Hamburg Arena would have loved to see their club, HSV Hamburg in the finals. But even with 'Van the man', this wish was made impossible a fortnight ago by a hardworking Fulham team.
The final between Fulham, lead by Bobby Zamora who missed out on a World Cup call from Fabio Capello, against Athletico Madrid team who had in their ranks the likes of Forlan and Sergia Aguero was always going to be a high tempo affair. And the Hamburg arena did witness an interesting final.
The first half an hour of the match was dominated by the team from Madrid as Forlan and Aguero toyed with the Fulham backline and went close on more than one occassion to open the scoring. Finally Forlan broke the deadlock assisted by Aguero on the 32nd minute. The response from Fulham was swift and Davies scored on the 37th minute after some good work by Zamora.
The second half started with lot of possession for Fulham. It was not until the 65th minute that the Madrid team got a look on the Fulham goalmouth.There were some nice run ins by Gera. Neither team could find the winning goal and the game went into extra time.
Both the team went on attack in the extra time and Forlan turned in yet another Aguero pass, past Mark schwarzer to score the winner. In my opinion a deserved win made possible by a stellar performance from the Uruguayan striker.
Chelsea scouts would have been impressed by the display put up by their summer target, Sergio Aguero.The question is would Madrid be willing to give upon their young Argentinian talent.
