FULL TIME: Real Madrid 1-0 Manchester City (agg 1-0)
But it matters not! City can’t get back upfield again, and the referee blows his whistle! Real Madrid have made their 14th European Cup final! They’ll face their city rivals Atletico in Milan later this month, a repeat of the 2014 final. You can’t say they didn’t deserve it tonight: they carried the greater attacking threat, and on another day would have scored a couple more. City by comparison didn’t get a single effort on target. On the other hand, it took a deflected goal to beat them, they hung in there, refusing to buckle under pressure, and Sergio Aguero very nearly silenced the Bernabeu with a stunning effort during the game’s last knockings. But on the whole City didn’t do enough. Ah well, they’re making incremental progress, and there’s always next year. A good night for Pep Guardiola, if nothing else.
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90 min +5: A ball looped forward into the City box. James is free! But with only Hart to beat, he falls backwards and can’t connect with the ball. City escape!
90 min +4: Sterling tries to send Iheanacho into space down the right, but the young striker is crowded out. Real go back upfield and stroke it around awhile.
90 min +3: Otamendi is booked for a high boot on Ronaldo. The clock keeps ticking.
90 min +2: The assistant ref holds up four minutes. The first two are spent rubbing Keylor Navas’s leg; he’s down having picked up an injury while making that clearance. There will be more than four extra minutes, I’ll be bound.
90 min: Aguero has been quiet tonight, but suddenly he’s come alive. Perhaps too late. He chases a long ball down the left. Pepe misreads the bounce on the edge of the box, forcing his keeper to come out and batter the ball into the stand.
89 min: The Bernabeu falls silent for a couple of seconds as Aguero, in a little space down the inside-left channel, lashes a screaming dipper up and down towards the top right. He’s got Keylor Navas beaten, but the ball whistles inches over the bar and onto the top netting. The City fans celebrate, before swallowing their cheers. Real fans are too shocked to respond. For a moment, an eerie quiet descended on the Bernabeu. City so close to a spectacular goal, so close to the final!
88 min: Modric is replaced by Kovacic. He takes a full minute to get off the pitch, professional time management at its very best.
86 min: Bale is blocked fairly obviously by Otamendi as he bombs down the left. The referee, perhaps wondering whether he should even the decisions up a little bit, doesn’t give the free kick. The home fans, plus Zinedine Zidane on the touchline, aren’t best impressed.
84 min: De Bruyne takes the free kick. It’s practically a corner, so why he tries to catch Keylor Navas out at his near post is anyone’s guess. His effort to curl it directly into the bottom left would have been parried clear had it been on target, which it wasn’t, the side netting rippling harmlessly. A waste of a good chance. Real should be down to ten for the remainder, mind.
83 min: Sterling dribbles along an intricate route down the left. Near the corner flag, Lucas Vazquez slides in and upends his man. Yellow, but that should have been a straight red card: the Real man was out of control and planted his studs on Sterling’s shin. A potential leg-breaker. Thankfully Sterling will be OK.
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82 min: It’s Sterling versus Carvajal again. This time he earns a yard, and has a chance to loop a cross into the centre. But there’s nobody other than Iheanacho in the middle. Real are sitting back, inviting pressure, but City haven’t responded to the come-on yet. They need to start throwing men forward.
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80 min: Another skitter for Sterling down the left. For a second it looks as though he’s got the legs to beat Carvajal, but heads down a blind alley and the chance to cross is gone.
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77 min: Lucas Vazquez dances down the right. His shot isn’t up to much. Meanwhile Fernandinho slides in on Kroos, who doesn’t like the challenge. The pair rub eyebrows in the muscular style. The referee gives both of them a bollocking, nothing more. Given that he’d initially misidentified Fernandinho for De Bruyne, he probably wasn’t arguing from a position of absolute authority.
