Sid Lowe was in Madrid tonight to watch the hosts and champions serenely progress to the quarter-finals. His report is in, and here it is. Thanks for reading this one. Nighty night!
Jurgen Klopp, bitterly disappointed yet magnanimous, speaks to BT Sport. “Being 5-2 down is obviously not a great result … if you wanted to go through, you really needed to put in a special performance, and that wasn’t a special performance tonight … it was an open game but Madrid had the better chances … Ali had to make two sensational saves, wow! … the goal was a scrappy one but that was obviously not decisive any more … the right team went through … that’s what we have to admit … Madrid controlled the game … it’s not what we wanted but it’s what we got, and now we have to carry on … in three halves of two games, they were the better team … but to be honest, if we draw at home and play here like we did tonight, we go out as well … you cannot come here and hope that you get something … we prepared for a special performance but were not able to put it on the pitch … it was obvious, nobody thinks ‘how did Liverpool go out?!’ and that’s probably the best sign that the right team went through.”
Here are the teams in Friday’s draw for the quarter-finals of the Champions League … helpfully arranged in order from most to least likely overall winners, as the bookies currently see it!
Manchester City
Bayern Munich
Real Madrid
Napoli
Chelsea
Benfica
Internazionale
AC Milan
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A grim look on Jurgen Klopp’s face as he congratulates Carlo Ancelotti and his players. Real Madrid, who won their 14th title at Liverpool’s expense last season, were much the better side in this tie against the same opponents over both legs. Alisson prevented tonight’s scoreline being nearly as ugly for Liverpool as it was in the first match at Anfield. The Liverpool players look drained, Alexander-Arnold staring exactly one thousand yards into the distance. As Gerry Marsden continues to croon, it’s impossible to shake the feeling of a real fin de siècle vibe tonight. The end of the road for one of the great Liverpool teams.
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FULL TIME: Real Madrid 1-0 Liverpool (agg: 6-2)
The champions are through to the quarters! Liverpool flattered by the scoreline, with Alisson their star man. A nice touch as Real play You’ll Never Walk Alone over the PA system.
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90 min +4: Tsimikas is booked for swinging a lazy arm in Ceballos’ face. A lively cameo!
90 min +3: The referee is sent across to the monitor … but for once sticks with his original decision! No penalty. Seems fair enough: even though his arm was well away from his body, it had pinged up at speed from his hip, and he was looking the other way. The Bernabeu isn’t happy, not that it matters a jot.
90 min +1: Gakpo and Robertson are replaced by Tsimikas and Carvalho. Tsimikas immediately finds himself in the centre of the action, Rodrygo cutting back from the right wing for Vazquez, who shoots straight at the Liverpool defender. Real want a penalty, even though the ball pinged off Tsimikas’s thigh and up onto his arm. VAR gets involved!
90 min: Robertson attempts to release Gakpo into the Real box down the left. The pass is heavy, the run half-hearted. There will be two added minutes.
88 min: Oxlade-Chamberlain, under no pressure in the centre circle, passes the ball out of play, then offers an apologetic hand to his manager. Klopp, now resigned to defeat and becalmed, nods back sadly.
86 min: Vazquez comes on for Carvajal.
85 min: Some good work by Oxlade-Chamberlain as he cuts in from the left. The ball’s worked, via Salah, to Alexander-Arnold, just inside the box on the right. Alexander-Arnold has the chance to shoot from a tight angle, send in a cross certainly, but takes a heavy touch and settles for a corner … which he then overhits. Goal kick.
84 min: Vinicius and Kroos are replaced by Asensio and Tchouameni.
83 min: Nacho steps across Elliott and is slightly lucky to escape a booking, for persistently looking for a row, if nothing else. A couple of minutes earlier, he’d needlessly shoved a smiling Salah, who had no interest whatsoever in throwing hands.
83 min: A little bit of space for Elliott, 25 yards out. He opens his body and aims a curler towards the top left, but there’s not enough whip on the ball and Courtois does what Courtois does.
82 min: Benzema departs as well, with Rodrygo coming on in his stead.
