And if you asked the Real Madrid fans that same question you’d get exactly the same answer.

Sick of being second best to Barcelona, sick of football they view as pragmatic they want their cake and to eat it.

With champagne, and golden spoons and second helpings.

But if you asked the President, Florentino Pérez or Madrid’s debutant coach, Rafa Benítez the same ‘just what is it that you want to do?’ question the answer might be different.

Much more pragmatic.

Thursday’s Champions League draw gives them a group perfectly balanced not only for an assault on Europe but for the right kind of early season test.

Paris St Germain have shown over the last three seasons with Barcelona and Chelsea [ten games, two wins, four draws, four defeats] that they are on the rise and that they can threaten anyone on their day.

Not a side Madrid have to fear but one which will mean Los Blancos will need to focus and find top gear [no Primal Scream reference there] in order to subdue.

Madrid start at home, and their first away trip is far easier and less tiring than PSG’s.

Their final group game is at home and against, nominally, the weakest team. Even the schedule is on their side.

However, and this might be heretical, is winning the Champions League actually Benitez’s priority?

‘Just what is it you want me to do, Florentino?’ might well be Rafa’s question to the Madrid President.

Los Blancos have won the Spanish title twice in the last eight years.

Their fans and some of their ‘cyclops-vision’ media not only crave it, they crave the opportunity to wave two fingers at their city neighbours, Atlético, who won the title more recently, and Barcelona, who’ve dominated La Liga for a decade.

More, Carlo Ancelotti was shown the door in the summer just 12 months after winning the Champions League so dramatically against Atleti.

A victory which, if you consider the alternative for Madrid, should really have earned him another five years of job safety at the Bernabéu. It didn’t.

Major League Concerns

So whatever the sheen of Madrid’s history says, whatever the threat of Barça closing the European Cup gap between them still further Rafa Benítez must prioritise doing something he’s not achieved since the last time he coached in Spain, eleven years ago – winning the title.

Will that undermine trying to win La undécima? Madrid’s eleventh Champions Cup?

The answer lies with Ronaldo. Whatever the club’s ambitions he wants more Champions Leagues, he wants to haul Messi back in the Ballon D’Or voting and, judging by his variety of sour looks in Monte Carlo on Thursday, he wants to win the UEFA Best Player In Europe back.

Vitally, too, Ronaldo wants to edge ahead of Messi with whom he’s tied at 77 goals apiece at the top of the all-time Champions League scoring list.

With nine games of Rafa in charge Madrid have failed to score on five occasions, usually with Ronaldo absent.

So, I think there’s some fun in the Ronaldo-Messi betting.

The End of His Ron

Ronaldo has significantly outscored his rival over the last four Champions League seasons – by nine.

The last time Messi beat Ronaldo to UCL top scorer was in 2011/12 – coincidentally the last time he had a shot at Bayer Leverkusen or Bate, Barça’s new group rivals.

Against Bernd Leno, Leverkusen keeper, Messi scored six in two matches. In Borisov he put two past BATE.

Clues for this season?

Ronaldo hasn’t faced [and thus not scored against!] any of Madrid’s group rivals.

So, a priori, it might be worth an investment that Messi outscores Ronaldo this Uefa season, finishes Champions League top scorer and, thus, establishes the all-time lead.

Valencia, qualifiers, have a group in which Zenit and Lyon are both within Los Che’s orbit – beatable but, equally, capable of exploiting Nuno Espirito Santo’s team if they perform dozily.

The key to qualification is taking at least seven points from the first three games – home to Zenit, away to Lyon and then home to the weakest club, Gent.

In fact having home then away back-to-back matches with the Belgians is manna from heaven in terms of qualifying for the knockouts.

If you run a fantasy football team or like to look for less than obvious scorers then think about Sofiane Feghouli who just loves Uefa football and consistently rises to the challenge.

Their Group to Luis

Barcelona, who I think are capable of being the first to retain this competition, were given a draw that the naive think was wonderful but which will concern Luis Enrique.

Ex coach of Roma he’ll understand how hostile it is there and that starting at the Olympic Stadium in Italy’s capital is no ‘gimme’.

That their third fixture is also away, in Belorussia, means that the reigning champions need to start with concentration and hunger.

You’re laughing at me? BATE Borisov you splutter?

