Alfredo Di Stefano Stadium was the place where Liverpool visited Real Madrid in the UCL quarter-finals. We got player ratings.
With a total of 19 European Cups between both, Real Madrid and Liverpool played the first-leg quarter-final tonight. Before the game. Jurgen Klopp wanted to create a small distraction by criticizing the Alfredo Di Stefano Stadium by calling it a “training ground”. This was just another tactic to distract the world from the dismal season Liverpool has at the moment. But tonight was a perfect day for them to recover against a limited Real Madrid. Before the match, Los Blancos got the news of Raphael Varane’s Covid-19 infection, he missed the match tonight.
Zidane decided to not use the line of five defenders and gave the offense more activity. During the first half, both Vinicius and Asensio played at the highest level alongside Toni Kroos. The young Brazilian is started his revenge tour against all the critics after a spectacular assist from the German midfielder. He drew first blood against a weak Liverpool side in the first half. Marco Asensio managed to score the second goal ten minutes before halftime.
Salah responds and Vinicius gets a brace.
After the break, Jurgen Klopp appeared to convince his players to improve on every line. Mohamed Salah scored one for Liverpool in a moment where we initially thought he was offside. However, the referee and VAR confirmed the goal that gave the Reds a glimmer of hope. But all that fell apart after Vinicius scored his brace when Luka Modric assisted him from the right flank.
Even though Liverpool was close to scoring another goal, Zidane’s side prevented them from doing so. There’s still the return leg to take place next week at Anfield Road, but Liverpool won’t have their supporters to push them to victory like in previous years. Real Madrid got a wonderful result with this unexpected victory.
Player ratings
Real Madrid: Courtois (7), Mendy (7), Nacho (6), Militao (5), Lucas (7), Casemiro (8), Modric (8), Kroos (9), Asensio (7), Vinicius (9), Benzema (7).
Bench: Valverde (7), Rodrygo (6).
Liverpool: Alisson (6), Robertson (7), Kabak (6), Phillips (5), Trent (5), Keita (6), Fabinho (6), Wijnaldum (5), Mane (6), Salah (7), Jota (6).
Bench: Thiago (7), Shaqiri (7), Firmino (6).
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