81 min: Modric is replaced by Ceballos. What an ovation he receives, from all four corners of the Bernabeu.
80 min: Benzema hurt his ankle while knocking that loose ball home. But goalscorer’s gonna score goals. He gets some attention, and with Barcelona coming up this weekend, surely he’ll be subbed in short order.
GOAL! Real Madrid 1-0 Liverpool (Benzema 78); agg 6-2
Real make the breakthrough, and it’s a bit of a farce. Benzema dinks down the middle. Vinicius, bustling in from the left, goes to swipe home, only to fall over. VAn Dijk hesitates. The prone Vinicius sticks out a leg to hook back to Benzema on the spot. Benzema slams home, and if this tie wasn’t long over already, it is now!
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77 min: Real counter, Carvajal pulling a low shot well wide right from a promising position 20 yards out. Then Liverpool counter, Elliott evading a slide from Valverde and slipping Robertson into space near the byline. Robertson wins a corner that comes to nought. On the touchline, Klopp continues to self-combust. “Dear Owen Linderholm,” begins Richard Hirst. “I’m somewhat older than you, though not by too much, childhood also in Surrey, father had the village grocery shop, with lots of big old sweet jars, but clearly no PEZ dispensers. Maybe he was protecting me!”
76 min: Free kick for Liverpool out on the left. Robertson swings it in. Courtois catches it, then drops it, then smothers at Firmino’s feet.
75 min: Firmino and Salah combine cutely down the middle but the final wedged pass is too strong for Elliott, and Nacho comes across to cover.
73 min: Klopp receives a yellow card for haranguing the fourth official, presumably about the attention Nacho had just given Salah. Then he sends on Oxlade-Chamberlain for Milner.
72 min: Firmino rolls a pass down the right flank for Salah, who can’t power his way past Nacho. The Real defender high-fives with his team-mates after snuffing out the attack. The hosts have been superb this evening from front to back.
70 min: Salah dribbles into the Real area from the right … but again, there are no red men in the box to find. On the touchline, an empurpled Klopp screams at his troops to keep going. But there’s little left in the tank.
69 min: Suddenly Real turn up the gas. Vinicius steams in from the left, waltzes past Alexander-Arnold and Konate, and rolls across towards Benzema, who lashes over from just inside the box. That wasn’t far away at all.
67 min: Real stroke it around, hither and yon, probing patiently. Liverpool can’t get a sniff.
65 min: Space for Alexander-Arnold out on the right. He’s got time to line up a cross … but there’s nobody in the box to cross to. Liverpool keep on keeping on, but as far as inspiration goes, they’re running on fumes.
63 min: Modric flicks over Alexander-Arnold’s head down the left with insouciant ease. He loops a cross towards the far stick, where Valverde heads harmlessly over from six yards. He should have scored.
62 min: Firmino briefly threatens to dribble into space down the left but Carvajal gets in the road to nick the ball off his boot. Liverpool haven’t been found wanting for effort. Quality, though, is another issue.
60 min: Salah and Rudiger have been irritating each other with their mere presence, and the referee tells the pair to stop playing silly buggers. Klopp is understandably on Salah’s side in the row, and gives the fourth official some beneficial advice. Everyone calms down quickly enough.
59 min: Fabinho has the chance to send Salah into space down the right … but it’s another overhit pass. Liverpool’s collective radar has been wonky all evening. The pressure of playing the European champions on their own turf, I guess.
58 min: Firmino’s first act is to force a corner down the left. Valverde clears it. Unlike in last year’s final, Liverpool have done very little to test Courtois.
57 min: Liverpool make a double change. On come Firmino and Elliott, off go Jota and Nunez. “How old must Richard Hirst be?” wonders Owen Linderholm. “I’m 60 and in the wilderness of Surrey as a child, Pez were well known if not typical. I never cared for the flavors but the dispensers were cool. Wikipedia tells me they were marketed worldwide by the 50s.”
56 min: Real are knocking on the door again. Benzema rolls Vinicius into space on the right. Vinicius cuts back to Benzema, on the penalty spot. Benzema cocks his leg back to shoot, only for Alexander-Arnold to arrive from nowhere and block!