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76 min: Aguero bursts down the inside-left channel and looks to have been checked by Ramos, but he’s not getting the free kick. City are beginning to edge forward a little bit. Real have had all the chances, but this is still on a knife-edge.
75 min: Quite a few whistles ping around the Bernabeu as City stroke it around the middle while Real sit deep, making sure to keep a hold of what they’ve got. It looks like they might have started to think about how close they are to the final, which would be good news for City. The away fans singing Blue Moon again. Nerves pinging around the famous old stadium.
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73 min: A lull, which serves Real quite well. The clock is not City’s friend.
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71 min: Fernando is booked for a fairly cynical shove in Modric’s back, as the Real playmaker dribbles through the centre circle. He doesn’t bother arguing the toss.
70 min: A little space for Sterling out on the left. He dribbles with pace and purpose towards the Real box, before fizzing low into the middle, where Aguero waits to shoot. Ramos slides in to put a stop to City’s plans. But that is a little better from City, who still just need the one goal. Might all those missed chances start playing on Madrid minds?
69 min: The thoroughly ineffectual Jesus Navas is replaced by the excellent Kelechi Iheanacho. Here’s Kevin Wilson: “Film nerd comment (but slightly football related), but Silvana Mangano was married to Dino Di Laurentiis, film producer and uncle of the former Napoli chairman. You could do worse than watch Pasolini’s Teorema, where she plays the mother of a bourgeois family whose existence is unsettled by Terence Stamp’s Angel/Devil drifter.”
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67 min: Real make their second chance of the evening, swapping Isco for the 2014 World Cup golden-boot winner James Rodriguez.
66 min: How are City still in this? But they’re still in it!
REAL HIT THE WOODWORK!
64 min: The corner’s whipped into the box. Bale rises, 12 yards out, and plants a header towards the top right. He’s so unlucky: the header twangs off the underside of the bar and out! Lucas Vazquez tries to keep the move alive by chipping back into the centre from the right. Ronaldo is free, six yards out, and catches the ball with both hands before spiking it down and over the line! It’s the height of absurdity, but he’s not booked for his cheek because he was miles offside anyway. A cheeky wink to the referee, and we move on.
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63 min: Ronaldo picks up a loose ball, 25 yards from goal. He drops a shoulder to move to the right of the D. His shot takes a walloping deflection off Clichy, looping over a stranded Hart and just wide left of the unguarded goal. Corner. From which...
61 min: Yaya Toure, who has been invisible tonight, is replaced by Raheem Sterling. He’s got a habit of showing in big games, has Sterling: City need him to do that again tonight.
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59 min: Lucas Vazquez slides a ball down City’s always-wide-open inside-right channel. Ronaldo opens his legs and, from the edge of the box, slaps a low and hard effort towards the bottom right. Hart smothers brilliantly. City are under all sorts of pressure here. Their best bet? Hang on, hang on, hang on, and hope Real begin to get nervous as they get ever closer towards the final with just a one-goal lead to hang onto.
58 min: Ronaldo slips into Stepover Mode again. He tears down the right and zips a low ball into the centre towards Bale, but Otamendi is on hand to hook clear.
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56 min: Lucas Vasquez comes on for Jese. “Am I the only person who found that Silvana Mangano clip deeply weird?” wonders Marie Meyer. “Makes me wonder how future generations will view Single Ladies.”
55 min: City’s defence has, to a man, fallen asleep. Carvajal races after a long ball down the right. He loops a cross into the centre for Ronaldo. It’s a bit high, but Ronaldo still gets his head on it, sending the ball straight at Hart. City are very much second best at the moment, but they’re still just the one goal behind. And it only takes a minute.
53 min: How on earth are Real not two goals up? Bale drops deep down the right before chipping a delicious reverse pass down the channel to release Modric into the box. He’s one on one with Hart! He has to score, but allows an over-elaborate dink towards the top right to be smothered by the star-jumping keeper. What a miss! What a save! What a non-event the resulting corner turns out to be!
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51 min: Half-chances at either end. First De Bruyne, just inside the Real box, takes an airshot at a ball sent down the right by Sagna. Then Jese powers down the right, tearing past Mangala, only to blooter miles over the bar when he reaches the edge of the City area.
50 min: Bale, deep on the right wing, launches a long, drooping, diagonal pass towards Ronaldo, who has broken clear down the middle. He connects with a volley on the left-hand edge of the City D, but not particularly well, and the ball harmlessly bobbles through to Hart. A better connection, though, and City were in a lot of spectacular trouble.
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48 min: Real have come out with a view to putting this tie to bed quickly. Jese skips past Otamendi down the left and romps into a lot of space. His low cross is easily gathered by Hart at his near post. Jese should have done a lot better.
46 min: Hoo, City so nearly concede within 30 seconds of the restart. Kroos rakes a glorious diagonal pass to release Carvajal on the right. He hits a low, first-time ball into the six-yard box. Otamendi slides in to block, with Ronaldo waiting to sidefoot home in the simple style. As it turns out, the flag goes up for offside - both Carvajal and Ronaldo were ahead of the City back line - but that was close. The visitors have been woozy all night; they need to snap out of it quickly.
And we're off again!
So this is where we are: City were second best in the first half, doing quite a lot of wandering about, and yet they’re far from out of this. They just need a goal. They’ll go through on the away goals rule if this ends a score draw. But another Real goal will surely bury them. Just to clarify the Bale/Fernando goal/own goal situation: Bale certainly looked up as if to cross, and his hard cross-cum-shot took a deflection off the sliding defender to whip along an absurdly oscillating arc across the goal and into the top left. Fine margins, though. Does that clarify it? Hmm. Anyway, Real get the ball rolling for the second half.
Half-time entertainment: For those who enjoy a bit of history, here’s footage of Manchester City’s not-quite-epochal defeat by Fenerbahçe in 1968. It’s soundtracked to a version of El Negro Zumbón, which is a nice melodic touch.
But if events from 1968 are still too raw, here’s El Negro Zumbón being performed by Silvana Mangano in the 1951 Italian classic Anna.
HALF TIME: Real Madrid 1-0 Manchester City (agg 1-0)
A couple of added minutes and time for one last corner. It’s Real’s, out on the right. Ramos tries to get a head on it, but can’t, not quite. And that’s that for the first half. The goal that separates the sides has been taken off Bale by Uefa and credited to poor Fernando; turns out that deflection might not have been quite so slight after all. But this is mere admin: City have to find a second-half goal if they’re to keep their hopes of reaching a first Champions League final alive. It’ll be tense. No flipping!
44 min: De Bruyne turns down the middle of the park and slips a pass down the inside-left channel for Fernandinho, who cuts in from the flank and lashes a low shot inches wide of the left-hand post from the edge of the box. That’s the nearest City have come, and their best move too. Simple but highly effective.
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43 min: Bale drops a shoulder to earn himself a little pocket to the left of the City D. He has a shot but a fairly lame effort bumps harmlessly towards Hart.
42 min: Clichy goes on a baroque scamper down the left, and for a second looks like working a bit of space in the Real box. But he seems to lose heart and confidence mid-run, and checks back. The momentum is lost.
41 min: It’s not as though City aren’t doing their damndest to get back into this game. They earn themselves another corner, this time out on the left, but De Bruyne loops a fairly harmless set piece up, down and into the grateful arms of Keylor Navas.
40 min: And there’s more space for Marcelo down the left, sent clear into the City box but stopped in full flight by the flag of the linesman. An incorrect offside decision that dug City out of a hole.
38 min: City are living dangerously. Modric sprays a glorious pass down the left to release Marcelo, who flashes a high ball across the face of goal. Fortunately for City, there’s nobody in white to knock the ball past a flapping Hart.
DISALLOWED GOAL!
