Next Wednesday, 11th of March 2015, the all-powerful Bayern Munich will entertain the always dangerous Shakhtar Donetsk at the modern Allianz Arena for the second-leg of the Last 16 stage of the UEFA Champions League. After the first-leg’s goalless draw, there still is plenty of uncertainty around what the Ukrainian side will be able to achieve against one of the most powerful teams of the Old Continent and even if they are capable of causing Bayern a major upset.

The war conflict in the Ukraine has been having a huge negative influence on people’s everyday life and on football itself. In a recent interview, Shakhtar’s head coach, the old Romanian fox Mircea Lucescu, has admitted that everyone is doing their best to keep the players’ spirits up, but such is proving to be a gigantic task for all of those involved. Lucescu has also praised his team’s performance for the first-leg match and, although he acknowledged Bayern’s immense quality, he granted that his team will try to leave a good impression through the way they play.

When both sides measured forces last month in the Ukraine, Shakhtar put up an overall good performance and, although Bayern enjoyed from the best chances to score, Mircea Lucescu’s boys did good.

On the Ukrainian Premier League, Shakhtar are currently on the second place of the table behind the long time sleeping giants of Dynamo Kiev, who are having a memorable campaign so far this season, without a single defeat for the 16 matches they took part in.

For the clash against Bayern, the Romanian manager will most definitely not be able to rely on the contribution of the flamboyant Brazilian midfielder Barnard and of Kryvtsov, since both are currently sidelined due to injury problems.

As for Bayern, they are once again displaying all their power at Bundesliga and they will surely be coronated champions at the end of the season. Pep Guardiola continues to develop a team that has only been defeated once at Bundesliga this season and that is, using Mircea Lucescu’s words, “...the World’s strongest football team at the moment.”.

Last weekend, Bayern didn’t experience many difficulties to overcome Hannover, thus securing their nineteenth win in 24 matches so far this season.

For next Wednesday’s clash against Shakhtar, Pep Guardiola will not be able to rely on the services of the Spanish midfielder Xabi Alonso, who is currently suspended.

Despite Shakhtar’s good performances at the UEFA Champions League so far, Bayern Munich are firm favourites for the upcoming match.

Bayern Munich

Stats: W-4 L-0 D-1

Recent Form - WWWWD

Shakhtar Donetsk

Stats: W-3 L-0 D-2

Recent Form - DWWDW

Possible Line-ups

Bayern Munich (3-4-3) - Neuer - Badstuber - Dante - Boateng - Alaba - Ribery - Schweinsteiger - Bernat - Robben - Müller - Lewandowski

Shakhtar Donetsk (4-2-3-1) – Pyatov - Srna - Stepanenko - Kucher -Shevchuk - Fred - Fernando - Ilsinho - Taison - Costa - Adriano

Prediction

Bayern Munich 2 Shakhtar Donetsk 0