Beat Athletic Bilbao last season, thumped Bayern Munich the season before. BATE better than Barça, no. A niggly little test, yes.

And Now For Sevilla And Atlético

Which leaves the two sides who play at the Sanchez Pizjuan on Sunday night [19.30, Sky] – Sevilla and Atlético.

Atleti catch Benfica [whose striker Jonas didn’t mind a goal or an assist against the Colchoneros during his time with Valencia] at a good time given their consistent sales policy and the loss of influential coach Jorge Jesus.

Galatasaray and Astana carry their levels of threat/difficulty but Diego Simeone’s side is so hard working, so well balanced and so bloody stubborn that they’ll win the group regardless.

Sevilla? Well aside from the €20m cash windfall of qualifying the Champions League has brought them the reality of fighting for elbow room at Europe’s elite table.

Manchester City, Juventus and Borussia Mönchengladbach [who Sevilla put out of Europe last season] may prove too much for qualification, especially after losing three key players in Vidal, M’Bia and Bacca and needing to integrate new guys like Immobile, Konoplyanka and Llorente.

But, could Sevilla surprise everyone again by qualifying? Might they even retain the Europa League for the second consecutive time if not?

This Weekend

As for Sunday, it’s now six Liga and Cup matches since Sevilla beat Atleti at home.

There’s ill feeling between the sides who jostle to be considered third best in Spain – nearly eight bookings per match, average, over the last four meetings if you are a card-counter.

A splurge of reds in the Copa a couple of seasons ago.

Sevilla are nobody’s mugs though having lost just once at home since March 2014 [2-3 to a Ronaldo hat trick in May]

Griezmann, Llorente and a Coke/Koke any time might pay.

Score draw. 2-2 at 14/1.

Atleti: Oblak; Juanfran, Godín, Gímenez, Felipe; Koke, Gabi, Tiago; Oliver; Griezmann, Torres/Jackson
Sevilla: Beto: Coke, Rami, Kolo, Tremoulinas: Banega, Krykowiak: Vitolo, Iborra, Reyes: Immobile/Llorente

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Football, the ultimate team sport, is once again under his thumb.

Since January 4 this year Juve, as a squad, have scored 60 times in all three of their competitions.

Since January 4 Messi, alone, has scored 36 and given 14 goal assists – it’s completely remarkable.

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He ripped up the Copa del Rey final last weekend with two beautiful goals and a clever part in the third.

When the big games arrive – so does Lionel Andrés.

One of my early interviews with him was Autumn 2006 when he was admitting that it had been a flash of temper which made him refuse to go down to the pitch in Paris and celebrate with his team mates after Barça beat Arsenal in the Champions League final.

Not being named in the match squad by Frank Rijkaard had absolutely infuriated him.

He closed that subject with a:

God willing I’ll be back to lift that trophy a few times in the future.

Well, he’s had the opportunity twice and in both 2009 and 2011 he took that opportunity by scoring past Edwin Van Der Sar twice.

Not a bad record. (Ex Juventus keeper Van Der Sar was 38 when he first conceded to Messi in a Champions League final, Gigi Buffon is 37).

But add this context. Messi has played in 23 ‘final’ matches for Barcelona – 12 ‘one-off’ finals and 11 other ‘home-and-away’ finals. 23 matches … 20 Messi goals.

Of those 18 finals he’s only lost three.

And it might guide you to know that the only one-game finals Barcelona have lost with Messi in their side are the ones where he hasn’t scored – the 2006 Spanish Supercup and the Spanish Copa finals of 2011 and 2014.

Stop Messi and you have a chance – that’s the message.

During 2015 he’s shown his big-game mentality. Goals home and away against the reigning champions – Atlético. Goals in key matches against Valencia, Sevilla, Athletic and the Catalan derby with Espanyol plus a nifty assist for the first goal against Madrid in the Clásico.

Notwithstanding all that – IF you want to oppose him, oppose Barça then perhaps there’s a gentle hint.

He’s gone from having scored eight in six Champions League games during the 2014 group stage to having scored twice in six games in the 2015 knock-out matches.

Okay – he was just stunning despite not scoring in the home win over Manchester City

And the two he did get, plus an assist, were in the epic 3-0 semi-final win over Bayern.

But, figure it as you wish, there’s been a drop-off in him hitting the net in the Champions League this calendar year.

