Champions League: Manchester City vs Real Madrid
At 3:00 a.m. Beijing time on April 27, 2022, the first leg of the Champions League semi-finals, "Blue Moon" Manchester City will face "Galaxy Battleship" Real Madrid at home. Manchester City have gone hand in hand on both the league and Champions League fronts this season, becoming the league leader with 80 points at the league end, but only one point ahead of Liverpool behind them, and it remains to be determined who will spend the final championship; and in the Champions League, Blue Moon eliminated Sporting Lisbon and Atletico Madrid and successfully reached the semi-finals. In terms of lineup, Kyle Walker and Stones are 2 injured, and the core main player De Bruyne has also suffered minor injuries recently, and whether he can play this game is doubtful.
In his pre-match press conference, Manchester City manager Guardiola said about the match, saying: "It is a special battle, it is a pleasure to be here against real Madrid, Barca, Bayern, Liverpool and other top teams. We are honored to be here (in the Champions League semi-finals), we have been here a few times before, but they are regulars here. We know the gap between the history of the team and Real Madrid, which cannot be changed, but football is an 11-on-11 sport, the players decide the game on the pitch, we have played with teams of this level many times, we know that the game is decided by the players, the protagonist of the game is them, not me and Carlo Ancelotti. It can be seen from this that Guardiola's views are still very rational and objective.
Real Madrid's performance this season is obvious to everyone, the team at the league end, with 78 points to rank the top of the league, in the case of 5 rounds of La Liga schedule, ahead of Barca behind the 15 points, this season's La Liga champions have fallen into the bag, it can be seen that the team has now been out of the league involvement, can fully cope with the Champions League, from the last round of the game against Osasuna, it can be seen that manager Ancelotti will be Vinicius and Valverde and other main forces, It can be seen that An Shuai has made obvious retention moves.
Yesterday, the real Madrid official website announced the big list of this game against Manchester City, Eden Hazard, Luka Jovic and Mariano were absent, and Benzema, Bale and Modric were all listed. The specific list is as follows:
Goalkeepers: Courtois, Lunin, Fuedias;
Defenders: Carvajal, Militang, Alaba, Vallejo, Nacho, Marcelo, Mendy;
Midfielders: Kroos, Modric, Casemiro, Valverde, Vazquez, Ceballos, Isco, Camareunga;
Forwards: Benzema, Asensio, Bale, Vinicius, Rodrigo.
In terms of past encounters between the two teams, Manchester City has won 3 wins, 2 draws and 3 losses in the past eight times against Real Madrid, and the past performance is not different, but it is worth noting that in the last 3 games, the Blue Moon has won all. In terms of recent situation, Manchester City is currently fighting in the league and the Champions League, and the league championship is still more involved in the team's energy, and the core main force De Bruyne has suffered recent minor injuries, which still affects its play to a certain extent; and Real Madrid is currently fully committed to the Champions League, and it can be seen from the big list that it is basically the main force.