Petr Cech save The Day
Only when listening to Petr Cech at
Munich’s Mandarin Oriental Hotel on Sunday morning did it become clear
just how brilliant a performance he delivered on Saturday night.
Only
then did it become clear that Chelsea’s victory was a victory for
intelligence and logic as well as courage, determination and
athleticism; for meticulous preparation on the part of Roberto Di Matteo
as well as guts and guile and the finishing of the irrepressible Didier
Drogba.
Cech sat with a
small gathering of invited journalists, his winner’s medal hanging from
his neck and the European Cup positioned on the carpet in front of him,
and explained how he made the first of three penalty saves.
It was perhaps the most crucial,
awarded to Bayern Munich in the fifth minute of extra time after Drogba
had foolishly felled Franck Ribery. John Mikel Obi played his part,
mischievously informing Arjen Robben that his former Chelsea colleague
would know exactly what he intended to do; that Cech would make the
save.
Cech, it turns out,
was not quite that confident, but the thought process that led to him
choosing the right way — a thought process built on a study of the
Holland winger’s technique — remains incredibly impressive.
‘Robben
always shoots different ways,’ said Cech. ‘There’s no pattern in his
penalties. So I didn’t know what to do with him. Half he shoots to the
right, half to the left. No pattern whatsoever. He even runs up the same
way to the ball.
But when
you’re tired, when you’ve played for 95 minutes, players choose power
rather than technique, rather than placing it. I thought he’d smash it
somewhere near the corner and hope it would go through. He’s
left-footed. I’m left-footed, and I thought if it was me I’d shoot
across, left to right. Which is why I went to my left.’
This is a guy who mastered Spanish in
a month, his fourth language. For this Champions League final he
mastered Bayern’s penalty takers in two hours, destroying the myth that
the Germans always win these shootouts.
Even on the eve of the game Jupp Heynckes was pointing to the superior
mental strength of his compatriots when it comes to scoring from 12
yards. Cech and Chelsea’s penalty takers took a sledgehammer to that
theory. Not least with the saves to deny Ivica Olic and Bastian
Schweinsteiger.
How much did Cech know about Bayern’s
chosen five on Saturday night? ‘Quite a bit because I went six times
the right way for the six penalties,’ he said with a wry smile. ‘I
either guessed pretty well or I was ready to guess pretty well. I’d seen
all the Bayern penalties since 2007. It took me about two hours to go
through them all on a DVD, on the flight over. The coaching staff
studied them too and we took notes. When it came to the shootout I then
said, “Guys, the notes?” But Hilario said, “You don’t need the notes,
you’ll save everything”.
‘Mario
Gomez hit the best penalty. I got close to Manuel Neuer’s. But I’d gone
the right way each time and it would have been impossible to have kept
guessing right and not saved one. That’s what happened. I got a touch on
Schweinsteiger’s, too.’
It was astonishing, not least the way
Bayern contrived to lose the initiative three times. They tossed it
away when they allowed Drogba to cancel out Thomas Muller’s 83rd-minute
opener with a thumping header of his own two minutes from time; again
when Robben missed his penalty and lastly when the shootout was 3-1 in
their favour.
They also
squandered the considerable advantage that came with being at home. A
neutral venue? Try telling that to Chelsea when three-quarters of the
ground was a sea of red. In every respect it was like a home game for
Bayern, even down to the tactics of the teams. Bayern attacked and for
the most part dominated, unleashing 35 attempts to Chelsea’s nine and
earning 20 corners to Chelsea’s one. But it was from that one corner,
delivered by Juan Mata, that Drogba equalised.
The one that got away: Cech was beaten by Thomas Muller's penalty but it proved to count for nothing
In
midfield, in particular, Bayern were excellent, especially Toni Kroos
and Schweinsteiger. What a player Kroos is. But Schweinsteiger could not
watch when Robben took that 95th-minute penalty and the fear of losing a
third title this season clearly got the better of him when it came to
taking Bayern’s final spot-kick.
Under
the guidance of Di Matteo, super cool until he needed to deliver a
stirring speech to his shattered players at the end of normal time,
Chelsea displayed no such nerves.
Winner: Didier Drogba scored the penalty that won Chelsea the trophy
Frank
Lampard and Mikel worked tirelessly in midfield, while David Luiz and
Gary Cahill were magnificent for two centre halves returning from
injury, keeping Gomez quiet with impressive ease.
Luiz
not only confirmed he had suffered a setback with his hamstring injury
on the Thursday but revealed it went again after 20 minutes of this
game. ‘I told myself I’d play with the heart rather than the body,’ he
said afterwards.
In Cech’s
words, ‘Cahill and Luiz were amazing’, and never more so than when Luiz
took that huge run- up before thumping home his shootout penalty
following Mata’s opening miss.
Big winners: Chelsea celebrate their Champions League triumph in Munich
Ashley
Cole was also immense, at left back and when it came to burying his
penalty at a Bayern end that became a wall of sound designed to
intimidate the Chelsea players who had to make that lonely walk from the
halfway line.
To beat
Bayern in the manner they did, to exorcise the ghosts of Chelsea’s
Champions League past, to heal the scars of Moscow, was a credit to all
those involved. From Di Matteo to the Champions League debutant, Ryan
Bertrand.
Home comforts: Chelsea paraded the Champions League trophy in London on Sunday
In
Drogba, though, they had their big-match winner; the scorer of nine
goals in nine cup finals and someone, surely, Roman Abramovich has to
keep at Stamford Bridge.
Where
John Terry had failed in 2008, Drogba succeeded. ‘I was confident,’ he
said as he recalled the thoughts passing through his mind as he marched
towards the penalty spot. ‘I wanted to score for Petr Cech, for my
team-mates, I just wanted to make Chelsea smile.’
He certainly succeeded.
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