36 min: Kroos whips the free kick to the left-hand corner of the six-yard box. Pepe tries to meet the dropping ball with a volley, but can’t connect. No matter, for Ramos is on hand to tuck the loose ball underneath Hart and into the net. But it won’t count! There were four Real players offside when the free kick was sent in; Pepe and Ramos were two of them. City breathe again.
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35 min: Bale very nearly bursts into an awful lot of space down the right, but opts for a pass inside towards Jese instead. His rangefinder is wonky. In the resulting breakdown, Kroos is shouldercharged in the chest, in a fairly industrial fashion, by Fernandinho, who is lucky to avoid a booking. A free kick, 35 yards out on the right. From which...
33 min: A low ball into the Real box from the right nearly finds Aguero on the edge of the six-yard box, but Carvajal slides in to deflect the ball past the right-hand post. A corner, which leads to a light game of head tennis, one ended by Keylor Navas charging off his line and claiming possession.
32 min: Aguero looks to pass Ramos down the middle. He’s stopped by the defender hanging out an arm and catching his eye. The referee deems it accidental. “When you said in the preamble that Yaya Toure would be ‘refreshed’, did you mean ‘half-drunk’?” wonders Adam Hirst. “His aimless slow wanderings around the centre circle at half the pace of the match seem to indicate that.”
30 min: De Bruyne is booked for a fairly average clip on the back of Marcelo’s heel, as the pair compete down the City right. I suppose by the letter of the law that’s a correct decision, but it seems pretty unnecessary: it was a clumsy forward’s challenge, no more, no less.
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28 min: Real pass time with some more of that gentle midfield possession. Pass, pass, passity, pass. City can’t get a sniff of the ball at the moment. Here’s Shaun Wilkinson: “I feel like a terrible human being for even asking this, as he has been such a fantastic defender and seems like a great bloke, but at what point do City say enough is enough with Kompany? Much as I would love to be wrong, this pattern of missing a large amount of games, then playing a couple before getting hurt again seems to be pretty established now.”
26 min: Ronaldo goes into stepover mode down the left, and purchases one free kick off Sagna. He takes the set piece, near the corner flag, himself. Hart punches clear with Ramos lurking in an offside position.
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24 min: De Bruyne makes a little ground down the right but isn’t able to bother Navas in the Real goal. City clearly aren’t of a mind to die wondering; they’ve looked more dangerous since going behind.
23 min: City need a goal now, but they can’t afford to go too gung-ho. Marcelo and Isco combine down the left to set up Ronaldo, whose first-time shot from the edge of the area is high and wide.
21 min: City try to respond immediately, Navas earning a corner down the right. From the set piece, Fernando rises 12 yards out and thumps a header over the bar. That was quite a chance to equalise - and effectively take the lead in the tie - immediately.
GOAL! Real Madrid 1-0 Manchester City (Bale 20)
When the goal came, it was so simple. Carvajal is given plenty of time down the right. Too much time: Clichy doesn’t close his man down. Carvajal slides one forward to release Bale into the box. Bale takes a look across: he’s got three men in the middle. But instead he belts a high ball across Hart from a tight angle. It rises and curls and dips and lashes into the top left! Did he mean that? It’s genius if he did. But perhaps he didn’t. And there might be a little deflection from Fernando, sliding in to block. Either way, it’s the very definition of a cross-cum-shot.
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18 min: Modric finds a pocket of space in the middle, 25 yards from goal. He thinks about shooting towards the top left, then the top right. As he shapes to curl one goalwards, a combination of Fernando and Fernandinho nip at his heels. He goes down looking for a free kick, but he’s not getting one. It was fair hassle. The ball nearly squirts through the middle for Ronaldo, anyway, but there’s too much pace on it and it flies through to Hart.
17 min: City can’t get hold of the ball at all. Real are content to stroke it around in the midfield. For now.
