From the man behind the football king to the football king

On the afternoon of February 24, the entire Manchester United team arrived in Madrid to prepare for the first round of the Champions League quarter-finals against Real Madrid two days later.

On the evening of the 25th, the fifth and sixth games of the quarter-finals started, with two Premier League teams playing. As a result, Manchester City won 3:1 at home against Naples, while Chelsea lost 0:1 to RB Leipzig away.

Four teams played in the Champions League knockout stage, but only Manchester City won!

This is a complete subversion of everyone's cognition for the Premier League teams that were still very strong in the Champions League last season.

It was also at this time that people realized how serious the internal friction in the Premier League was.

The powerful Liverpool was seriously injured because of the bloody battle with Manchester United in the league. In the Champions League, they suffered a 1:4 defeat, which basically announced that they were eliminated in advance.

Tottenham and Chelsea are currently striving for the Champions League qualification for next season, and they are also fighting with Premier League teams. In addition, the strength of the opponents is not weak, and then they all lost.

Only Manchester City, which almost withdrew from the league championship competition in advance and had no suspense about the Champions League qualification, could focus on the Champions League. In addition, it was a home game, so it won a big victory.

Under such circumstances, Manchester United's away challenge to Real Madrid was not favored by the gambling companies and the media. On the one hand, it was because they were fighting very fiercely with Liverpool in the Premier League, and on the other hand, their opponents were too strong.

Real Madrid, known as the king of the Champions League, has been often beaten by Barcelona in La Liga in recent years, but in the Champions League, they are the well-deserved kings. Whoever meets them will be skinned alive.

Of course, as the Champions League champion in the past two years and a new unbeaten record of 32 games in the Champions League, Manchester United is also an opponent that no team wants to face.

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In the first decade of the new century, Manchester United and Barcelona were the most successful teams in this decade.

Manchester United has always maintained its competitiveness in the Premier League. Although the rise of Chelsea has posed a certain impact on them, Manchester United has not been silent because of this, but has become stronger and stronger. In the Champions League, Manchester United reached the Champions League final in the 2007-2008 season and the 2008-2009 season, and won the championship once. It can be said that Manchester United has been very successful in the past decade.

Another successful team is Barcelona. Although Barcelona fell into a trough at the beginning of the century, they returned to their true colors as a strong team from the 2003-2004 season, suppressing Real Madrid in the league, and won the Champions League twice in the 2005-2006 season and the 2008-2009 season, and won an unprecedented six championships in 2009.

Therefore, the match between Manchester United and Barcelona was also called the European Derby.

After entering the 2010s, with the aging of Havertz and Besiktas, Barcelona gradually declined, while Real Madrid reached its peak under the leadership of Cristiano Ronaldo, reaching the top of Europe in the 2013-2014 season and winning the 10th Champions League trophy in team history; then, under the leadership of Zidane, it became the first team to successfully defend the title since the Champions League reform, becoming the veritable Champions League king. Cristiano Ronaldo laid the foundation for his Champions League king as a player.

The situation of Manchester United was similar to that of Barcelona. With the departure of Cristiano Ronaldo, the curtain call of the Class of 1992 veterans such as Giggs, Scholes and Gary Neville, and the aging of the golden central defender duo of Ferdinand and Vidic, especially the retirement of Ferguson, it also fell into a trough.

However, with the joining of Bruno and Mourinho's entry into Old Trafford, the Red Devils quickly achieved a revival. They overthrew Real Madrid's domination of the Champions League and became the second team after Real Madrid to defend the title after the Champions League reform, becoming the new overlord of the Champions League.

Under such circumstances, the match between the two teams that successively defended the Champions League was widely called the new European derby by the media, and it also attracted the attention of the whole Europe and even the whole world.

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In the match against Real Madrid, Mourinho still arranged a 433 formation. However, in the midfield trio, Fred and Kante partnered as double defensive midfielders, and Bruno still played as attacking midfielder. The front trident was a combination of Harry Kane, Rashford and Mbappe. The four defenders from right to left were Cancelo, Maguire, Van Dijk and Luke Shaw, and De Gea guarded the goal.

This is a standard configuration for Mourinho when facing a strong team.

"This is a relatively conservative starting lineup." Andy Gray commented concisely.

Mourinho sat in the coaching seat, staring at the field. The away game against Real Madrid in the Champions League quarter-finals was very critical. If Manchester United could not get a good result, it would be very difficult for them to advance.

Mourinho is ready for a tough battle. He arranged for Kante and Fred to form a double defensive midfielder partnership in order to go head-to-head with Real Madrid.

