that’s it. The 2021/22 season will end with the biggest game that European football has to offer between two longtime rivals for the coveted title of all. On the one hand, Liverpool, the six-time European champion and one of the best teams on the continent today if not the best. From the other side, Real Madrid, with 13 trophies behind them, a long history and a crazy road that has passed to reach the status quo. Before it all boils down to one big evening in Paris, we took a Liverpool fan and a Real Madrid fan to help you pick. And this time: the coach, the bench and the wineries.
coach
Carlo Ancelotti – “The important thing is not to be in good contact with the footballers, but with the people who play football,” the Italian said in one of the interviews this season, in what probably best sums up his approach to the profession. Unlike many coaches who remain true to their playing methods and principles at all costs, Ancelotti puts his players first at the top of the pyramid, and whatever way he chooses to play is primarily designed to get the best out of them. Even after the crazy turnaround against City, Tony Cross said: “He asked the veterans’ opinion about the substitutions he should make. It describes him perfectly as a coach and shows why the team is working so well.”
At the start of the fourth decade of his coaching career, Don Carlo’s career seemed to be on the wane, but as Real Madrid looked for a coach after Zinedine Zidane, he did not hesitate to call Florentino Perez and offer himself for the job. “I came back to life,” the 62-year-old Italian recently admitted at the championship celebrations, and despite expectations, Real Madrid also looks different. As he promised at his first press conference, the team is more conquering and plays well, with a great atmosphere in a locker room that has known a rift or two in the past. (And only to think that the club would have stepped out of the appointment of Masmiliano Allegri). When he first came to the club in 2013, he led the club to win “Desima” already in its first season. Will he recreate the achievement in his second term if the 14th Cup?
Jürgen Klopp – He turned fans from skeptics, believers, champions after 30 years, to Champions League holders, the English Cup, the League Cup, the European Super Cup and the World Club Championship. Jürgen Klopp is Liverpool and Liverpool have become Jürgen Klopp in the last seven years. The German has built a winning team, a champion, step by step, point-by-point acquisition by point-acquisition and the success of Hardes is first and foremost recorded in his name.
Try to look back and remember what you thought of every player who came to Liverpool. Did you believe that Muhammad Salah, who was acquired from Rome, would control European football? And what about Andy Robertson, Virgil Van Dyke and Trent Alexander Arnold? Klopp took the gene-pressing method with which he made his name in Dortmund, added a host of layers to it and carefully selected players who could execute his game plan in practice. He has already won every possible title as the Herds manager, reached the Champions League final with them three times in five years and with or without the second trophy, will still be one of the great coaches who have been in world football.
bench
Real Madrid – Unlike previous years in which it swung this time it is no longer possible to find names like Albero Murata, Hamas Rodriguez or Matteo Kovacic, who could easily have been car players in other teams. Still, despite the relatively short roster that led to a lack of rotations this season, Ancelotti has managed to “revive” some players who took an important part in the final third of the season, hoping to give the coach options in a game that could reach as many as 120 minutes and penalties.
Andrei Lunin, who has been a mystery since landing on the team as a potential in the summer of 2018, but last month proved he is actually not a bad goalkeeper at all. In addition to the Ukrainian you can find in the back squad Nacho, the loyal home player who no matter what year we are or who the coach is, he will always go up to play in the crucial stages of the season and exceed all expectations, similar to the loyal soldier Lucas and Essex, who last year The right defender. In addition, it is impossible to ignore Captain Marcello, who despite the consistent and steep decline in ability in recent years, manages to occasionally provide magic moments, and it will be interesting to see if he will be responsible for another one in what will probably be his “last dance” in the white uniform.
Like Marcelo, it will also be Isco and Gareth Bale’s farewell game, which will be interesting to see if they share. The last time the Welshman met Liverpool in the final, neither team can forget, each for his own reasons. At the link you can find Eduardo Camavinga, the energetic diamond who fitted in great with the team and took a big part in all its revolutions, along with Danny Sebaios who already looked finished, but has become a legitimate rotation player in recent months. On offense the main solutions are Marco Asensio, who scored against Liverpool last year, and usually fits in better as a replacement for the car player, and of course Rodrigo, who especially loves the Champions League, and proved it with the goals against Chelsea and City. “It will be a game for a lot more than 11 players,” Ancelotti said and rightly so, and it will be interesting to see who he chooses to use.
Liverpool – If in Klopp’s previous seasons Liverpool had a strong first team with meager alternatives, this season it looks completely different and the staff depth is exceptional. So unusual that the German allowed himself to make an extensive rotation against Southampton and still won 1: 2. Last season’s shocking and full of injuries has long been forgotten and every player in the squad has a worthy replacement in case.
So let’s dive into the depths of the bench. Substitute goalkeeper: Quiben Clare, who has already managed to be the hero of one of Liverpool’s titles this season – the League Cup. On defense there is Joe Gomez, who has become an excellent backer for TAA, the Greek scout Costs Tsimikas who has received more credit this season from Klopp and has already cooked six times. Highlight in the back: Ibrahima Konata, who arrived as a prospect for the future and is already threatening the place of Joel Matip in the center of defense alongside Virgil Van Dyke.
Continue. The link has the never-ending James Milner, Nabi Keita who knew some beautiful moments and goals this season, Curtis Jones and Harvey Elliott who are set to lead in the future and have helped in the present as well. And the offense – finally laden with quality: Roberto Firmino who until recently was part of the attacking trio that tore Europe apart, and an origami obsession, which has become synonymous with a super sub and one that is debated over whether he is considered a Liverpool legend. Above all, of course, is Diego Jote, who’s funny not to put him in the squad given the fact that he has scored 21 goals this season, but that’s exactly what the strength of Liverpool’s 2021/22 model has to say. There is someone to trust.
Who is more of a winner in the Champions League?
Real Madrid – Apparently there is no club that is more identified with the top factory on the continent, which is not really surprising. Real Madrid is the champion of wins in history, in the current format of the factory, in the current century, in the last decade or in any category you choose. She has won seven finals since 1981, which means that statistically, if you are alive, there is a good chance you have never seen her lose in the final. So what’s the wonder that the Bernabeu fans sing in every “We are the Kings of Europe?” Game.
For nine players it will be the fifth final of their career, and more than two-thirds of the squad have already experienced at least one Champions League final in their lives, in one class or another, and with such experience it is simply impossible to compete, no doubt that is what pushed you survive. It started with the surprise loss to Sheriff Tiraspol, continued with the bizarre UEFA mistake that turned a slight draw against Benfica Lisbon into a pair of encounters against Paris Saint-Germain, and the plot of what happened in a knockout, do not be surprised if Florentino awards tomorrow to Netflix.
Double lag against PSG 29 minutes to the end? No problem, Kerim Benzema will score a hat-trick in 17 minutes. Chelsea almost with a makeover at the Bernabeu? Modric will find Rodrigo with the False on the way to overtime. City leads 3: 5 in 180 minutes? In five minutes it will be five or five.
Because to beat Real Madrid in the Champions League you have to kill it, it is advisable to make sure a kill and even that will not always be enough against the team that even if it leads 0: 1 until the 93rd minute, one Modric corner for Ramos can change everything. She’s the Undertaker, she’s the phoenix or any other image you choose. She managed to record three losses in a knockout, and still be the only team in history to manage to reach the final with such a balance. Still, can anyone bet against her?
Liverpool – True, it must be admitted that it is very difficult to face Liverpool in this category against the European champions 13 times, the only one to win three times in a row in the Champions League and five in the European Champions Cup, but we will try nonetheless. Each club has its own moments, the ones that go back to them years ago and Liverpool have some that not only its fans go back to.
Because who does not think that the 2005 final in Istanbul is one of the craziest finals seen if not the craziest of them all. In that season, few imagined an option in which Liverpool would even reach the final against Milan, after all, they barely qualified from the home stage, and with a 3-0 deficit in the half, they probably already engraved the letter M on the cup, but the rest? history.
That season there was also that goal of Steven Gerrard against Olympiacos who gave Liverpool the place in the eighth, but should not go too far. Just three and a half years ago there was a moment similar to Allison that provided a stop against Napoli in extra time, which sent Liverpool to the quarter-finals. In the semi-final Barcelona came to Anfield with a 0: 3 advantage from Camp Nou and then came Dibuk Origi and Giorgini Vinaldom, Alexander Arnold took one short corner and the end is known to all.
Of course it should be noted that unlike recent times, Liverpool’s way to the final was quite comfortable, but it was also its beauty – not to get caught up in unnecessary dramas. The “House of Death” Hards finished with 18 of 18 and in the semifinals surpassed in the face of Villarreal’s great comeback attempt. In nine finals Liverpool participated, only three of which they finished without the coveted trophy, including the one in 2018 on which they will want revenge on Real Madrid and the last time the Blancos lost in the final, was in Paris, against Liverpool. Just saying.
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