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jenni_blogI don't think anyone would argue that Barcelona and Real Madrid were the favourites to go through to the final this year. But the exact opposite happened. It's not that Chelsea and Bayern Munich are not good teams. Far from it. But with it being impossible for both of these teams to win their respective leagues, while Barcelona and Real Madrid were still battling it out to see who would win theirs, the key factor for the CL semis seems to be that while Chelsea and Bayern were able to rest their players for their Champions League matches, Barcelona and Real Madrid had to face each other last Saturday in a high octane match that probably decided who would be La Liga champions. And I think that 'El Clasico' game probably took all the wind out of both teams' sails.
Both semi-finals were highly dramatic. Here are some photos.
"He ain't heavy, he's my brother."
I won't go into great detail because everyone probably knows what happened, but one more fascinating fallout from the semis is that both Chelsea and Bayern will be missing tons of key players for the final. Most notably, Chelsea's entire back line will not be able to play. All these players are suspended for the final, due to accumulation of yellow cards or the issue of red ones: John Terry, Branislav Ivanovic, Gary Cahill (he's injured), David Luiz (ditto), as well as Raul Meireles. Did I miss anyone?
Bayern Munich will be missing Holger Badstuber and Alaba, and I'm not sure if there's anyone else not going to be able to play.
More from Barcelona vs Chelsea:
And from Real Madrid vs Bayern Munich:
Both semi-finals were highly dramatic. Here are some photos.
"He ain't heavy, he's my brother."
I won't go into great detail because everyone probably knows what happened, but one more fascinating fallout from the semis is that both Chelsea and Bayern will be missing tons of key players for the final. Most notably, Chelsea's entire back line will not be able to play. All these players are suspended for the final, due to accumulation of yellow cards or the issue of red ones: John Terry, Branislav Ivanovic, Gary Cahill (he's injured), David Luiz (ditto), as well as Raul Meireles. Did I miss anyone?
Bayern Munich will be missing Holger Badstuber and Alaba, and I'm not sure if there's anyone else not going to be able to play.
More from Barcelona vs Chelsea:
And from Real Madrid vs Bayern Munich:
