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Although without Mbappé, Madrid is still the club of the galácticos

2022-05-27T04:07:24.738Z


While City and PSG try to emulate the whites' glamour, Liverpool draw strength from the aura of their Heysel and Hillsborough historical dramas: you never walk alone


When Real Madrid lost the first leg of the round of 16 on February 15 in Paris, the world was different.

By the time the second leg was played in Madrid, Russia had already invaded Ukraine.

Football had ceased to be important.

But those who saw Real Madrid miraculously come from behind will never forget it.

This year, the Champions League final takes place at a time when war is raging across Europe.

The venue has been moved from Saint Petersburg to Paris because Russia, the aggressor, has been excluded from the competition.

The autocrat Putin's war is changing the whole world.

The Real Madrid team is the one distracting Europe during this confusing spring.

On their way to the final, they beat last year's finalists Chelsea and Manchester City just as spectacularly as they did with PSG.

Their rivals dominated the match, Madrid surviving critical phases and then surprising their rivals and the football world with bursts of brilliance.

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In the semi-final against City, Real lost by two goals in the 90th minute... and won.

It reminded me of Bayern Munich's painful defeat against Manchester United in 1999 or Chelsea's victory in the

Finale dahoam

in 2012, my personal Waterloo.

In the Premier League, on the other hand, City turned a 0-2 deficit into a 3-2 deficit in five minutes and became champions.

The inexplicable is part of the fascination of football.

Now, Madrid, champion 13 times, faces Liverpool, who have been six times.

As for whether Madrid can pull off another miracle, all eyes are on Karim Benzema.

The best striker in the world represents what Madrid is: talent, genius, intuitive knowledge of the game, belief in his own strength.

Against PSG he scored three goals in 17 minutes, and 10 in the six qualifying games.

He has already equaled Cristiano Ronaldo's record and could surpass him in the final.

Benzema's missteps off the pitch don't make it easy to admire him unreservedly.

But he is one of the greats.

He has already won the Champions League four times.

In Paris, like Luka Modric, Casemiro and Toni Kroos (who won the first of his four titles with Bayern), he could catch up with Alfredo di Stéfano, who forged Real Madrid's myth with the singular winning streak from 1956 to 1960.

Discipline is not something one would associate with Benzema.

Keeping a player like him focused requires a manager who knows who he is dealing with at a club every footballer dreams of playing for.

Carlo Ancelotti, the first coach to reach the final for the fifth time, is a perfect fit for Real Madrid at the moment.

Against City, he changed Kroos, Modric and Casemiro in 10 minutes.

Recognizing the right moment for that coup requires a gut instinct.

And a coach who gets those players to accept that decision from the wing, as Ancelotti does, enjoys absolute credibility.

Galacticos: that has been the hallmark of Real Madrid for more than half a century.

There are the best of the best of each generation.

They come from Spain and South America, occasionally from Europe, usually from the great footballing nations of France, England, Italy and Germany.

City, and especially PSG, emulate Madrid and want a piece of that glamour.

They have been chasing it for a decade without reaching it.

They are still copies, and Madrid, although they have been left without Mbappé, are still the original.

The Madrid players celebrate the victory against City.Ballesteros (EFE)

Liverpool FC follows another course.

The decisive factors in his football are physicality, speed, forward drive in almost every position.

This is how most teams would like to play.

In the Europa League final, Eintracht Frankfurt defeated Glasgow Rangers in an exciting battle.

But no one comes close to Liverpool's excellence: the style of the moment is tailor-made for the working-class port city.

There, in seven years, a unity has been forged between Jürgen Klopp and his players.

He manages to bring Liverpool's “underdog” mentality onto the pitch and draw strength from the aura of the club's historic dramas at Heysel and Hillsborough.

Like all great teams, Liverpool have created an identity that has led them to their third final in five years.

Barça was "more than a club";

FC Bayern was

miasanmia;

at Liverpool, Virgil van Dijk, Trent Alexander-Arnold and Sadio Mané “never walk alone”.

"You will never Walk alone!".

The team is bigger than the individual.

Philippe Coutinho, once the best of Liverpool, did not know how to see it.

He didn't succeed at Barcelona or Munich, and now he plays for Aston Villa.

Egyptian Mohamed Salah, on the other hand, became a star in the Liverpool community.

When he was a 12-year-old boy, he traveled every day by bus for four hours to go to training;

he today he is in the Hall of Fame.

This ambition, this desire to assert itself, characterizes Liverpool.

The contrast with Madrid and Benzema could not be greater.

That's why I have an incredible desire to see this game.

Naturally, we cannot enjoy football in a relaxed way, we cannot forget about the war.

It has repercussions for the peoples of Europe, especially for the Ukrainian.

In the initial league, Real Madrid lost at home against Sheriff Tiraspol, a club from Transnistria.

His coach, Yuri Wernydub, left the team just before the Europa League match against SC Braga on February 24 to go defend his native Ukraine.

A few months ago he was winning at the Bernabéu;

he now he fights with his compatriots on the front line with a gun in his hand.

A football story of the year 2022.

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Source: elparis

All sports articles on 2022-05-27

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