Any manager new to the Champions League pauses for thought. Should I adapt our natural game, he asks, or trust in what works domestically?
Diego Simeone confronted those questions long ago. Hansi Flick posed them to himself for the first time less than a year ago.
Both the long-serving manager of Atletico Madrid and his recently-appointed counterpart at Bayern Munich, who meet on Wednesday in Germany, came up with some pretty good answers when they first took on the most prestigious of club tournaments.
In 2013-14, Simeone instantly led Atletico, who had not gone beyond the European Cup quarter-finals for 40 years, to within a 93rd-minute Sergio Ramos equaliser of winning a final.
Flick did even better. Appointed Bayern’s interim manager, aged 54, he took charge of his first Champions League fixture only last November.
By the middle of August, he was delivering the club’s sixth European Cup triumph. His record in the competition reads: Eight matches, eight wins, 30 goals scored, four conceded.
In Flick's fantastic journey, Barcelona were thrashed 8-2 and in the course of 270 minutes against the best of London, 10 goals were put past Chelsea and Tottenham Hotspur.
In the final, the combined might of Paris Saint-Germain's Neymar and Kylian Mbappe were kept at bay in a 1-0 win, a modest scoreline by the standards of Flick's Bayern.
Once upon a time, Simeone’s Atletico had some of that swagger. In his first eight matches as a Champions League head coach, seven years ago, Atletico racked up 20 goals.
But over the longer term of the Argentinian’s stamping his own rugged personality on the club, a specific image has been set. Flick summed it up yesterday: “Atletico? Defensively sound, compact, hardworking, passionate and always putting pressure on the opposition.”
Atletico have made it to two finals under Simeone, and won two Europa Leagues on his watch largely because they have been wretchedly hard to beat.
They still usually are, as a vibrant Liverpool discovered last March, when they fired off 34 shots to Atletico's 10 at Anfield, and still saw a 2-0 home lead crumble into a 3-2 defeat in extra-time.
Classic Atletico; typical of the club who this summer made keeping hold of Jan Oblak, perhaps the most coveted goalkeeper in the sport, their transfer window priority. Sure enough, they are the only undefeated team in this season’s La Liga so far.
Simeone is proud of that, but also of an Atletico capable of scoring the sort of goal that set up their second victory of the season, against Celta Vigo on Saturday.
A fluid, intricately choreographed move, through Koke’s clever chip, Diego Costa’s superb lay-off and a cut-back pass from Manu Sanchez was finished off by Luis Suarez’s third Atletico goal since he joined from Barcelona.
The goal featured four players and just five touches. It was initiated by two old Simeone loyalists, Koka and Costa, finessed by a young academy graduate, Sanchez, and completed by an illustrious capture from the transfer window, Suarez.
________________________________________________
Gallery: Arminia 1 Bayern 4
________________________________________________
That goal was a glimpse of the slick, imaginative Atletico beyond the rugged image. It’s what some big money has been invested in – €120 million ($141.8m) on the brilliant prodigy Joao Felix in 2019; the taking on of Suarez’s high salary – with a view to grafting onto to the solid foundations that yielded silver medals in the Champions League a sharper attacking edge that might bring gold ones.
As Lucas Hernandez, the Bayern defender who played under Simeone for five seasons before moving to Germany last year, pointed out, Simeone’s Atletico may have a distinct brand, but have developed.
“They will always give you a hard game because they are so tough, and defend so well,” said Hernandez, who played in Bayern's 4-1 Bundesliga win against Arminia Bielefeld on Saturday – a result that leaves the club sitting second in the table, one point behind RB Leipzig. “But you can’t compare them with, say, four years ago. There are different players there now and while they still defend well, they have a lot of quality up front.”
Costa misses the trip to Bayern with injury, and Sanchez concedes his place to Renan Lodi, the squad’s senior left-back. Simeone will also be without Jose Gimenez from central defence and Saul Niguez from midfield, both with fitness issues.
Lucas Torreira, signed on loan from Arsenal at the close of the transfer window, could make his debut in the Champions League, a competition the 24-year-old Uruguayan has yet to play in.
Flick could line-up a Bayern starting XI almost the same as the one that beat PSG to lift the trophy in Lisbon in August, except that Thiago Alcantara has since left for Liverpool.
Hernandez, in form this season, may start at left back instead of Alphonso Davies, while Leroy Sane, the star summer recruit, is still recovering from a knee problem.