54 min: … and then suddenly Liverpool break, two on one. Salah just has to play in Nunez on the left, but seriously underhits his pass, allowing Militao to intercept. What a chance to give Liverpool hope!
53 min: Robertson’s mistake allows Valverde to race clear down the inside-right channel. He’s one on one with Alisson … but once again the keeper turns hero, starjumping and blocking. He may have made that mistake in the first leg, but without Alisson, Liverpool would be on the end of a hiding tonight as well.
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52 min: Camavinga pings a pass down the left for Vinicius, who rolls across for Benzema, preparing to tap home. But Van Dijk comes across to intercept and clear, then the flag goes up for offside.
51 min: Nacho, who enjoys a good grimace, goes down spectacularly on the left touchline after being clipped by Jota. A lot of frowning and rolling around. Jota not too sure what’s going on. Nacho gets up soon enough and we play on.
49 min: Liverpool have clearly been told to up the press. How long they can keep it going, with Milner, Jota and Fabinho in the middle, is another matter altogether.
47 min: Nunez has the opportunity to send Jota into space down the middle, but pushes him wide left with his pass. Just a corner, that comes to nothing. But a fast start to the half for Liverpool, if nothing else. “Richard Hirst will be even more disappointed to learn that vintage PEZ dispensers can fetch hundreds at auction,” reports Joe Pearson.
Real Madrid get the second half underway. Didi Hamann comes on for No changes. They’re 45 minutes away from yet another quarter-final. Having been by far the better side in the first half, Vinicius in particular outstanding, it’ll take an outlandish performance by Liverpool to deny them.
Half-time entertainment. “What a sheltered life I have led,” begins Richard Hirst. “I had to look up PEZ (apparently the preferred format). I have to say I don’t think my life would have been improved if I had been aware of it, but then I’m an old curmudgeon - any reference to candy is automatically frowned upon.”
HALF TIME: Real Madrid 0-0 Liverpool (agg: 5-2)
Nunez, out on the left, switches play with a long pass towards Salah on the other flank. He feeds Alexander-Arnold, who wins a corner. Liverpool waste their opportunity to change the entire tenor of this tie, and the whistle goes for half-time. Real, by some distance the better side, are still sitting pretty; Liverpool still have their three-goal mountain to climb. They’re not quite out of it yet … but without Alisson, their 1% chance would be a big fat zero.
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45 min: Valverde prepares to race clear down the middle, but Liverpool back line has stepped up just in time, and the flag goes up for offside. There will be two minutes of first-half stoppage time.
43 min: Konate does extremely well to hold off an insistent Valverde and win a free kick. Real haven’t visited the Liverpool final third for a while. They’d been camped in it earlier. “Can Hamann come on at half time?” quips Matt Dony.
41 min: Fabinho tries to release Alexander-Arnold down the right with an ambitious diagonal pass, only to send the ball sailing high into the stand. Alexander-Arnold cocks a despairing head back, a Pez dispenser of frustration.
39 min: Salah accidentally steps on Nacho’s boot, whipping it off, so play stops awhile as the Real left-back pulls it back on and ties his laces. That’s the action, the breaking news.
37 min: One corner leads to another, then Jota chases a ball only to be clumsily skittled by Benzema in the box. But the flag had gone up for offside, so there goes Liverpool’s penalty dream.
36 min: Jota, on the edge of the Real D, rolls an inviting pass to Gakpo on his right. Gakpo meets it first time with a rising drive that Courtois parries round the post. Corner.
35 min: Vinicius is a constant threat, and the boss of Alexander-Arnold. He swans past him gracefully before gliding in from the left and sending a low shot into the arms of Alisson.
34 min: Wise decision, because nothing comes of the corner. Liverpool have done a decent job of slowing Real down in the last few minutes, though how long they can keep them at arm’s length is anyone’s guess.
33 min: Nunez drops a shoulder to make his way past Carvajal on the left. He steps inside and curls towards the bottom right. Courtois extends an arm to tip around the post for a corner. Not entirely sure that was heading in, but the Real keeper wasn’t going to take any chances.