So, how do you rate the test that lies in front of him?

He’s never played Juventus competitively, never played Italy either. Thus it is that despite he and Buffon having played well over 1500 competitive club and international matches between them they’ve never gone toe-to-toe.

Who wins – the good big one or the great little one? Lucky it’s not boxing.

Might Buffon (below) in any way intimidate Messi – it’s not so ludicrous?

Messi’s penalty misses tend to come against keepers he thinks loom large in the goal. Something he once told me about Abbiatti at Milan.

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Speaking of Milan, Messi’s faced the defensive strategies of Juve coach Maxi Allegri eight times in the Champions League when he’s been in charge of the Rossoneri. Eight times, eight goals.

Where else might there be some fun? I pointed out last week that Barcelona have just begun to drift a little from nearly an entire season of excellence defending set plays or the ball into the box from open play.

But conceding like that to Bayern, Deportivo La Coruña and now Athletic [Iñaki Williams] in the Copa final tends to indicate that this is where Juve will surely concentrate. Chiellini, Pogba, Vidal, Morata all look like goalscorer candidates.

Of the two golden veterans, Pirlo (above) and Xavi, only the Italian is sure to start. But is Iniesta fully fit after his calf problem? Might Xavi get some game time? Probably, yes.

Pirlo scoring a direct free kick ain’t the daftest idea, Pirlo perhaps winning the MVP [if there’s a market on that] isn’t outright crazy.

Xavi said last week:

I adore watching Pirlo play, we’ve been facing each other for club and country since we were kids.

They’ll probably be playing together in Qatar from next season.

So, Xavi? Well he has a remarkable record. Goal assists in each of the two Champions League finals in which he’s played. A goal assist in each of the two European Championship Finals in which he’s played.

A goal and a goal-assist in two of this three Copa Finals against Athletic Bilbao, a goal against Juventus the last time they faced each other, a goal assist in the World Cup semi final, a goal and an assist in the World Club Cup final.

If he’s on the pitch at any stage on Saturday night then you might want to back him as an anytime goalscorer.

This is quite possibly Barcelona’s tightest final since Sampdoria took them to extra-time in 1992.

I reckon both teams to score. Then either 2-1 Barcelona or 2-2 and penalties. But if Messi wants it, if Messi performs – don’t back against him. It’s that simple.

Graham’s best bets:

• Both teams to score and Barcelona to win @13/5
• Barcelona to win 2-1 @ 12/1. 

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Each club was given around 39,000 tickets for this blue-riband match in a 98,000 capacity stadium – but you can expect to see red and white ribands, scarves, txapela hats, strips, banners and flags everywhere.

The Barça fans will be present, don’t worry about that. But so absolutely enormous is the hunger from the Athletic support to see their first trophy since 1984 that you can expect black market briefs to have landed in Basque hands. To the extent that, I guarantee, some Barcelona fans will have sold the tickets they won in the club lottery to Athletic fans just in order to fund a trip to Berlin for the Champions League final next Saturday.

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If you are old enough to remember how the FA used to allocate the Tartan Amy about fifteen or twenty tickets for Wembley but by the time kick off came there were at least 60,000 of us there …. like that.

• NB: If you are shading the odds based on location and the fact that Athletic have only won 18 times in 87 years of visits to the Camp Nou bear this in mind.

The concept of travelling fans in Spanish football is utterly different from the UK and Ireland. If any away team takes 1000 supporters to an away ground that’s regarded as pretty stellar. In La Liga there’s no guaranteed quota for ‘away fans’ to the extent that there is in the Premier or Champions League.

Thus if there are upwards of 50,000 Athletic fans in the Camp Nou, and I think there will be, then that utterly changes the atmosphere from any visit by Los Leones to play Barcelona in any of their home stadia.

There are a few famous occasions of mega favourites [mostly Madrid] losing the cup final in their home stadium. On their centenary in 2002 and in Jose Mourinho’s last ever Madrid game when they lost to Atleti in that dramatic 2013 Copa Final.

This is a fantastic photo of Barcelona fans’ tribute to Xavi at the Nou Camp. pic.twitter.com/QCZLf1UyN9

— Paddy Power (@paddypower) May 27, 2015

The second thing to establish is that if there has ever, in the history of this crazy sport of ours, been a support which is able to exhibit primeval levels of desire, and to transmit that sufficiently for their team to narrow the quality gap on an opponent – it’s the support of the Athletic fans.

