Trash-talking
The Champions League final will be played in two days.
Vicente del Bosque, who has won the Champions League as the coach of Real Madrid, as well as the World Cup and the Euros as the coach of Spain, believes that Real Madrid will handily defeat Liverpool. He doesn’t think there’s “even one Liverpool player who would improve Madrid, not even [Mohamed] Salah” (the quotation is from this article).
Actually, right now, Salah is better than any of Madrid’s forwards, but del Bosque has an excellent point. Player for player, Real Madrid is overwhelmingly the better team.
Then again, that is why Liverpool employs the “storming” tactic (see two entries ago). It allows a team to have a good chance, head-to-head, against an opponent whose players are more skillful. Already this year, it has allowed Liverpool to thrash Manchester City.
In other news, the legendary Xavi, formerly of Barcelona, offers this amusing analysis of Real Madrid’s defensive midfielder, Casemiro:
“Madrid break apart, seven players attack and Casemiro stays back on his own to cover the centre.”
Pretty impressive, right? Covering the center all alone? Not impressive enough for Xavi:
“He does not dominate space-time.”
Whoa. That’s a tall order. I’m not even sure if I dominate space-time.
I predict that the score will be Real Madrid 3, Liverpool 1. But I want Liverpool to win, and I think that that could very well happen.
Vicente del Bosque, who has won the Champions League as the coach of Real Madrid, as well as the World Cup and the Euros as the coach of Spain, believes that Real Madrid will handily defeat Liverpool. He doesn’t think there’s “even one Liverpool player who would improve Madrid, not even [Mohamed] Salah” (the quotation is from this article).
Actually, right now, Salah is better than any of Madrid’s forwards, but del Bosque has an excellent point. Player for player, Real Madrid is overwhelmingly the better team.
Then again, that is why Liverpool employs the “storming” tactic (see two entries ago). It allows a team to have a good chance, head-to-head, against an opponent whose players are more skillful. Already this year, it has allowed Liverpool to thrash Manchester City.
In other news, the legendary Xavi, formerly of Barcelona, offers this amusing analysis of Real Madrid’s defensive midfielder, Casemiro:
“Madrid break apart, seven players attack and Casemiro stays back on his own to cover the centre.”
Pretty impressive, right? Covering the center all alone? Not impressive enough for Xavi:
“He does not dominate space-time.”
Whoa. That’s a tall order. I’m not even sure if I dominate space-time.
I predict that the score will be Real Madrid 3, Liverpool 1. But I want Liverpool to win, and I think that that could very well happen.