31 min: Fabinho advances down the right and crosses long for Nunez, who from the edge of the box, attempts to steer an adventurous header across Courtois and towards the top right. Easy for the keeper to deal with.
29 min: Van Dijk, in a tight spot in the left-back position, sprays a glorious diagonal pass towards Salah, who is wrestled to the floor on the halfway line by Valverde. The resulting free kick ends up finding Robertson on the left. He whips a low cross along the corridor of uncertainty, but there’s nobody in red near enough to attack the ball.
27 min: Nunez drives down the right and finds Alexander-Arnold, who crosses for Gakpo. A header flashes harmlessly wide. Better from Liverpool, though the bar has not been set high.
26 min: Benzema sends Vinicius clear down the inside-left channel with a cute pass down the channel. Vinicius is denied at the near post by Alisson, who kicks his low poke away. The flag goes up for offside, though had Vinicius found the net, VAR might have taken a good look at that. He looked on. Alisson to the rescue again, then.
25 min: Alexander-Arnold again overhits a pass down the inside-right channel with options on. Goal kick.
23 min: As if that Alisson save from Camavinga wasn’t good enough already, the shot took a significant deflection off Milner en route too. Real must be wondering how on earth they’re not comfortably leading tonight’s match already.
22 min: Modric curls in from the right. Deflection. Corner. Kroos takes. Fabinho clears. But Liverpool remain penned in. The ball drops to Modric, 25 yards out. He sends a nuclear-force screamer towards the top left. It rises inches over the bar. Alisson was beaten that time. That one would have taken the net off, plus the posts out of the ground!
20 min: … and here he goes again! Camavinga sends a power curler towards the top right from the edge of the box. Alisson fingertips the shot onto the bar and away. Liverpool are properly under the cosh here, but their keeper is doing all he can to keep them in the tie.
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19 min: I did Alisson a huge disservice back there. Vinicius’s shot didn’t hit the bar at all. It was blocked by the keeper’s strong right arm. That’s an outrageous save from point-blank range. Vinicius did very little wrong.
18 min: Alexander-Arnold creams a lovely pass down the right to release Salah into space. Salah enters the box and cuts back for Jota, who meets the dropping ball in space, ten yards out … only to shank woefully.
16 min: This is beyond frantic. Liverpool counter, and Nunez nearly gets the better of Rudiger in a footrace down the left. Nearly, but not quite. A well-timed sliding tackle … though both feet were off the floor, studs showing, and if he’d missed the ball, the referee might have had some thinking to do.
15 min: The corner. Some bedlam. Then the ball drops to Vinicius, six yards out. He’s surely got to score, but his shot rises and pings off the crossbar and back out. How did he miss? Did Alisson get something on that? He may well have done, you know.
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13 min: Van Dijk wins a header at the corner, but there’s no pace behind it, and Real break at speed. Valverde clears. Vinicius races down the left. Benzema enters the box from the right and prepares to take the pass and shoot. Gakpo comes across in time to poke out for another Real corner.
12 min: Attack may be the best form of defence for Liverpool, so Van Dijk creams a diagonal pass towards Salah on the right touchline. Salah turns on the jets and wins Liverpool their first corner of the evening. Before it can be taken, Militao goes down clutching his face and needs a brief spot of treatment. He’s fine to continue, though.
11 min: Another corner for Liverpool out on the left, where Alexander-Arnold is struggling to cope with Vinicius. Modric sends long. Van Dijk heads clear. But Liverpool can’t get out, and it’s not long before Kroos is larruping a rising shot towards the top left from 25 yards. Alisson handles well.
9 min: Nothing comes of the corner, but Real suddenly look very dangerous. Second-half-at-Anfield dangerous. Liverpool might have to do some clinging on for a bit.
8 min: Alexander-Arnold slides in on Vinicius near the left-hand corner flag. A free kick that’s floated into the mixer. Gakpo deals and clears, but Real come quickly again, Camavinga reading a poor Alexander-Arnold pass in midfield. Soon enough, Kroos is cutting back from a promising position on the left. Milner reads the danger and blooters out for a corner.
