MADRID, 16 Abr. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Real Madrid and Manchester City will visit the Etihad Stadium this Wednesday in search of sealing their place in the semifinals of the 2023-2024 Champions League against Manchester City, a rival that has turned its stadium into a fortress, still impassable for the Madrid team. on his previous five visits.
After the first even match in the capital with a lot of spectacle and offensive waste on the part of both teams, everything will be decided this Wednesday, April 17 in a stadium where the 14-time European champion has never won, with eight goals conceded in its two last visits, and where, on the contrary, the authority of its ‘owners’ can be decisive.
The English champion has not lost in its stadium since November 2022, when it lost (1-2) in the match prior to the World Cup break in Qatar. From there and after beating Luton last weekend (5-1), they have gone 35 games without losing, a hierarchy that is more overwhelming considering their almost impeccable run in the Champions League in the last four seasons.
The last defeat at the Etihad in the top continental competition was in its debut in the group stage of the 2018-2019 season against French side Olympique Lyon. Since then, out of 30 games, only Ukrainian Shakhtar (1-1 in the first phase of 2019-2020), and Portuguese Sporting (0-0 in the round of 16 second leg of 2021-2022 after 0-5 in Lisbon), they came out without losing.
City have won their last 12 home games in the continental club competition, scoring 41 goals – 3.41 per game – and only conceding 9 goals. Furthermore, considering the current edition of the Champions League, the English are undefeated in nine games, with eight wins and only one draw at the Bernabéu, with 27 goals in their favor – the highest scoring team in the tournament -.
At the Etihad, the 14-time European champion has not yet been able to win in his five visits, always losing when the tenant on the bench was Pep Guardiola. In fact, in the ‘citizen’ fiefdom the only LaLiga team capable of winning in the Champions League was FC Barcelona in the second round of 2014-2015 (1-2).
The last precedent between Real Madrid and City at the Etihad was last year, in the second leg of the semi-finals, after a 1-1 draw at the Bernabéu. However, Guardiola’s men were a roller at home and sank their rival with a resounding 4-0 that could have been even more painful, to catapult them to the final in Istanbul, where they won their first ‘Orejona’ against Inter Milan .
In 2021-2022, Ancelotti’s pupils left the Etihad with a lot of life, in the first leg of the semi-finals, with a 4-3 for the English, who could have increased their income much more if their lack of aim and the ‘connected’ Vinícius and Benzema. A result that they knew how to do well at the Bernabéu, where they won 3-1 in one of the three epic comebacks of a Champions League that they ended up lifting.
Before, in 2020, with Zinédine Zidane on the bench, Real Madrid fell again (2-1), then in the second leg of the round of 16 and being eliminated after the defeat in the first leg at the Bernabéu (1- 2). Sterling and Gabriel Jesús did not waste Varane’s mistakes, while Benzema made it provisional 1-1 in a match without an audience due to the pandemic.
Real Madrid’s most positive results against City date back to 2016 and 2012. Seven years ago, the whites took a poor but valuable 0-0 in the semi-final first leg against a team coached by their former Manuel Pellegrini, whom they eliminated with the 1-0 in the second leg in Madrid. The other match is from the group stage of the 2012-2013 campaign, which ended in a one-goal tie (Benzema and Agüero), in the only match in the ‘citizen’ fiefdom in which the Madridistas have been ahead.
REAL MADRID HAS ALREADY ASSAULT OTHER FORTRESSS
The objective of the current European champion will be to conquer another ‘large’ continental fiefdom as it has already achieved in recent years. In 2022-2023 he beat Liverpool at Anfield (2-5) and Chelsea at Stamford Bridge (0-2), a stadium where he also won a year before (1-3). In that 21-22, they also beat Inter (0-1) at the Giuseppe Meazza.
Furthermore, on the way to the ‘Décima’, in 2014 and against the Bayern then coached by Pep Guardiola, they were able to win in Munich, a historically adverse scenario, by 0-4, repeating victory at the Allianz on the way to the ‘Tuodécima’ (1-2) and towards the ‘Decimotercera’ (1-2), in both cases in first legs. They also attacked the Parc des Princes (1-2) and Allianz Turin (0-3) in the 2017-2018 campaign.
Nor should we forget that in this campaign, the team coached by Carlo Ancelotti won, including a comeback, 1-2 at the Spotify Camp Nou, in LaLiga EA Sports. Although the whites’ performance was not as high at the Cívitas Metropolitano, where they have not won this season, losing in the League (3-1) and in the Copa del Rey (4-2, after extra time).
2024-04-16 08:00:01
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