That last trophy they won was in May 1984 against Diego Maradona‘s Barça [and it ended in Bruce Lee-Enter the Dragon style scenes between the two sets of players because of bad blood over the Butcher of Bilbao Andoni Goikoetxea-Maradona incident earlier that season] but they’ve lost their three subsequent cup ties against Barça, including the Copa Finals of 2009 and 2012, on an 8-2 aggregate.

However, believe me, it was a life-changing experience to listen to the Athletic fans at the Calderón Stadium three years ago. They’d just lost the Europa final 3-0 to Atlético and this was a gambler’s last-gasp chance at redemption.

Within what felt like the blink of an eye they were not only 3-0 down, again, but being toyed with. It was Bambi versus the Terminator. But, boy, those fans just never let up – a Phil Spectator Wall of Sound from start to finish. Part encouragement to their battered players, part pure defiance. Just monumental.

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At the end of the match when Barcelona were celebrating, Xavi and Puyol sought out an Ikurriña [Basque] flag [It’s red with a white cross superimposed on a green X] paired it with the Catalan ‘Senyera’ flag and placed them both, symbolically, in the centre circle together. A real gesture of respect.

These are the two sides which have most won La Copa and it is a regular pairing in the final too. But recent years have seen not only a resurgence of the ‘Clásico’ final but a complete alteration of Real Madrid‘s valuation of winning the domestic knockout tournament.

Thus, make no mistake, there’s a reason why this isn’t being held at the Santiago Bernabéu as Athletic wanted it to be – Florentino Pérez has got the huff.

Remember the days when not everyone could afford a football, and one dumpy kid whose parents splashed out on him every Christmas would sulk: ‘It’s my ball and if you wont’ pass to me I’m leaving, and it’s coming with me’? That’s our Florentino.

Carlo Ancelotti sacked, Rafa Benitez as good as confirmed, money to be spent, David De Gea likely to join… the last thing old Don Florentino wanted was for Basques or, worse, Catalans to be celebrating in ‘his’ stadium as they lifted the Copa up to the skies

This is the first trophy Rafa will be expected to lift when the final is played next season, in April most likely. Just watch Los Blancos clamour to hold the final in the Bernabéu or the Camp Nou then if they’ve qualified!

But… to business. If this is to be Athletic’s Copa then by far the most likely route to glory is a set play. Or the second ball off one. Barcelona are markedly better at defending them this season but lately have lost goals to both Bayern and Deportivo in this way.

Athletic have a couple of powerful weapons in this department – both Aritz Aduriz [by far their leading all-comps scorer this season, all time stat = three goals v Barcelona] and their ex-Liverpool stopper, Miki San Jose [six goals this season, none in nine v Barcelona], are aerially adept.

Bet your bottom dollar that Luis Enrique, and his tactical/strategic guru Juan Carlos Unzué will put special emphasis on Barcelona not conceding corners or free kicks in their own half.

But here’s the rub. Plenty of Ernesto Valverde‘s players have figures like: Played Barcelona 15/18/20 times Won: 1. If you want reason to believe that some kind of ‘opposition’ to Barcelona might be worth your while when you punt then it’s got to be based around the coach, Valverde.

For Athletic, in his first spell over a decade ago, for Espanyol and for Valencia he’s turned up a series of draws home and away and he won his first Catalan derby as Espanyol coach 3-1 – albeit as the Frank Rijkaard era became moribund.

Barcelona have been in ‘off’ mode since beating Atlético at the Calderón two weeks ago – valuable rest and recuperation for tired minds and bodies. But will that give them turbo-charged sharpness and power to overhaul Athletic in a blitzkreig first half …. or will it leave them just a little sluggish and vulnerable to being closed down?

Is Luis Suárez‘ hamstring fully healed?

The obvious thing to point to is that Messi loves playing Athletic – 15 goals in 22 matches against them. He doesn’t hate finals either. He’s only lost four of 17 with Barcelona and in the 22 matches those finals have entailed he’s scored 18 times plus given four goal assists.

