My UEFA Champions League Prediction

I'm So after the eagerly awaited Champions League draw, there were many mouth watering ties to look forward too, PSG v Real Madrid, Man Utd v Wolfsburg, Atletico v Benfica, Juve v Man City and last but not least  Arsenal v Bayern. This has also brought up some fantastic ties, where various mangers and players will be returning to former clubs, like ‘the special one’ returning back to FC Porto where it all began, Di Maria’s return to the Santiago Bernabeu and the great Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s long awaited return to Malmo, which cause their website to crash yesterday due to so many fans checking the draw, and finally the return of Memphis to PSV.

The Champions League always throws a good surprise or a group of death (That the Italians always end up in). Lone behold Juventus get drawn in a really tricky group along with Manchester City, Sevilla and Borussia Monchengladbach.  After Juventus reached last year’s final, where my friend Samuel Menzenga predicted it in a blog. I’m now going to predict who I think is going to be in the final, and who I think will be selected in the UEFA Team of the Year.

 A lot of people will be saying Barca, Madrid, or Bayern for the title, I do believe that one of these prestigious clubs will be in the final, however id be more inclined to go for Bayern Munich, but who else you ask will be joining them in the final for this year’s Champions League ? That’s where my surprise package comes in and I’m going for Manchester City.

Over the years they’ve always been nearly men, however they’ve had real tough draws against the likes of Barcelona and Bayern, and if you want to be the best, you’ve got to beat them. Some of you will be reading this and thinking why Manchester City, well they have a more complete squad now, Pellegrini has strengthened Manchester City’s squad superbly this window and addressed key issue’s in Defence, Midfield and Attack. The signing of the robust Nicolas Otamendi is a good one, a strong hard tackling Argentine who not afraid to get stuck, moreover the foundation of going on into the latter stages of the Champions League  is by having a strong defence and with Vincent Kompany by his side Manchester City will be getting that. In Midfield the signing of Raheem Sterling, where some say they’ve completely overpaid for Sterling and to be fair they probably have, however Sterling can change a game with his electric pace down the wings. Finally, although not confirmed yet, but with the impending arrival of the Belgium wizard Kevin De Bruyne playing behind Sergio Aguero, would add so much more quality in that final third, taking some of the pressure of the likes of the pint sized Spaniard David Silva and the ever so reliable, back to his best Yaya Toure. So that’s my surprise package, the final will be Man City v Bayern.

Now onto UEFA Player of the Year, is going to be again another surprise, Thomas Muller... I’ve tried to avoid all the obvious candidates i.e. Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi. I really do think that Thomas Muller is seriously underrated; he’s superb, scores goals consistently for not only Bayern but for Germany also. Muller is a talisman for Bayern, the fans adore him for his never say die attitude, furthermore he leaves everything on the pitch, with his tireless displays, which he showed in last year’s semi final against eventual winner Barcelona, where Muller was nothing but positive, stating that they could ‘turn round the result and that if any Bayern player didn’t believe so, they’d be better off not even on the bench.’ So that’s my Player of the Tournament, the ever so consistent and tireless Thomas Muller.

See below for my predictions of the UEFA Team of the Year!

Thanks for reading