"In the La Liga match last weekend, Real Madrid not only lost to Levante in an upset away game, giving up the top spot in La Liga, but also lost the general Hazard. The Belgian winger was injured in the game and is said to be basically out for the season. This is the fourth time Hazard has been injured since he moved to Real Madrid. The first three injuries accumulated 100 days of injury and missed 1 Taylor said, "Perhaps Florentino has regretted spending 100 million euros to bring the Belgian winger to the Bernabeu last summer."

Andy Gray said with a smile: "Although Hazard was injured when he was at Chelsea, in general, he did not miss much time. But after joining Real Madrid, he was injured this season. The time is almost the same as all the injuries he had in previous seasons.”

Martin Taylor took up the topic and said: "However, there is no problem with the thickness of Real Madrid's lineup. Even if Hazard is injured, they can still field an extremely luxurious top lineup..."

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Mourinho also glanced at the players of Real Madrid. Just looking at Real Madrid's defense, he knew how strong this team was. Carvajal, Ramos, Varane, Mendy, these The four defenders are all top defenders who are famous in today's world football.

Casemiro, Modric and Valverde in the midfield are also the top midfielders currently, and Isco, Benzema and Vinicius on the striker are also well-known.

This is a tough battle, and Mourinho now hopes that Real Madrid coach Zidane will underestimate the opponent.

Today's game definitely deserves the title of "European Derby", so this game has also attracted a lot of attention. At least more than 180 countries and regions around the world have chosen to broadcast this game live.

Manchester United had a tough time at the Santiago Bernabeu, as they were blocked hard by Real Madrid.

Real Madrid head coach Zidane disappointed Mourinho. Not only did this gentleman not underestimate the enemy, but he also paid special attention to Manchester United and completely treated Manchester United as Barcelona.

Real Madrid, sitting at home, even lowered its profile and did not hesitate to use fouls and destructive tactics to restrict Manchester United.

On Manchester United's side, the double defensive midfielder composed of Fred and Kante is also very tough. Throughout the game, situations where people fell on their backs frequently occurred.

The game scene was very heated, the whistle sounded frequently, and the smoothness of the game was repeatedly broken.

It can be said that just watching this game, you can hardly imagine that this is a game between the two top teams in world football today, and it is even more like a physical battle in the Premier League.

Both sides focused more on restricting their opponents and preventing each other from scoring goals, but they were greatly curbed on the offensive end.

The deadlock was not broken until the 39th minute of the first half. Manchester United made a mistake in passing the ball in the backcourt. Vinicius broke through with the ball and passed the ball across. Isco easily pushed and scored, and Real Madrid took the lead at home.

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When Isco scored, the huge Bernabeu stadium burst into crazy cheers.

Mourinho clenched his fists in displeasure, but finally failed to hold on.

He began to think about how to deal with the second half of the game in a 0:1 situation. However, Mourinho soon discovered that the tactics and strategies he had just thought of turned out to be useless, because Manchester United quickly scored to equalize the score.

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Maybe the goal was finally scored and the first half was coming to an end, so Real Madrid's players were a little relaxed.

When Manchester United organized this offensive, when Luke Shaw broke through from the wing to the center, Real Madrid's defensive players did not actively defend. The lax defense allowed Bruno to catch Luke Shaw's pass. , stop the ball calmly at the top of the arc in the penalty area, and then turn around and shoot more easily. The football drew an arc and hit the dead center of the goal.

"GOOOOOOOOOOOOOALLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!!"

Mourinho was stunned for a moment, then clapped excitedly in celebration.

"Well done, Bruno!" He expressed satisfaction with the team captain for stepping forward at the critical moment.

"Real Madrid conceded the goal very quickly and they were only ahead for three minutes!"

"This goal conceded exposed Real Madrid's shortcomings. After the goal, they relaxed. In addition, Casemiro's defensive awareness that was half a beat too slow was really ridiculous." Martin Taylor said mercilessly, "Casemiro is like an 80-year-old man, watching Bruno turn around and shoot."

The first half of the game ended at 1:1.

It stands to reason that two goals in half a game give the impression that this first half of the game should not be so boring, and can even be said to be relatively exciting, but the audience who watched this game definitely did not think so.

Throughout the first half of the game, both sides seemed to focus all their energy on fierce fighting and defense. Everyone on the court fell on their backs. On the sidelines, Manchester United head coach Mourinho and Real Madrid head coach Zidane also yelled. Yelling, the atmosphere is manic.

If both sides hadn't scored a goal at the end of the first half, the entire first half would have been the lowest-tech and roughest game in the Champions League in recent years.