Company: Instabug
Founded: 2013
Based: Egypt, Cairo
Sector: IT
Employees: 100
Stage: Series A
Investors: Flat6Labs, Accel, Y Combinator and angel investors
Winners
Best Men's Player of the Year: Kylian Mbappe (PSG)
Maradona Award for Best Goal Scorer of the Year: Robert Lewandowski (Bayern Munich)
TikTok Fans’ Player of the Year: Robert Lewandowski
Top Goal Scorer of All Time: Cristiano Ronaldo (Manchester United)
Best Women's Player of the Year: Alexia Putellas (Barcelona)
Best Men's Club of the Year: Chelsea
Best Women's Club of the Year: Barcelona
Best Defender of the Year: Leonardo Bonucci (Juventus/Italy)
Best Goalkeeper of the Year: Gianluigi Donnarumma (PSG/Italy)
Best Coach of the Year: Roberto Mancini (Italy)
Best National Team of the Year: Italy
Best Agent of the Year: Federico Pastorello
Best Sporting Director of the Year: Txiki Begiristain (Manchester City)
Player Career Award: Ronaldinho
Al Jazira's foreign quartet for 2017/18
Romarinho, Brazil
Lassana Diarra, France
Sardor Rashidov, Uzbekistan
Mbark Boussoufa, Morocco
Hotel Data Cloud profile
Date started: June 2016
Founders: Gregor Amon and Kevin Czok
Based: Dubai
Sector: Travel Tech
Size: 10 employees
Funding: $350,000 (Dh1.3 million)
Investors: five angel investors (undisclosed except for Amar Shubar)
The specs
Engine: 2.0-litre 4-cyl turbo
Power: 247hp at 6,500rpm
Torque: 370Nm from 1,500-3,500rpm
Transmission: 10-speed auto
Fuel consumption: 7.8L/100km
Price: from Dh94,900
On sale: now
Other must-tries
Tomato and walnut salad
A lesson in simple, seasonal eating. Wedges of tomato, chunks of cucumber, thinly sliced red onion, coriander or parsley leaves, and perhaps some fresh dill are drizzled with a crushed walnut and garlic dressing. Do consider yourself warned: if you eat this salad in Georgia during the summer months, the tomatoes will be so ripe and flavourful that every tomato you eat from that day forth will taste lacklustre in comparison.
Badrijani nigvzit
A delicious vegetarian snack or starter. It consists of thinly sliced, fried then cooled aubergine smothered with a thick and creamy walnut sauce and folded or rolled. Take note, even though it seems like you should be able to pick these morsels up with your hands, they’re not as durable as they look. A knife and fork is the way to go.
Pkhali
This healthy little dish (a nice antidote to the khachapuri) is usually made with steamed then chopped cabbage, spinach, beetroot or green beans, combined with walnuts, garlic and herbs to make a vegetable pâté or paste. The mix is then often formed into rounds, chilled in the fridge and topped with pomegranate seeds before being served.
if you go
The flights
Fly direct to Kutaisi with Flydubai from Dh925 return, including taxes. The flight takes 3.5 hours. From there, Svaneti is a four-hour drive. The driving time from Tbilisi is eight hours.
The trip
The cost of the Svaneti trip is US$2,000 (Dh7,345) for 10 days, including food, guiding, accommodation and transfers from and to Tbilisi or Kutaisi. This summer the TCT is also offering a 5-day hike in Armenia for $1,200 (Dh4,407) per person. For further information, visit www.transcaucasiantrail.org/en/hike/
PROFILE OF CURE.FIT
Started: July 2016
Founders: Mukesh Bansal and Ankit Nagori
Based: Bangalore, India
Sector: Health & wellness
Size: 500 employees
Investment: $250 million
Investors: Accel, Oaktree Capital (US); Chiratae Ventures, Epiq Capital, Innoven Capital, Kalaari Capital, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Piramal Group’s Anand Piramal, Pratithi Investment Trust, Ratan Tata (India); and Unilever Ventures (Unilever’s global venture capital arm)
What is the FNC?
The Federal National Council is one of five federal authorities established by the UAE constitution. It held its first session on December 2, 1972, a year to the day after Federation.
It has 40 members, eight of whom are women. The members represent the UAE population through each of the emirates. Abu Dhabi and Dubai have eight members each, Sharjah and Ras al Khaimah six, and Ajman, Fujairah and Umm Al Quwain have four.
They bring Emirati issues to the council for debate and put those concerns to ministers summoned for questioning.
The FNC’s main functions include passing, amending or rejecting federal draft laws, discussing international treaties and agreements, and offering recommendations on general subjects raised during sessions.
Federal draft laws must first pass through the FNC for recommendations when members can amend the laws to suit the needs of citizens. The draft laws are then forwarded to the Cabinet for consideration and approval.
Since 2006, half of the members have been elected by UAE citizens to serve four-year terms and the other half are appointed by the Ruler’s Courts of the seven emirates.
In the 2015 elections, 78 of the 252 candidates were women. Women also represented 48 per cent of all voters and 67 per cent of the voters were under the age of 40.
Our legal columnist
Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
City's slump
L - Juventus, 2-0
D - C Palace, 2-2
W - N Forest, 3-0
L - Liverpool, 2-0
D - Feyenoord, 3-3
L - Tottenham, 4-0
L - Brighton, 2-1
L - Sporting, 4-1
L - Bournemouth, 2-1
L - Tottenham, 2-1
MOUNTAINHEAD REVIEW
Starring: Ramy Youssef, Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman
Director: Jesse Armstrong
Rating: 3.5/5
COMPANY%20PROFILE
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3EName%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Floward%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3ERiyadh%2C%20Saudi%20Arabia%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFounders%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAbdulaziz%20Al%20Loughani%20and%20Mohamed%20Al%20Arifi%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ESector%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EE-commerce%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ETotal%20funding%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAbout%20%24200%20million%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestors%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAljazira%20Capital%2C%20Rainwater%20Partners%2C%20STV%20and%20Impact46%0D%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ENumber%20of%20employees%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E1%2C200%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
