Didn't Liverpool beat the team that beat Bayern? I don't see Liverpool failing to get past Bayern or Ajax.
Come off it. Man City were all over them. The game would have been done and dusted if Cancelo decided to boot it up the pitch instead of play around. Real Madrid were incredibly lucky to get through this.
City was better at playing football, Real was better at winning the tie. And I'm not intending that as a dig of any form - it's been Real's MO the whole competition, and three ties in it can't be attributed to luck anymore.
What, games are played to the final whistle, not a few minutes before it.
Did you watch the games? Madrid trailed from minute 3 in the first game to minute 89 in the second and didn’t even have a shot on target for 80 minutes in the second leg.
You do realise the better team don't always win the tie?
Real were better at both, playing football, and winning the tie, because well they did both!
There is no way to say for sure "if they replayed the same scenario 100 tomes they would lose 99 of them for sure.", that is pure speculation.
Well, at half time possession was 50-50, and while Madrid didn’t have a shot on target, City wasn’t dangerous at all and Madrid situations were more dangerous I think. Shots on targets are not all. City had pretty safe shots on targets that will never be goals.
Didn‘t city hit the bar and post which wouldn’t count as a shot on target but you know is about as close as you can get without a goal
The Spanish league objectively hasn’t been the strongest in a while, hence why it’s been a constant flurry of English teams making the CL finals. Early to mid 10s the Spanish league was the best league in Europe by a mile. Last couple of years it’s clearly been the Prem. If Liverpool win the CL 3 of the last 4 winners have been English teams, 5 out of the last 8 finalists have been English teams. These things go in cycles and likely will trend back to Spain once Guardiola and Klopp leave but it all depends on the quality of player and manager that follows them.
Overall I did not get the impression that City dominated to be honest. It was a close game. Each team had his moments.
The first leg is irrelevant, the tie is over two legs, it is what a team does over both legs that matters, and over both legs Real Madrid went through as they deserved to.
But English teams are not as dominant as they are being made of.
This is about competition for players, not standings
West Ham are one of only 3 teams to beat Liverpool this season. And they're not particularly better than Betis because the vast majority of top football players fall broadly into 4 categories:
If we win the CL we should also be awarded the PL, the FA Cup and the League Cup. It's only logical. Quintuple here we come!
Yeah Portsmouth were obviously better than us, the European and English champions in 2008, because they beat us in the FA Cup etc. Cup competitions are fickle. A league format, it's hard to argue with the winner being the best side. Cup competitions not so much.
The simple point is Real Madrid went through deservedly, it is kind of irrelevant when a team scores to win a game or a tie, as long as they do just that more times then the opposition do, and that is exactly what Real Madrid did, they played to the full time whistle.
Funnily enough, that is the exact reason Man City lost: they kept playing to the final whistle. If they pulled the same time-wasting crap as Madrid did in the second half of extra time, they would have won.
Well Real Madrid were the better team because they scored more goals, and let in fewer than Man City, so there was no metric to suggest or to support the fanciful notion that you are trying to suggest with your last sentence, sorry.
The likes of Leicester and West Ham can afford more of those good players than a team like Betis can.
Not really. There are comparatively a lot of good players. Much more than there are great or world class ones, and enough to go around for upper midtable sides across at least the top 4 leagues to fill up
Yes, luck is part of the game but luck alone does not explain the crazy recoveries of Real Madrid during the 80s in European competitions, the never-die attitude to overcome adverse results in a big deal of the games of the 2006/07 Liga or the comebacks vs PSG, Chelsea, City and Sevilla in less than two months in 2022, just to name a few examples that come to memory.
Nope, no trolling here.
Which isn't a good argument when these same caliber of players are either produced for next to nothing or purchased for significantly less in other leagues.
Yeah I would go as far as to say that Real have barely been "the better side" for a cumulative 90 minutes (excluding added time) over their 6 knockout games vs PSG, Chelsea and City. (A half vs Chelsea? 20 Minutes vs PSG? A couple or minutes vs City?)
Ha ha, that is very good, excellent reply!Not the 89th, but almost. Genoa needed the 2 goals and they got them.
I don't buy this storytelling we're being fed this year about the "never die" attitude, the fans "believing the team will prevail eventually" and all that stuffs. When you take the games against PSG, Chelsea or City, the stadium was pretty much dead before the 1st goal was scored.
No way. You may hate City, so do I. But City was easily the better team by miles. Madrid didn't outclass anybody. They were very lucky.