7 min: Salah does much better here, though. He harasses Rudiger into slipping, 30 yards from his own goal, and slips the ball forward to Nunez, who whistles a low drive towards the bottom right. Courtois kicks away confidently.
6 min: Liverpool deal with the corner easily enough, and have a chance to counter, but Salah, over eager, suffers a rush of blood and blooters a simple pass towards Robertson on the left out of play.
5 min: Real have settled after that brief early Liverpool flurry, and Vinicius wins a the first corner of the evening out on the left. Modric to take.
4 min: The travelling Liverpool support are giving it plenty. They’re in great voice. It’s not quite Anfield under the lights … but it’s the best they can do at the Bernabeu, and everything’s worth a try, right?
3 min: Kroos slips a pass down the inside-right channel and suddenly, with the Liverpool defence playing a high line, Benzema is free! But he can’t beat Alisson as he attempts to pass the ball into the goal from the edge of the area. Alisson blocks, then the flag goes up for offside.
2 min: Liverpool are on the front foot early doors. Alexander-Arnold spots Gakpo in space out on the right touchline but belts his pass down the channel out for a goal kick. Then they come again through Milner down the left. His cross is deflected and loops into the arms of Courtois.
Real Madrid v Liverpool (agg 5-2)
Benzema and Milner shake hands, exchange pennants and toss coins … then Liverpool get the ball rolling. “James Milner is an incredible footballer,” writes Rwik Chattopadhyay. “He made his Premier League debut for Leeds on 10 November 2002 — the day Eduardo Camavinga was born! 845 appearances for his clubs! What a guy! No wonder Klopp calls him Mr Consistent.
The teams are out! Real Madrid in white, Liverpool in red. Two classic looks as old as time. Zadok the Priest (Version) blasts out of the PA system, not to universal approval it has to be said. The previous entry just might go some way to explaining that. Anyway, a cracking atmosphere under the Bernabeu lights. We’ll be off in a minute!
These two teams met in the final last season, of course, a game seriously tarnished by organisational problems and awful treatment of Liverpool fans. Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin has now apologised for both the situation, and the initial blaming of supporters for the resulting delay in kick-off. Speaking in an interview on Gary Neville’s The Overlap channel, he said:
First of all I can say that I feel sorry for what happened and we will make sure that it doesn’t happen anymore. That’s the most important thing for me.
When I was at the match, I remember I had a meeting with the King of Spain and my people came into the room and said, ‘something urgent had happened’. I went out and they say there is a problem with an entrance or some entrances for the fans. Nothing else.
We didn’t know how serious that was back then because Uefa does not have jurisdiction outside the stadium. There is French police and they didn’t communicate with us.
It was a difficult situation and look, trust me there is not a single person in Uefa who is not terribly sorry that those things happen. Probably this is the main topic at Uefa how to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
[Blaming fans and claiming thousands of tickets had been forged] was a mistake, that was a mistake from our side but it was hard to check what was right and what was wrong. We got so strange information and I really didn’t know the scale of the thing that happened.
I am still expecting feedback from the experts we have that are dealing with it.
Me as president of Uefa, I don’t deal with organisation of the match but we have to have better communication with the local authorities because in London [at the Euro 2021 final] again it was not Uefa who should protect outside the stadium, it was local police and, obviously, not very successful.
Jurgen Klopp speaks to BT Sport. “We have a saying in Germany: if you have a problem, find an offensive solution … we have midfield players on the bench but they did not play for a long time … Cody has rhythm and Diogo is a player who always can make a difference … so that’s why we go for that … it would be helpful to score the first goal … each goal Madrid score would make the hill we have to climb even higher … the biggest thing we have to do is to defend … we cannot just attack and hope they don’t score from their situations … we need a super performance, that is absolutely clear, we don’t have to think about anything else, we just have to make sure we are ready for a special game … if we can do that, then it’s good, if not, then Madrid will go through.”