Graham’s Bets

So, in summary. Barcelona should win, it’s far from ludicrous to suggest that Athletic might make them struggle to do so – in fact backing FCB to have to come from 1-0 down and win 2-1 doesn’t look a hopeless cause to me.

Messi, Aduriz, Piqué, San Jose and possibly [finally!] Iniesta might be worth ‘any-time’ shouts.

• Barcelona to come from behind and win – 13/2
• Barcelona to win 2-1 – 17/2
• Iniesta to score anytime – 12/5

If there was a market where you can back which fans will make more noise, throughout… back the Basques.

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This is the definition of an intriguing wee fixture carrying far more history, and ‘sizzle’ than is immediately apparent.

The reigning champions against a side which has been brutally asset-stripped since Manuel Pellegrini left.

No-brainer, right?

Hold your horses. Since Málaga drew at home to Barcelona in late September (preventing Messi and Co from getting a single effort on target and making it seem like Javi Gracia’s mob had about 15 players on the pitch) they’ve played six times and won five. Fifteen points via five back-to-back victories – one short of the club’s all-time record. Interestingly, too, the Malagueños have only won away to Atlético three times in history – but two of them have been in the last five visits (since Jan 2010).

• In fact, in those last five matches at the Calderón, Málaga have two single-goal defeats (2-1 each time), two wins (0-2, 0-3) and last season’s 1-1 draw.

On which point, that draw should make this a grudge match for Diego Simeone’s lads. On the penultimate day of the season Málaga had nothing to play for, bar pride, but led 1-0 until relatively late and battled like it was for their lives. Barça drew at Elche that weekend so a win for Atlético would have meant the title and an ability to rest key players (particularly the injured Diego Costa) at the Camp Nou and get them fit and fresh for the Champions League final against Madrid which they failed to win by a handful of seconds before collapsing, exhausted, in extra time. NB the Spanish for revenge is ‘revancha’.

Foto del partido #VamosMalaga pic.twitter.com/tmFyNziDWp

— Samuel Garcia (@samuel7garcia) October 19, 2014

Nordin Amrabat, Málaga’s leading scorer (three) is out injured and although he’s not prolific I like Samuel Garcia as an anytime goalscorer at 11/2. Scored a brilliant goal at Atlético in that 1-1 draw last May, and two crackers in Málaga’s last four wins. P.S. Málaga’s last two away wins have cost the opposition coaches their jobs – Albert ‘Chapi’ Ferrer at Córdoba and Jagoba Arrasate at Real Sociedad. But if Paddy offers you odds on Diego Simeone to complete the hat-trick – politely refuse to invest your money, okay?

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Eibar v Real Madrid, Saturday 5pm

Spanish football does many things well but has made a real botch-up of the Copa Del Rey. Cup ties (coming to a Sky Sports 5 midweek soon) are now home and away, ensuring that giant-killing is now as rare as finding a genuine, full-blooded, club-wielding, 15ft giant with a long beard and a stroppy attitude. So treasure this game. It’s as close to the magic of the FA Cup 3rd round as the Spanish game has.

The world’s best-known club, against one from a Basque town of 27,000 inhabitants. Played in a stadium which houses fewer than 6000 spectators, with several hundred watching from the terraces of tower blocks which surround the partially-open Ipurúa ground. This is Eibar’s first time in the top league in 74 years but they’ve played Madrid at home once before, in the Cup 10 years ago. A bonkers night which finished 1-1 but during which Iker Casillas had to excel.

The even better story, beyond the kitsch, is that Gaizka Garitano has got his side playing confidently, with great order and a dash of daring. The fact that Luka Modric is absent injured and Madrid’s central midfield needs re-jigging, will probably be better tested on bigger pitches than this. But elite coaches hate, just hate, that post International break threat of players having ‘relaxed’ and not yet being back in their club mindsets.

VULNERABILITY is the word which makes them lose sleep and snap irritably at the missus. Is this the moment to recommend that you back the total underdogs? I’m not certain Madrid (read Ronaldo) won’t cope. However if you wanted to favour Eibar then when they’ve had two weeks of planning, concentrated tactics and training, when Modric is out, when the game’s at Ipurúa and the referee has a record of Madrid only winning 17 of 31 games when he’s been in charge …. then there won’t be a better moment I’d venture.

