Month: August 2019

Player Ratings Celtic 3-4 Cluj 2019 Champions League Second Leg | How did Callum McGregor play at left back?

Celtic were knocked out of the Champions League last night by CFR Cluj Napoca, who scored four goals at Parkhead to stun the Scottish champions. Neil Lennon’s tactics of moving Callum McGregor from midfield to left back to bring Oliver Ntcham into the starting lineup, thus benching LB Boli Bolingoli, didn’t quite come off as the Hoops shipped in four goals at home. “Clujless” was used in the Scottish press to describe Celtic’s play against their Romanian visitors.

Scott Brown also gave away a needless penalty at a crucial stage of the game.

Here are the Celtic player ratings vs Cluj from various Scottish newspapers.

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Player Ratings Porto 2-3 Krasnodar Champions League 2019- Wanderson stars as FCP knocked out

FC Porto were stunningly knocked out of the Champions League in the third qualifying stage as Russian side Krasnodar beat them 3-2 at the Dragao, thus sealing the tie on the away goals rule. Porto had won 1-0 in the first leg a week ago, and many assumed it would be a formality for them to progress, especially at home, but Krasnodar stunned them with three first half goals- one from Tonny Vilhena and two from Magomed Suleymanov.

Here are the player ratings for Porto 2-3 Krasnodar from the Portuguese newspapers. Krasnodar’s Wanderson received special praise, with one paper even giving him a perfect 10 for this game.

Not such a great evening for Porto players like Saravia

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Player Ratings Dinamo Kiev 3-3 Club Brugge Second Leg Champions League 2019 | Percy Tau Red Carded, Mignolet ships in three

There was plenty of late drama in Kyiv as Club Brugge scored twice to draw the game 3-3 and win the two legged tie 4-3 on aggregate. In the first leg that marked Simon Mignolet’s debut for Brugge, the former Liverpool goalkeeper had kept a clean sheet. Here he shipped in three goals, but was still one of the better Brugge players on show, as can be seen in these Belgian paper ratings below (he got a 7/10- the only other players with a 7 were Brugge’s three goal scorers on the evening)

Percy Tau was red carded (two yellows)- a tad unjustly, as Brugge coach Philippe Clement mentioned after the game. Nevertheless the South African star was criticised for “forgetting his defensive duties” at certain times in the fixture, and was rated a 5/10

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