… and finally we perform a wheel-screeching u-turn back towards the much more comforting and relatable world of thundering pessimism. “I’d give a lot of money to see Modrić’s face when he saw that Liverpool line-up. As a neutral I am hoping for an early Liverpool goal, but with that midfield of Fabinho (42) and Milner (75) he (37) must’ve been licking his lips and rubbing his hands etc and so on” – Brendan Large
“Liverpool threw the kitchen sink at Courtois in last season’s final and still came up short. The problem with that approach, as we saw in the first leg, is that they end up with the basement flooded. But it’s swim or sink tonight, so snorkel and goggles on and let’s dive in” – Justin Kavanagh
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Pre-match postbag o’blind optimism. “I am up for this, it’s not a no-hoper, an early Liverpool goal and the plot will twist. Watched too many games that were done and dusted in the Champions knockout that didn’t follow the plot” – Roger Kirkby
“Two years ago, Klopp’s 1% chance would have been 0.25% at best and commensurately tanked interest levels in this match. A win of 0-3 or 1-4 wouldn’t have been enough to extend the tie to extra time because of the away goals rule. I’m glad it was scrapped. I’m also sure Mister Klopp shares my sentiments” – Emmanuel Dairo
“I keep thinking, because it’s more preferable than wondering about the odds of a shock result tonight and/or chain-eating Crunchies to cope, that James Milner is fluent in Spanish. Maybe the captain’s trash-talk game could be the thing that swings a good result for Liverpool in the end? Obviously, if Real go through, I’m going to put my foot through my A-Level Spanish certificate and send Courtois the bill” – Gillian Kirby
Pre-match postbag o’pessimism. “Not only do Liverpool have no chance of beating Madrid, neither do Manchester City. Madrid with Benzema are unbeatable” – Jeff Sax
“I enter today’s match like I did the second leg v Barcelona in 2019. I have no expectations of a good result, but we’ll see what happens. Lucky jersey being employed” – Joe Pearson
“I should probably turn to heavy metal but find myself listening to the new Belle & Sebastian new album as the Reds get ready to be fed to the lions fight to the last minute for dignity and that one-percent chance of survival. One of the tunes (below) laments ‘I wish I could be content with the football scores’. I feel that lyric, but am prepared to make an exception today. If the score - against all odds - ends up Real Madrid 0:4 Liverpool FC, I’ll be sure to find some measure of contentment” – Peter Oh
Real Madrid make two changes to the starting XI selected for their 5-2 romp at Anfield. Nacho and Toni Kroos take the places of Rodrygo, who drops to the bench, and the hamstrung David Alaba.
Liverpool make three changes from that fateful day. In come Ibrahima Konate, Diogo Jota and, wearing the captain’s armband, James Milner. They replace the usual captain Jordan Henderson, who is ill, Stefan Bajcetic, who is injured, and Joe Gomez, who is benched. Four strikers! Jurgen Klopp has clearly decided Liverpool aren’t going to go home wondering.
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The teams
Real Madrid: Courtois, Carvajal, Militão, Rüdiger, Camavinga, Nacho, Kroos, Modrić, Benzema, Valverde, Vinícius Júnior.
Subs: Lunin, Vallejo, Hazard, Asensio, Odriozola, Vázquez, Tchouameni, Ceballos, Rodrygo, Mendy, Díaz, Rodríguez.
Liverpool: Alisson, Alexander-Arnold, Konate, Van Dijk, Robertson, Fabinho, Milner, Gakpo, Nunez, Salah, Jota.
Subs: Adrian, Kelleher, Gomez, Keita, Firmino, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Jones, Elliott, Tsimikas, Carvalho, Matip, Williams.
Referee: Felix Zwayer (Germany).
📋✅ Our starting XI 🆚 @LFC! #UCL pic.twitter.com/O5kJ5F7aKw
— Real Madrid C.F. 🇬🇧🇺🇸 (@realmadriden) March 15, 2023
The Reds to take on Real Madrid tonight 👊#RMALIV
— Liverpool FC (@LFC) March 15, 2023
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Preamble
After this …
… Liverpool need to channel this …
… and even then, away from home this time and against serial winners, that might not be enough. Damage limitation is the other, arguably wiser, option, but then faint heart and that. There goes that dream? Kick off at the Bernabeu is at 8pm GMT, 9pm in Madrid. It’s on!