Así celebró el capitán Mikel Arruabarrena su gol ante el Villarreal CF. (FotoVAVEL: Ricardo Larreina) pic.twitter.com/ozsM3lwvq1 — SD Eibar VAVEL (@Eibar_VAVEL) September 24, 2014

If the improbable is to happen Eibar would need their ‘pichichi’ Mikel Arruabarrena to score but not only should Madrid bring home the bacon, I’m sure they’ll score no matter how the game goes. Thus to win the Basques, who play in ‘Barça’ colours, would need a special ‘jack-in-the-box- goal’. Who better than Catalan, ex Barça B Abraham who scores once in a blue moon but hit an absolute pearler at Atlético this season?

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Barcelona v Sevilla, Saturday 7pm

I suggested a couple of weeks ago that Celta might win at the Camp Nou, and they did. When Barça failed to score that day it was the first time that had happened since Sevilla drew 0-0 there in October 2011.

That day the now pretty-much-forgotten Javi Varas seemed to have a personal grudge against Messi capped by saving his 90th min penalty.

Now it’s Unai Emery’s Sevilla who visit the Camp Nou and, like Celta, they have the pace, the technique, the attitude and the counter attack to win. Particularly following an international fortnight which can leave elite players sloppy and sluggish in its aftermath.

Messi will face Beto for the second time in 5 days pic.twitter.com/KEIsNnbQ8s

— Hzz. (@fcbtitto) November 22, 2014

Perhaps the best reason to suggest that won’t happen this time is, again, the Messi/Sevilla goalkeeper situation. Emery (who’s never beaten Barça as a coach) suddenly has doubts about the hero of last season, Beto, and the keeper has looked gaffe-prone. Messi keeps missing chances which he’d normally bury but he’s still getting goals and assists thus when he re-calibrates by a few millimetres and overtakes the all-time La Liga scoring record (two goals to overtake Zarra) then you’d guess a splurge of hitting the net will follow such a pressure release. More, Luis Suárez utterly changed Barcelona two weeks ago when they played poorly at Almeria but won. You’d take both teams to score, perhaps an M’Bia header for Sevilla but both Messi and Suárez to save some Catalan blushes.

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Deportivo v Real Sociedad, Saturday 9pm

Hail to the Scotia Nostra in Spain. Jack Harper, a talented young striker at Real Madrid, Ian Cathro, assistant coach at Valencia and now David Moyes in charge of Royalty. La Real have shown this season that when they play with pace and confidence they’ll give anyone a game. Fortunate beyond belief to squeeze past Aberdeen the effort absolutely knackered them and they’ve only managed to beat the Russian Cup finalists, the Spanish Champions and the European champions since.

David Moyes believes the @RealSociedad job is his biggest challenge & also believes #LaLiga is superior to the #BPL. pic.twitter.com/CNgJ6eiETS — Lineups (@LineupsApp) November 14, 2014

All week Moyes has worked hardest on two things – winning the ball back aggressively and quickly when it’s lost and the strategy of set plays.

• La Real go to a ground where they’ve won just six times in 36 visits, just twice in the last 10.

Depo, in the hands of a talented coach in Victor Fernández (do the names Nayim, David Seaman, Paris and 1995 help remind you who he is) are short of goals, short of talent, really, but they whipped Valencia 3-0 when Los Ché turned up lacking in intensity and concentration.

Can a foreign coach who has had to work through an interpreter and has only really been in charge for eight or so sessions impose his wishes, conquer La Real’s notoriously fragile confidence away from home and squeeze goals out of the under-performing Carlos Vela, Imanol Agirretxe or Alfred Finnbogason? Yes, by jove, yes he can! No worse than a score draw, Vela and Agirretxe to help out there and possibly even a 1-2 away beginning. Go on, Moysie.

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Borussia Dortmund

The German side are unbeaten against Ukrainian opposition in European competition, winning five and drawing one of their sex meetings. They are doing well in their domestic league but trail Bayern Munich by 15 points in the Bundesliga and are unlikely to close that gap. These two teams are in fact pretty evenly matched and that shows in the odds with both teams at odds of 13/8 to come away with a win here.

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Forget any notion of Spanish sunshine, Real can expect temperatures to drop as low as -5C in Moscow for their round of 16 first-leg clash against the Army Men (CSKA Moscow 7/1 draw 10/3 Real Madrid 4/9 – 90 minutes).

