The Breakdown: Malaga vs Porto

Malaga's debut season in the UEFA Champions League continued after they beat Porto 2-0 in Spain to progress to the last-eight 2-1 on aggregate.

Trailing 1-0 from the first leg, Malaga opened the scoring on Wednesday with a goal just before half-time thanks to a beautiful strike outside the box from Isco.

Porto were then reduced to 10-men shortly after the interval following a second yellow card to midfielder Steven Defour before substitute Roque Santa Cruz wrapped up the tie with a headed goal.

Malaga will now become the first Andalucian team to play in the Champions League quarter-finals.

Malaga

Defence

Trailing 1-0 from the first away leg, Malaga were a little nervous in defence in the opening exchanges on Wednesday as they knew they could not afford to concede an away goal. Weligton was key for them here as they survived a good spell of Porto pressure.

As Malaga began to get more of a stranglehold on the match their defenders began to venture further forward and Porto keeper Helton did well to divert Atunes' strike over the bar.

Caballero - 6.5 | Gamez - 6.5 | Weligton - 7 | Demichelis - 7 | Antunes - 6.5

Midfield

A terrific display from Joaquin on the night although had he been switched on from the very start Malaga could have had an early goal - the Spaniard's poor first touch denied him the chance to run through on goal against the Porto goalkeeper.

However Joaquin's play with Isco was exciting to watch and the latter's brilliantly manufactured goal was worth the ticket price alone.

Finally, credit must also be paid to Iturra who did most of the dirty work for Malaga to allow Joaquin and Isco the freedom to hurt Porto higher up the pitch,

Joaquin (Off 88') - 7.5 | Toulalan - 7 | Iturra - 7 | Isco - 8

Attack

Saviola turned back the clock with an impressive performance for Malaga. Full of energy and intelligent running, the Argentinean made the most of the space afforded to him by a very static looking Porto defence. He had a goal wrongly chalked off and was denied a goal again when Otamendi made a vital block on his shot close at goal.

In contrast, Saviola's partner in attack Baptista did not have a good game. Harshly penalised for fouling the goalkeeper which led to Saviola's disallowed goal but overall he had very little influence on the match.

Saviola (Off 79') - 7.5 | Baptista (Off 74') - 6

SUBS
Santa Cruz made his manager look like a very smart man indeed as he came off the bench to score Malaga's second goal of the game with almost his first touch. Super Sub.

Santa Cruz (On 74') - 7 | Piazon (On 79') - N/A | Camacho (On 88') - N/A

 

Porto

Defence

Helton was the busier of the two keepers as Malaga fashioned 7 shots on goal - and the Porto custodian had to be at his best to tip over an effort from Antunes in the first half. However, he did have some iffy moments including spilling a cross for Saviola to score but it was wrongly ruled out by the officials who felt Baptista had impeded the goalkeeper.

In general, Porto were too flatfooted in defence and they were getting caught out with balls over the top far too easily - the linesman's flag bailed them out on at least two occasions.

Sandro in particular had a poor game while at the other end of the spectrum Mangala put in a heroic shift.

Helton - 7 | Danilo - 6.5 | Mangala - 7.5 | Otamendi - 7 | Sandro (Off 70') - 5.5

Midfield

Moutinho looked the brightest in Porto's three man midfield (4-3-3) and he was only on the pitch for 45 minutes! He has useful knack for being able to create chances for himself and for his team-mates out of nothing and could have scored early in the game had it not been for Weligton's block.

Unfortunately, the midfielder is not match fit at the moment and was taken off at half-time for Rodriguez but the starlet struggled to make an impact as Porto had to reshuffle its pack following Defour's dismissal in the 49th minute.

Meanwhile, Fernando had to work his socks off for his team as Malaga made the extra man count in midfield while Gonzalez had a disappointing game in terms of what he did with the ball when his team went on the attack. He was not nearly direct enough which was a shame as Martinez would have certainly caused Malaga more problems with the ball played to him earlier in attacking moves.

Gonzalez - 6.5 | Moutinho (Off 45') - 6.5 | Fernando - 6.5

Attack

Early in the game Porto's three pronged attack looked quite promising with the movement of Defour, Varela and Martinez sharp.

Varela should be singled out for individual praise as well because Porto's best moves came through him before he was taken just before half-time.

Where it all fell apart for Porto was in the second half when Defour stupidly got himself sent off. The Belgian received a second yellow after bringing down Joaquin.

As a result, Martinez had to feed off scraps for the rest of the game but he almost scored late in the match when he steered a free-kick towards goal, only to see it just off target.

Defour (Off 49') - 4.5 | Martinez - 6.5 | Varela (Off 58') - 6.5

SUBS

Rodriguez found it difficult to escape the attentions of Toulalan and Iturra but did well when he had time on the ball to try and create something.

Maicon came on for Varela in the 58th minute and thought he had made himself a hero by heading home a free-kick late in the game. Instead, it was correctly chalked off for offside as the substitute had drifted beyond the last man before the kick was taken.

Atsu came on for the ineffective Sandro and at least did a better job at defending than his team-mate.

Maicon (On 58') - 6.5 | Rodríguez (On 45') - 6.5 | Atsu (On 70') - 6.5

Source: Hollywood