Real Madrid’s UCL winning DNA

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Leading up to the kick-off of Saturday’s Uefa Champions League final between Real Madrid and Liverpool, there was one stark difference between the two squads that ultimately cost the Reds. DEAN WORKMAN explores.

Zinedine Zidane’s team have all the experience of playing in showpiece occasions. Specifically, they know exactly what it takes to win the UCL. After Saturday’s 3-1 victory over Liverpool in the final, they have now won the tournament four out of the last five seasons and won it for an unprecedented third successive time, becoming the first team to win a hat-trick of European cups since Bayern Munich in the 1973-1976 seasons.

They are now 13-times European champions and a host of players in that Galacticos squad are now four-time European champions. Winning football’s biggest club prize is supposed to be the crowning moment of a player’s career and it generally comes around once, maybe twice, but the way that Real Madrid have normalised winning it over the past few seasons is nothing short of remarkable.

The scary thing for the rest of Europe is that this squad still has a lot to give. Bar Cristiano Ronaldo, Sergio Ramos, Karim Benzema, Keylor Navas and Luca Modric, the rest of the squad is under 30 years old and with Zidane at the helm, they will undoubtedly be targeting more UCL success.

This experience, this know-how, is what ultimately saw Real Madrid overcome Jurgen Klopp’s team on Saturday.

Liverpool had started the game the brighter of the two sides, but after Mohamed Salah and Sergio Ramos got into a tangle – which saw the Egyptian having to be withdrawn with a shoulder injury – the complexion of the game changed completely.

Whether Ramos intended to injure Liverpool’s star man, only he would know. The fact is that incident changed the game and what was to follow was further proof of Madrid’s experience in handling the big occasion and on the flip side, Liverpool’s inexperience.

If you run through the Liverpool squad, you would do well to find any player who has the experience of playing in cup finals, let alone the biggest club cup final in the UCL. It only took one of those inexperienced players to let the pressure get to them, forcing them into a mistake, which at this level, will end up costing you.

Unfortunately for the Merseyside club, the pressure got to the worst possible player on the field – their goalkeeper Loris Karius.

The young German first inexplicably threw the ball straight into the path of Karim Benzema, resulting in one of the strangest and most unexpected goals in European final history, as Madrid went 1-0 up.

Liverpool then equalised through Sadio Mane and the game looked to be hanging in the balance.

Madrid hit the front through a Gareth Bale wondergoal. The Welshman’s bicycle kick will live long in the memory and yet again proves how the Madrid players just know how to produce these moments of brilliance on the biggest stage.

Calamity then hit for Karius and Liverpool as Bale’s long-range strike squirmed through the goalkeeper’s hands, hitting the back of the net and sealing the victory for Madrid.

Real Madrid beating Liverpool 3-1 on the night without having played particularly well. That, however, would not have bothered Ramos and his teammates, who got what they came for and were named European champions yet again.

Photo: Armando Bambini/Backpagepix

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Dean Workman