Real Madrid vs Tottenham Hotspurs

Lloris' save on the Benz header was a bit of superhuman ability and luck, gotta give him credit on that one.

The Ronaldo shot from close range going to the roof of the net was a pretty crazy reflex save too.

Ronaldo needs to play alone up front, with Asensio and Isco behind him.

Our midfield tries to support too much, because Ronaldo and Benzema don't press defences. Cant have two of that kind of player starting.

You could see in this game kroos making pressing defenders. That's ridiculous. He has to do his job and someones else's.

Also, out of the midfield three, modric has been lacking for that last few games, he has been below form and his passes has been poor.

I would try Ceballos for Modric. Younger, hungrier and good vision.

vanDEEZ wrote:I feel like we didn't play poorly. Tottenham are a good team with a good coach, played with 5 defenders who all defended pretty well apart from Aurier's mistake. I wouldn't even call their goal a chance they created, but apart from that their chances were incredibly limited.

Overall for us I felt defense was decent, really liked Achraf today. Midfield was good, Modric MotM. Forwards played okay, but lacked the killer touch/instinct.

Really disappointing but understandable. We have been playing better away than home so far this season, which is indicative of how teams set up against us at the Bernabeu v. at their own home. I'm fairly confident of an away win on the return leg.

we were poor , so were Tottenham. The quality of match was really bad.
We didnt do anything in the seond half, we kept trying the crossing game when they were playing with 5 defenders. We should have attacked in a different manner and obviously the lack of attacking threat from right wing was there to see. It was Achraf alone there ; who had no other option other than trying to go round the defender and Verthongen was too clever to fall for that. We should have taken off benzema and introduced a right winger early in the second half.

No wonder Freeza did not show up here, I think Benzema gave him some sort of mental anguish. He definitely gave me a headache, hate that guy so much.

Anyway, Hala said all that needs to be said on this match. Can't disagree with that assessment. I want to but I cannot.

Subbing Isco when he is our best player on the field is wrong wrong wrong.

Personally I thought Hakimi was quite decent.

He's a very young player, I don't expect an ultra polished game...especially going up against Vertonghen, an experienced, veteran defender. He didn't face much action on his side defensively (Poch set up to go straight to Llorente and attack the CB's directly OR, actually often in conjunction with, attacking Marcelo's space. Not to mention Vertonghen is meh offensively, especially compared to Aurier), but dealt with what he had to well. He pushed up without ever exposing his side defensively.

Overall he was a net neutral for me, but that's good for an 18 year old in a big CL game. Also did well to set up the chance where Ronaldo hit the post and Benzema missed a near open net.

I didn't feel Isco was very effective to be honest. Benzema linked up with players better than he did IMO, but again Benz missed multiple chances I feel 90% of strikers would have scored so I can't praise Benzema too much either.

Given the injuries the subs were the probably the right calls, I might have put on Ceballos instead, but I'm not ZZ.

the finishing will come with time. and Lloris had a great game.
Took a pen to beat him. considering who we got for firepower, that is no easy task even if our frontline is on the blues.

As for the scapegoating, I have no time or patience to engage in such childish nonsense.

with regard to team as whole, I have no concerns bar injuries or suspensions. Struggling now is preferable vs struggling later. We'll sort ourselves out eventually. but do remember the season we're coming off of. this season is the one where we should be at our most complacent. I expect us to get worse before better.

Tottenham look pretty flawless at the moment. Completely dismantled Liverpool (not that it's a tough thing to do, but still). This all being accomplished with a good deal of their starters and key players out. I still think we will win the away leg, but it won't be easy and the more I watch Spurs the less confident I am with that bet.

Also Kane's goal scoring numbers for 2017 are better than Ronaldo's. I still think if a deal was possible for Kane we should have gone for it in the summer. Think about how many points he would have saved us already by replacing that bump on a log Benzema