Fragile advantage
In the first leg of the play-off for the round of 16 of the 2024 - 2025 Champions League, which takes place at 3:00 a.m. on February 13, Celtic will play at home. This is a huge advantage for coach Brendan Rodgers and his team as they are on a 10-match winning streak at Celtic Park. In the framework of the most prestigious European club tournament, the Scottish representative is unbeaten in the last 5 home matches. In contrast, Bayern Munich has only won 1 match in the last 5 away matches. All 3 losses that coach Vincent Kompany and his team suffered in the Champions League group stage came away, when they faced Aston Villa, Barcelona and Feyenoord.
With Harry Kane in top form, Bayern Munich have a good chance of winning against Celtic.
Before the match, coach Rodgers also mentioned the home advantage to cheer himself and his students. He shared: "We have great players in the squad and are reaching high confidence. The upcoming night will be extremely exciting. 60,000 people will support Celtic and we will get a lot of energy from that. We will cause many difficulties for Bayern Munich and let's wait and see how things go."
" GREY TIGER" STILL SUPERIOR
However, this seems to be the only advantage that Celtic possesses. What coach Rodgers emphasized before this confrontation is mainly just the mental strength of the players. Because in reality, Bayern Munich's professional strength is superior. The attacking stars including Jamal Musiala, Leroy Sane or Harry Kane are a big challenge for Celtic's defense. Although not in very good form in this year's tournament, Bayern Munich is also among the teams that score the most goals with 20 times tearing the opponent's net. At this time, Kane is also leading the race for the European Golden Boot with 21 goals, equal to Liverpool's Mohamed Salah. In all arenas, the England captain has scored 28 goals and 10 assists. Those are very impressive numbers.
In addition, Bayern Munich's ball control ability is also extremely impressive. In the last 10 matches, their average ball possession rate is up to more than 70%. This allows coach Kompany's students to always dominate the game, creating many opportunities. However, they also need to be careful when attacking because Celtic is a team that is very good at transitioning from defense to attack.
The "Gray Tigers" will focus all their efforts on the Champions League arena. In this season's Bundesliga, the Bavarian team is on a 7-match winning streak to dominate the top of the rankings. The gap between them and the second-placed team Bayer Leverkusen has now reached 9 points. If there are no surprises, Bayern Munich will reclaim the German throne after a season occupied by coach Xabi Alonso and his team. With less pressure on the domestic arena, Bayern Munich will focus especially on the away match against Celtic to gain an advantage in winning a ticket to the round of 16.
Celtic have not performed well in the Champions League group stage this season. Despite receiving a favorable draw when their opponents in group 1 and group 2 were only Dortmund, RB Leipzig, Atalanta and Club Brugge, they only ranked 21st with 12 points. The Scottish representative has almost no experience playing against the "big guys" this season. In addition, Celtic's head-to-head record with Bayern Munich is also very poor with only 1 draw and 3 losses. This is also the reason why many experts believe that Celtic will hardly be able to create a surprise against the "Gray Tigers" in the upcoming match.
In the match taking place in the early morning of February 13, the remaining 3 pairs are Club Brugge - Atalanta, Monaco - Benfica and Feyenoord - AC Milan.
Source: https://thanhnien.vn/celtic-co-du-suc-lam-kho-hum-xam-185250211213114764.htm
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