However, the freezing weather is likely to be the only obstacle standing in the way of Spain’s capital club recording a fourth straight away win on the road in Europe so far this season.

Jose Mourinho’s men have also not even conceded a goal away from the Santiago Bernabeu and the Portuguese coach, a two-time winner of Europe’s elite club competition, has too many established professionals at his disposal to worry about the cold.

The La Liga table-toppers ’scored in both halves’ away to Lyon and Ajax in the Champions League already this season, so the 6/5 about the same outcome at the Stadion Luzhniki could appeal.

CSKA will draw inspiration from a record against Spanish opponents which shows no defeats in a total of five games, home and away, but Real Madrid are a class above and a lack of genuine match sharpness means this is a massive ask for the Russians.

Leonid Slutsky will also be missing Russia’s number one goalkeeper, Igor Akinfeev, meaning Sergey Chepchugov will make only his seventh appearance for the club.

If under-pressure Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas is hoping for a kind fixture at the Stadio San Paolo away from the spotlight, he is sadly mistaken.

Napoli ended Manchester City’s hopes in the Champions League group stage and will be desperate to claim another Premier League scalp when the west Londoners arrive in Naples for the first-ever meeting between the two sides.

Since returning to continental competition after 13 years in 2008, the Serie A high-flyers have gone 11 matches unbeaten and, priced generously at 13/10 (draw 9/4, Chelsea 9/4 – 90 minutes), stand their best chance of adding to the turmoil at Stamford Bridge.

Chelsea have slipped out of the top four in the Premier League and were held to a 1-1 draw by Championship side Birmingham in the fifth round of the FA Cup on Saturday, while Villas-Boas has been forced to deny claims his job is on the line and Daniel Sturridge has rubbished reports of a dressing-room revolt.

Forget the behind-the-scenes nonsense, the truth is Chelsea are not playing well enough – they have won just one of their last six games in all competitions – a 1-0 win away at QPR in the FA Cup – and the best they can hope for in Italy is to avoid defeat.

This is the stage Napoli’s principal striker Edinson Cavani relishes and he scored twice against Roberto Mancini’s men.

At 11/8, and against a vulnerable Chelsea defence potentially missing John Terry, the Uruguay powerhouse simply cannot be ignored to ‘score anytime‘.

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Manchester United are currently second in the Group C table, after one win and two draws from their opening three fixtures.  The Reds host Romanian minnows Otelul Galati on Wednesday night and are heavy favourites to secure the victory at 1/10, the visitors are a massive 25/1 to record a shock win at Old Trafford and the draw is 9/1.

United should have no problems in seeing off their Romanian opponents and in the half-time/full-time market a Manchester United/Manchester United result pays out at 1/4. Boss Sir Alex Ferguson is set to name a strong side as although Otelul shouldn’t represent a massive test United need to secure the victory to bolster their chances of reaching the latter stages and Javier Hernandez can be backed at 5/2 to open the scoring.

Manchester City desperately need to secure three points in their trip to Villarreal. The Premier League leaders have impressed domestically but have struggled in Europe and have won one, drawn one and lost one so far, leaving them third in the Group A table.

A loss for Villarreal would be catastrophic as they are yet to register a single point in Europe after three games.  It promises to be a hard-fought game at El Madrigal on Wednesday but City should have the quality to secure the win against Villarreal, who are also struggling for form in La Liga, and City are 8/13 to come away as winners, while the hosts are 5/1 and the draw is 11/4.

Boss Roberto Mancini is expected to include Manchester derby hero Mario Balotelli in his Champions League squad for the first time this season. The temperamental Italian has missed the first three games of the campaign due to a suspension that has been hanging over him since last season but Balotelli has plenty of Champions League experience, having been a member of the Inter Milan squad that secured the title in 2010.  Balotelli is priced at evens to score at any time and considering his form of late it could be worth backing the 21-year-old to hit the target in Spain on Wednesday.

The pick of Wednesday night’s ties is arguably Real Madrid’s trip to Lyon, in what could well be an entertaining contest. The Spanish giants have picked up maximum points in their three fixtures to date, while Lyon are level on points with Ajax in the Group D table. A win for Real would see them  qualify for the next round and the La Liga league-leaders should be able to get the better of the French outfit, with a Madrid victory priced at 8/13.

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