UCL QF : Juventus Vs Real Madrid

Marca put out a poll today as to who should start against Juve. There were 2 surprises!

Neither Bale nor Benzema came anywhere close to be listed. Instead their spots were voted as Isco and Asensio!

Navas; Carvajal, Varane, Ramos, Marcelo; Casemiro, Modric, Kroos; Asensio, Isco; Ronaldo.

If bale and Benz were Spanish they'd probably have won the poll tbh

Why is fcking carvaval again defending Higuain the CF on a freekick?

Im not convinced with this performance. We are unable to hit Juventus on break and Juventus has been pressing us to submission in our half after 30 minutes.

Mr Nick09 wrote:Why is fcking carvaval again defending Higuain the CF on a freekick?

This is definitely a coaching thing now. No question about it imo

Isco wil never work without a decent striker

Adit wrote:


Now real on possession will look something like this. Carvajal will be isolated on the right and will have the most number of passes received. Isco-Marcelo and Ronaldo will have to work out something on the left to create chances. The other option is Carvajal crossing to Ronaldo/Benzema.





Now if Juventus decide to go offensive mode then they might switch to something of a 4321. This is while a bit difficult for Madrid to defend opens up space for Ronaldo to counter attack. Juventus could get destroyed if Zidane brings Bale along side Ronaldo. Juventus defenders will not be able to cope up with the pace.

First two goals



So easily predicted before 2 weeks of the game. When you analyze the game in a tactical way it is incredible to see how simple the game is actually.

Doc wrote:

Mr Nick09 wrote:Why is fcking carvaval again defending Higuain the CF on a freekick?

This is definitely a coaching thing now. No question about it imo

How would you have done it? You need to cover Chiellini and Barzagli with the CBs. Higuain is shit in the air on set pieces. They played two big mids that needed some muscle on them. That left Carvajal. It was just one of those things.

One of our fullbacks will need to do well in these because our forwards can't obviously and Modric, Kroos, Isco and Marcelo are basically taking space.

Our set piece defense is always at a disadvantage. We're asking 3 guys to defend 4-5 against most teams.

Actually, it doesn't matter at this point who gets marked on set pieces because we'll still find a way to muff it up.

But that's almost irrelevant as we actually beat Jjuve 3-0 in Turin, did not think we would have done that. Maybe a 2-1 or sneak a 1-0 but 3-0, well done.

Only if Zidane and his men showed this sort of initiative earlier in the season...

Cristiano

The problem is that our actual defenders have to be damn near perfect because we have no secondary defenders helping out.

ZZ actually subbed Benz early today. He's finally realized how shit he is we played much better without him. Both he and Bale can gtfo

Although we won rather convincingly in the end, I was still not happy with our defending. FBs, Modric and Benz were terrible and it didn't help that Modric and Casemiro got dispossessed left, right and center

If we go through and get Barca, we are going to need to defend much much better

The CBs though were near perfect, brilliant game by them. And Ronaldo made a mockery of the otherwise solid CB pair of Jjuve. Chiellini doesn't kck the ball from Buffons grasp against any other player but Ronaldo must scare the shit out of them

i've been critical of him but i liked how varane played today, the defense was obviously shaky but varane put in a damn good shift, he proved me wrong in my criticism and really manned the defense, i think he was a bit of an unsung hero, he had a lot of 'right place, right time' moments, and such moments for a defender isn't down to luck at all, solid reading of the game from him

Those crosses to Mandzukic. Too easy. Ffs he always gets the better of Carvajal

And we hit the bar for the umpteenth time this tie *sigh* we're going to blow this wrent we

Good subs IMO, we will see if it plays out. Both Casemiro and Bale were sh*t in the first half so maybe a formation change and cutting the dead weight will give us a better performance in the second half

God let's never have to play Vallejo again... and Carvajal needs to figure out how to defend a cross. Marcelo would do well to at least TRY and get in the way too lol.

Navas ffs. Dude was awful.

Vallejo made a rock bottom performance. CR wasn't his usual self and these subs were perfect. GG

Juve didn't deserve this. They were absolutely fabulous. Not like in the first leg. Modric and Casemiro were atrocious.

Congrats to Juve, even if they played abit like Atleti they were still more classy than those bastards

I hope to never see either Bale or Benz in the line up ever again. You could tell ZZ was shitting himself, it was the first time in his RM tenure he made subs at HT

Navas had 1 spill, but the defense was horrible and couldn't cope with the Juve press.

Well, I am glad that nervy match is over. This leg really needed Ramos' leadership out there, even if he is error prone.

Only positive I can take is that it seems like no players got injured which is surprising given how many thuggish tackles we took.

Apart from that we got complacent and played like garbage.

Ramos had to come down to the fecking bench to sort these guys out. No leader in this team bar him. Glad he is back. We are more assured with him, nice experience for Vallejo but my God I was literally trembling everytime a cross came in

i fell bad for vallejo, he played a few games this season, can't stay fit and now this. He will go on loan, must sign a 4th CB

Mr Nick09 wrote:i fell bad for vallejo, he played a few games this season, can't stay fit and now this. He will go on loan, must sign a 4th CB

This game exposed Varane as well. I never rated Vallejo, so I'm not really "surprised" with how clumsy and reckless he was. But if anything, this game solidified my original thoughts on Varane. He's a good defender, but incredibly mistake-prone. You can't trust a defender like that.

Varane is fine as a CB, but he played next to a train wreck.

What Varane is not is a leader of the defense, just not the type of player he is, but he can still grow into that type of player.

but Varane was not exposed lol

I thought carvajal, despite the goals from mandzu, was our best player tonight. Also, ronaldo working his ass off was great to see. Deserved goal for his efforts tonight

Carvajal really really really needs to stop ball watching on these plays. If you're on a bigger player, it's too late to try and mark him once the ball is in the air. He needs to stop them from getting into positions or do things to put them off so they can't jump like that.

He needs to learn the tricks of the trade in these situations.