Monday, March 8, 2021
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Champions League 2010 2011 Roma Shakhtar Donetsk
First and Second Leg
uefa champions league 2010/11round of 16 March 2011
Just a couple weeks ago, Roma were likely the heavy favorites for their Champions League match with Shakhtar Donetsk. After all, despite the fact that Shakhtar took their group, this is the first time the Ukrainian side has made it into the Round of 16. Deep into their winter break, the club hasn't played a competitive match in 70 days. Roma, meanwhile, were flying high in Serie A, believing themselves to have secured a Champions League spot for next year as well. But on the eve of Wednesday's match, Roma haven't won in their last three matches, with two successive defeats seeing them slide down to eighth place.
English Leagues the 70s: Crystal Palace Manchester United Division One 1972 1973
16 December 1972Selhurst Park,
London
The end of the 71-72 season saw George Best's increasingly chaotic life unravelling further. At the start of the campaign Best had been in top form and at one point he reeled off 11 goals in a 10-match spell to drive United to the top of the table. But in the New Year he vanished for days and United's title hopes disappeared with him. Astonishingly, despite missing training on numerous occasions and going AWOL between games, Best still managed to play in 40 of United's 42 league matches and finished the club's top scorer yet again with 18 goals. In May 1972 he failed to turn up to play for Northern Ireland against Scotland and he admitted publicly that his drinking was out of control. He escaped to Spain, insisting that he had retired from professional football, aged 26. But his retirement lasted just a fortnight and he returned to Manchester in time for the start of the 1972/73 season. The messy end to his career, though, was in sight. By now United had degenerated into something like anarchy, with the dressing room riven by discontent. Best in open revolt and results in freefall. United opened the new season abysmally, failing to win any of their first nine games and they were knocked out of the League Cup by Bristol Rovers. It was clear that O'Farrell, a mild-mannered man from Cork, was unable to keep a lid on the madness and he was relieved of his duties in December 1972, thanked for his services and paid off with a golden goodbye of about £50.000. He left Old Trafford feeling bitter about his treatment, frustrated that he had never been able to exert any authority while Busby was still around. Many of the players still called him Boss and OTarrell felt he had been let down by him. 'I had never admired a man as much as Matt Busby,' O'Farrell said. 'But when I left Old Trafford I had never been let down by any man as much as by him.' Many of the players, who had not wanned to O'Farrell's self-effacing, low-key character, were glad to see O'Farrell leave. Denis Law said, 'He came a stranger and he left a stranger.'
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