When you're defending a 2-0 away lead in the knockout rounds of the Champions League, the correct move is to defend it. Unlike many, I wasn't expecting a goalfest at Stamford Bridge in the second leg of our tie against FC Copenhagen - there was simply no motivation to do anything until it became evident that the Danes were able to get into the game. Since they probably wouldn't be able to trouble the defence, Chelsea probably wouldn't be that worked up about scoring goals. Getting to the quarter-finals without picking up an injury or tiring out too many players was the goal, and with a scoreless draw Chelsea cruised to said goal.
Not that it was particularly pretty to watch, mind. The Blues rested several big-name players, leaving the likes of Fernando Torres and Michael Essien on the bench, but Ancelotti still stuck with veterans over youth, keeping Josh McEachran off the field and also refusing to give Salomon Kalou a start. Like in Denmark, both teams fielded a 4-4-2, but this time for Chelsea both Didier Drogba and Yuri Zhirkov got starts, and both had fairly good games.
To be honest, I really wasn't that into the match. We all knew that it would take a Copenhagen goal to make things remotely interesting, and they only came close to that once, when Dame N'Doye hit the post from a free kick with Petr Cech wrong-footed. The visitors generated zero chances from open play and managed a grand total of two shots on target, neither of which caused the goalkeeper any trouble at all..
Chelsea, on the other hand, had seven shots on target and a rather remarkable 29 in total (to Copenhagen's eight). They really should have had more than thirty shots over the course of the match though - around Johan Wiland's area they were seemingly incapable of shooting without going through some sort of convoluted passing display, like a secret handshake or something. Nicolas Anelka, who was offside no less than 15,421 times today, was one on one with the goalkeeper twice and shot nonce, which takes some doing. Yuri Zhirkov also contrived to miss two glorious chances, but considering he was falling over while he shot both times I'm inclined to forgive the Russian.
This all would have been monumentally annoying if we'd needed goal(s) to progress, but we didn't, so there's room for magnanimity despite the Blues virtually boring us to death with an uninspired team selection and tactics so boring that I've used boring twice thrice in one sentence. We're through to the quarter finals, and there are more important games ahead. We'll find out our next European opponents on Friday, but in the meantime we have Manchester City at home to worry about this weekend.
I've gotta go now, guys. Carlo Ancelotti's lost Josh McEachran somewhere and he needs help finding him.