David Luiz will come hair to face with former club Benfica
The Champions League quarter-finals draw is out and on paper Barca vs Milan promises to be an even contest depending on whether Leo Messi decides to cut the Serie leaders some slack. There are some personal points of interest too which makes this interesting.
Zlatan Ibrahimovic goes up against his former club which spurned him for David Silva who in turn has fallen out of favour. Milan defender Thiago Silva is being pursued by Barca.
Chelsea vs Benfica will pit former players David Luiz and Ramires against their old club. The Portugese club are running second in their league and if fourth placed Sporting Lisbon’s victory over City, the world’s largest spenders, is anything to go by, the Eagles have cause for optimism. Benfica progressed out of the CL group stage after battling Utd to two draws. So they will be no pushovers.
Bayern vs Marseille should be a no contest if Mario Gomez and the Robbery combination decide to play on the same page. The Bundesliga side have been notoriously inconsistent but of late been stringing some eye raising scores.
Real vs Apoel will centre around Cristiano Ronaldo trying to match that five goal output by Messi. The problem is he’ll try so hard he should make this match marginally interesting. Plus, you have to love the idea of a club from Nicosia, Cyprus playing the part of Goliath slayers.
First legs to be played March 27th and 28th, followed by the return legs on April 2rd and 4th. Semi-finals are scheduled for April 17th and 18th.