, and this will make the difference. We may be missing 4 players to their 3 due to cards, but we have the superior replacements.

NA NA NA NA NA NA NA NA HEY HEY HEY.... GOOOOODBBBBYYYYYEEEEEE!! See ya later Barca!

Look out lads, big Drogs on the loose.

Mata has to start IMO. Kalou is a good player but we may well have to pot 1 here and Mata is where it all starts for us these days.

I would stick with the same players we had in the first leg, as they played the entire match as a cohesive unit. That said, Bertrand was so stellar against Arsenal that it would be hard to exclude him from the squad. Tough choice for RDM no doubt, but in the end it is better to have options than not.

Yes it's not much bigger is it, the Bernabeu is a big pitch, Camp Nou just a touch bigger than what we're used to.

Barca fans may have had a point, IF Guardiola actually started second team players today. He did not, he went with his regular starters that we saw in the first leg against us, and that we will see in the second leg. These players will have played ~190 minutes of football within the last 6 days prior to the second leg. RDM meanwhile DID "go easy" in our match vs Arsenal (and still got the draw!). He rested 8 out of our 10 outfield players who are expected to go in the second leg. That is a HUGE advantage to our players, easily levelling the home turf advantage in my view.

Skills that pay the bills right there!

Alright lads...Time for a little vengeance!!! I want revenge for the referee-caused disgraces of 2009! We know how these whining divers play now, the boys (Drogs in particular) have been giving them their own medicine, and Barca don't like it! Keep on playing with a chip on your shoulders boys! Last time out we showed no fear, let's bring it once again! CAREFREE!!! KTBFFH!

Reposting from the Arsenal vs Chelsea thread: This will be our winning edge: El Classico. Let's hope for a good one, with lots of physical battles all over the pitch. :blue scalf:

With the draw and the performance as a whole, I am very happy considering we rested about 8 out of our 10 starting outfield players ahead of the Barcelona clash. In fact, I'm almost giddy to think that our boys will all be fresh while most of their starters will go through a draining battle in 2 hours' time.

Proud of the boys today. Clearly we rested some players ahead of the Nou Camp clash, and yet we still got a point. Truth be told we needed all 3, but at least Arsenal may not qualify now. Overall I saw a splendid defensive effort (where were those under coach DVD, I mean AVB?), which is exactly what we need to replicate in the next match, which will be the biggest match of the last 3 years for our lads. That said, Torres, Malouda, and Sturridge all showed today why they do not deserve to start against Barcelona.

Fair is fair, if Nando scores even a brace he will at least have earned super-sub status. That said, if healthy Drogba is without a doubt the man to start against the Uefalona Divers FC next week.

The only problem with Torres playing this role is that, well...he's Torres. Nando has had an awful season, and while he has picked it up in the last few matches, it hasn't been against upper tier teams. If Torres wants to see anything more than pity minutes against Barca next week, he is going to have to step up against Barca-lite (Arsenal) this weekend, in a big way. I mean either a goal or an assist from Torres to show us that he means business, otherwise I would stick with the same line-up as the 1st leg (no Torres).

Fyp. Roman likes his CL money (as do I).

RDM has been, well...so far so good, put it that way!