15 min: Bale slips Carvajal into space down the right, but the full back’s cross is wayward. City mop up. They look a little shaken in the wake of Kompany’s injury, struggling to keep hold of the ball. They’ll need to settle quickly, because Real appear to be in the mood to apply some pressure.
13 min: Bale tries to break free down the inside-left channel, but Fernando stands up well and blocks the path. But Real are beginning to work up a head of steam, and Carvajal, from deep on the right, curls one onto Ronaldo’s head, ten yards out. Ronaldo climbs above Otamendi but heads high and wide right. A decent chance for someone so good in the air.
12 min: That early injury setback for City has ruined the early rhythm. Real pass it around the back awhile, warming themselves up again.
10 min: Kompany limps off, his race already run. It’s difficult to watch as he reluctantly offloads his armband; the big man’s had no luck with injury. Mangala comes on in his place.
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8 min: Very worrying signs for City here, as Kompany goes down after playing a simple pass in the midfield. He clutches the top of his left leg, and grimaces quite a lot before going down.
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7 min: Navas is seeing a fair bit of the ball out on the right. He strides inside and feeds Aguero on the edge of the D. Aguero tries to shift his feet to make room for a shot, but can’t engineer the space. The ball’s rolled left to De Bruyne, who tries to return it to Aguero with a low cross. It’s blocked at source by Carvajal.
5 min: Isco and Jese combine down the left to earn the first corner of the match. It’s looped into the City mixer, and after a brief bout of head tennis, Pepe sends a harmless header high into the air, allowing Hart to claim. It’s been a bright start to a tense occasion.
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3 min: Carvajal jigs down the right, cuts inside, and tries to find Jese on the edge of the box with a sliderule pass. It’s a dainty ball, but the Real forward made his run too soon, and realising he’s miles offside, doesn’t bother chasing. City go upfield, though Navas down the right. He skips past Isco and whips a fine high cross along the corridor of uncertainty, but there’s no City shirt in the middle. Nevertheless, Navas comes off his line and flaps the ball away in a slightly nervous fashion. Very strange, though it leads to nothing.
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2 min: Ramos, from a deep position on the left, tries to set Jese free down the right. Nope! That’ll be a goal kick. City go up the other end and immediately have three men flagged offside. Everyone finding their feet.
And we're off!
City get the ball rolling. The travelling City support really are giving it their all: the Bernabeu is huge, and teeming with Madridistas, but you can still hear Blue Moon being sung at considerable volume. “I’m wondering who Atletico fans will be rooting for tonight?” wonders Simon McMahon, a supporter of 1984 semi-finalists Dundee United. “No doubt a fair few will be itching to be given the chance of revenge against Real, but then that also brings with it the possibility of losing a Champions League final to them for the second time in three years. Losing to your city rivals in a match of such importance is not much fun. Take it from me.”
The teams are out! Real Madrid are in their famous meringue-white shirts, while Manchester City will play in third-choice neon green. It’s hardly news to report that there’s a crackling atmosphere at the Estadio Santiago Bernabéu for this European Cup semi-final. The home side are looking for their 11th title in this competition, while City are still seeking their first. But of course there’s always a first time for everything, as Leicester City can attest. Marina Hyde is already looking forward to the film of the fairytale. But we digress. This is on! We’ll be off in a minute!
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Manuel Pellegrini speaks! “It is important to realise that it is not easy to get to a semi-final. First you must be in the top four in your league, which is not easy in England. Then it is very difficult to continue after the group stage, the round of 16, the quarter final. So we must play, and fight for every ball to win the game and take our chance to reach the final. Our best opportunity is to play well in defence. Madrid are very dangerous and always look to attack. When we have the ball, we must not lose it. We will see if Yaya Toure is able to complete 90 minutes, but his experience in this game is very important.”
