Zlatan Ibrahimovic has urged Paris Saint-Germain to finish off Bayer Leverkusen after their 4-0 victory in Germany left them on the verge of the Champions League quarter-finals.
The Sweden star scored two goals in three first-half minutes as the Ligue 1 leaders ran riot at Leverkusen’s BayArena in Tuesday’s last-16, first-leg clash.
Bayer were reduced to 10 men for the final half an hour when Ibrahimovic’s marker Emir Spahic was sent off for a second yellow card.
Ibrahimovic’s two goals left him as the competition’s top-scorer with 10 Champions League goals in six matches, one more than Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo.
This was a five-star performance from PSG, but Ibrahimovic was forthright when asked if this Parisian side was the best team he has played in.
“I’ve played in fantastic teams so difficult to say, you can have a great team, but not win trophies, we need to finish the job first,” said the 32 year old.
Midfielder Blaise Matuidi put PSG ahead with barely two minutes gone before Ibrahimovic netted a penalty, then added a second when he unleashed a thunderbolt of a shot to make it 3-0 at the break.
Replacement Yohan Cabaye then added PSG’s fourth just before the final whistle to complete the rout.
“I have an embarrassment of riches in my team at the moment,” said PSG’s contented coach Laurent Blanc.
“We rediscovered the football we showed in the group stages, it was better than we played at the start of the year and I was pleased to see it.
“The players did really well and I have to praise them for the performance.
“We didn’t want to give Bayer any self-confidence and we tried to make sure they didn’t get any of the ball.
“We kept trying to push forward even when they started getting physical trying to stop us.”
Blanc dampened down growing expectations and said PSG will approach the return leg eager to secure another victory over Leverkusen, who have now lost six of their last eight matches.
“It doesn’t matter how the first leg went, we still have the second to come, obviously this is a big step towards the quarter-finals, but we want to win the return at the Parc des Princes,” said Blanc.
“We have ambitions in this competition.
“This is just one game and we can still meet other teams who have lots of experience, but of course the hopes and expectations are growing.”
Having been routed 5-0 by Manchester United at the end of November in their previous home Champions League match, Leverkusen were again outgunned and outclassed on the European stage.
“In the first half, we played without motivation, with fear,” complained defender Omer Toprak.
“Paris walked over us. It was too easy for them.
“We didn’t win any 50-50 balls, we got nothing.
“Unfortunately we quickly found ourselves reduced to 10 men in the second-half, which was a shame.”
Sami Hyypia-coached Leverkusen now face an unenviable task to try and salvage something from the return leg in Paris on March 12.
“It’s not easy to sit here after a performance like that,” said the ex-Liverpool defender, whose team have lost their last three home games.
“We played against a good team and to be behind after just three minutes only made it harder.
“Paris showed how strong they are.
“In the second-half, we played better after the red card with 10 men than we did with 11.”
ESSENTIALS
The flights
Emirates flies from Dubai to Phnom Penh via Yangon from Dh2,700 return including taxes. Cambodia Bayon Airlines and Cambodia Angkor Air offer return flights from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap from Dh250 return including taxes. The flight takes about 45 minutes.
The hotels
Rooms at the Raffles Le Royal in Phnom Penh cost from $225 (Dh826) per night including taxes. Rooms at the Grand Hotel d'Angkor cost from $261 (Dh960) per night including taxes.
The tours
A cyclo architecture tour of Phnom Penh costs from $20 (Dh75) per person for about three hours, with Khmer Architecture Tours. Tailor-made tours of all of Cambodia, or sites like Angkor alone, can be arranged by About Asia Travel. Emirates Holidays also offers packages.
Brief scores:
Toss: Northern Warriors, elected to field first
Bengal Tigers 130-1 (10 ov)
Roy 60 not out, Rutherford 47 not out
Northern Warriors 94-7 (10 ov)
Simmons 44; Yamin 4-4
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How to watch Ireland v Pakistan in UAE
When: The one-off Test starts on Friday, May 11
What time: Each day’s play is scheduled to start at 2pm UAE time.
TV: The match will be broadcast on OSN Sports Cricket HD. Subscribers to the channel can also stream the action live on OSN Play.
How Tesla’s price correction has hit fund managers
Investing in disruptive technology can be a bumpy ride, as investors in Tesla were reminded on Friday, when its stock dropped 7.5 per cent in early trading to $575.
It recovered slightly but still ended the week 15 per cent lower and is down a third from its all-time high of $883 on January 26. The electric car maker’s market cap fell from $834 billion to about $567bn in that time, a drop of an astonishing $267bn, and a blow for those who bought Tesla stock late.
The collapse also hit fund managers that have gone big on Tesla, notably the UK-based Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust and Cathie Wood’s ARK Innovation ETF.
Tesla is the top holding in both funds, making up a hefty 10 per cent of total assets under management. Both funds have fallen by a quarter in the past month.
Matt Weller, global head of market research at GAIN Capital, recently warned that Tesla founder Elon Musk had “flown a bit too close to the sun”, after getting carried away by investing $1.5bn of the company’s money in Bitcoin.
He also predicted Tesla’s sales could struggle as traditional auto manufacturers ramp up electric car production, destroying its first mover advantage.
AJ Bell’s Russ Mould warns that many investors buy tech stocks when earnings forecasts are rising, almost regardless of valuation. “When it works, it really works. But when it goes wrong, elevated valuations leave little or no downside protection.”
A Tesla correction was probably baked in after last year’s astonishing share price surge, and many investors will see this as an opportunity to load up at a reduced price.
Dramatic swings are to be expected when investing in disruptive technology, as Ms Wood at ARK makes clear.
Every week, she sends subscribers a commentary listing “stocks in our strategies that have appreciated or dropped more than 15 per cent in a day” during the week.
Her latest commentary, issued on Friday, showed seven stocks displaying extreme volatility, led by ExOne, a leader in binder jetting 3D printing technology. It jumped 24 per cent, boosted by news that fellow 3D printing specialist Stratasys had beaten fourth-quarter revenues and earnings expectations, seen as good news for the sector.
By contrast, computational drug and material discovery company Schrödinger fell 27 per cent after quarterly and full-year results showed its core software sales and drug development pipeline slowing.
Despite that setback, Ms Wood remains positive, arguing that its “medicinal chemistry platform offers a powerful and unique view into chemical space”.
In her weekly video view, she remains bullish, stating that: “We are on the right side of change, and disruptive innovation is going to deliver exponential growth trajectories for many of our companies, in fact, most of them.”
Ms Wood remains committed to Tesla as she expects global electric car sales to compound at an average annual rate of 82 per cent for the next five years.
She said these are so “enormous that some people find them unbelievable”, and argues that this scepticism, especially among institutional investors, “festers” and creates a great opportunity for ARK.
Only you can decide whether you are a believer or a festering sceptic. If it’s the former, then buckle up.
Palestine and Israel - live updates
NBA Finals results
Game 1: Warriors 124, Cavaliers 114
Game 2: Warriors 122, Cavaliers 103
Game 3: Cavaliers 102, Warriors 110
Game 4: In Cleveland, Sunday (Monday morning UAE)
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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