Grant and Slomka breathe easier after wins
PARIS: Chelsea manager Avram Grant and his Schalke 04 counterpart Mirko Slomka can sleep a little easier on Wednesday after both their sides reached the Champions League quarterfinals.
Grant - who has been under fire for his selection policy at the League Cup final loss to Spurs, which saw The Blues produce an insipid display - was never in trouble on Wednesday as Chelsea breezed to a 3-0 win over Greek side Olympiakos to win 3-0 on aggregate.
While Grant has not been publicly criticized by his club owner Roman Abramovich - the two are close friends - Slomka has not been so lucky with club president Josef Schnusenberg being his biggest critic.
However, Schalke's penalty shootout victory over former champion Porto in Oporto - the match ending 1-1 on aggregate after the hosts scored in the dying minutes to "win" the second leg - and making the last eight of the competition for the first time in club history will earn Slomka some breathing space.
But Schalke, apart from heroics by 21-year-old 'keeper Manuel Neuer, will have earned few new friends as its negativity in extra time against a 10-man Porto was in stark contrast to the attacking football of the 2004 Champions League winners.
However, while Grant and Slomka won a reprieve, a pall was cast over Real Madrid's German handler Bernd Schuster as the nine-time champions, reduced to 10 men in the 70th minute when Pepe was sentoff, lost 2-1 at home to AS Roma, 4-2 on aggregate.
It was the fourth successive season that "the meringues" have failed to make the last eight and leaves just Barcelona to fly the Spanish flag in the quarterfinals as Sevilla crashed out on Tuesday.
Roma may well end up being the only Italian contender as Inter Milan must overturn a 2-0 deficit at the San Siro against Liverpool next Tuesday.
Roma coach Luciano Spaletti was delighted with his team's second Champions League win in their fourth outing at the Bernabeu that condemned Real to its fourth successive first-knockout-round exit.
"I expected a tough game but my team came here to get a result and they responded perfectly," he told a news conference.
"We suffered at times but we deserved to go through. We didn't steal this tie from Real. I think both sides played well and that makes the win here at this ground even more special."
Grant wore a relieved look as a Frank Lampard-inspired Chelsea tore apart Olympiakos but was more interested in praising the players - who it has been reported snubbed him last week following the League Cup reverse telling him to go away twice when they were holding an inquest into the defeat - afterwards.
"I'm happy of course. We won, we are in the next round and played good football," said the former Israel coach, who aside from the problems on the pitch has also been receiving anonymous death threats.
"First we knew Olympiakos always score away so we knew they were very dangerous, so I'm happy the team played very mature.
"They were patient, held the ball most of the time and were quick when we needed to be. It was clever football."
Slomka, who has come under pressure after three successive league defeats, admitted Porto had the better of the match but took pride in his players holding on.
"We had to fight to the end, but we had the luck to have the decisive player in the shape of Manuel Neuer, not only in the penalty shootout, but also during the whole match," said Slomka.
Schuster, as has been his longtime habit indeed ever since his playing days, didn't concede an inch over his future despite the fact that even the domestic title last season did not save then Real coach Fabio Capello from the axe.
"At least we didn't go out because my players didn't want to fight," said the German.
Agencies
(China Daily 03/07/2008 page24)