Whatever the outcome tonight, here’s a reminder to enjoy every second while it lasts. Reaching the pinnacle of Europe is no guarantee that the good times will last forever. Next season, Nottingham Forest and Aston Villa will become the first pair of former European champions to face off in second-tier domestic competition. The Knowledge has today been looking into this sorry state of affairs, in a must-read article that also features an advert for 1970s UK milk concern Unigate Dairies starring Muhammad Ali.
Just a reminder of the result from the first leg: Manchester City 0.576734 - 0.972312 Real Madrid. That’s according to the Expected Goals model. For those of you who haven’t been experimenting with Kool-Aid or freebasing snake oil, it was 0-0. Another goalless draw is the only scoreline that’d take us into extra time and possible penalty kicks tonight, away goals and all that.
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The big news for Real Madrid? You know the big news for Real Madrid: Cristiano Ronaldo is back! He’s one of three changes to the XI that started in Manchester last week: Isco and Jese are the others who make the step up. Lucas Vazquez drops to the bench, while Casemiro and Karim Benzema are injured.
City meanwhile name the same XI who began the first leg, with one exception. The hamstrung David Silva is replaced by a refreshed Yaya Toure. For the record, there are eight changes to the team sent out for the fiasco at Southampton at the weekend. Not that absolutely everyone had an off day: let’s hope we still see the in-form and extremely promising Kelechi Iheanacho at some point tonight.
Tonight's teams
Real Madrid: Navas, Carvajal, Pepe, Ramos, Marcelo, Modric, Kroos, Isco, Jese, Ronaldo, Bale.
Subs: Casilla, Varane, James Rodriguez, Kovacic, Lucas Vazquez, Danilo, Mayoral.
Manchester City: Hart, Sagna, Kompany, Otamendi, Clichy, Fernando, Fernandinho, Toure, Navas, De Bruyne, Aguero.
Subs: Caballero, Mangala, Kolarov, Delph, Sterling, Bony, Iheanacho.
Referee: Damir Skomina (Slovenia).
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🎼 ♫ Die Meister BOO Die Besten BOOOOOOO Les grandes équipes GERROFF BOOOOOOO The champions ♪
Real Madrid are contesting the semi-finals of the European Cup for the 27th time in their history. So far, they’ve won 13, and they’ve lost 13, and the odds suggest statistical history is about to tip in their favour. That’s because they’ve won all five of their games at the Bernabéu in this season’s competition, a run which has included a 3-0 victory against Wolfsburg in the quarters and a Champions League record-equalling 8-0 shellacking of Malmö in the groups. If they experience the joy of six tonight, they’ll have made it to their 14th final.
The recent omens are good for Real. They’re unbeaten in nine matches against English clubs, having drawn last week against Manchester City, seen off Liverpool home and away in last year’s groups, knocked Manchester United out of the Round of 16 in 2013, beaten City at the Bernabéu in the 2012 groups before drawing in Manchester, and dispatched Spurs from the quarter finals in 2011. This represents something of a roll for La Liga’s grandest club against the finest the Premier League has to offer.
On the other hand, though, City have won three of their five away games in this season’s competition. Their last visit to Spain saw them steamroller European specialists Sevilla 3-1 in the Estadio Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán, one of the Champions League performances of the campaign. And having won their first-ever European Cup knockout tie in this season’s Round of 16, against Dynamo Kyiv - it was a long wait since losing to Fenerbahçe in the 1968-69 first round - they’ve got up some momentum of their own.
Real are favourites, yes. And Cristiano Ronaldo is back. But they’re not always comfortable here against English opposition - Arsenal won at the Bernabéu in 2006, while Liverpool repeated the trick in 2009 - and City have the talent to sweep anybody aside on their day. Are Real heading for the final against Atlético Madrid in Milan? Or could this prove to be the biggest night in City’s history? It’ll be a blast finding out! It’s the second Champions League semi-final! It’s on!
Kick off: 8.45pm local time in Madrid, 7.45pm back home in Manchester.
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