Real Madrid vs. Liverpool: 5 key matchups

Real Madrid face Liverpool in the Champions League final on Saturday. Here are five key matchups that could determine the result.

On Saturday, Real Madrid will face Liverpool in the Champions League final. Finals being what they are, there’s a chance we’re in for a cagey match between two sides more worried about not losing than they are about winning. Real and Liverpool being what they are, however, it’s more likely we’re in for a very silly, very entertaining, end-to-end goalfest. Whatever we get, these matchups will have a huge bearing on the result.

Mohamed Salah vs. Marcelo or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Marcelo vs. Trent Alexander-Arnold

There is no player who better epitomizes Real Madrid’s unerring confidence in their own superiority than Marcelo. If the Brazilian isn’t the best left-back in the world, he’s definitely the left-back in the world most likely to go viral 27 times in the same season for a variety of touches so sublime as to render phrases like “defensive responsibility” and “tracking back” almost completely meaningless.

Marcelo has been — at times, in his way — exposed during Real’s run to the final, most notably in the second leg of the quarterfinal against Juventus, who scored two of their goals from crosses on Marcelo’s wing, and the first leg of the semifinal against Bayern Munich, who took the lead through right-back Joshua Kimmich with Marcelo caught at the other end of the pitch, for some reason busy retrieving the ball for a goal kick.

Whether Marcelo’s occasional absence from the left side of Real’s defense is down to a lack of defensive chops or is simply reflective of his general disinterest in anything that isn’t, like, a no-look back-heel through ball in the opposition penalty area is beside the point, which is this: His occasional absence from the left side of Real’s defense could be a serious problem against Mohamed Salah, whose 43 goals this season trail only Lionel Messi among players in Europe’s top five leagues.

Real are not the sort of team to make significant changes to their approach based on the strengths of the opposition, but giving Salah the freedom of the right side of the pitch, the room to build up a head of steam running toward the box with the ball at his feet, is a dangerous game. That isn’t to say Marcelo will adopt a deeper starting position, but it is to say that if he doesn’t, Sergio Ramos in central defense and Casemiro in holding midfield are going to have very busy games.

And of course Marcelo isn’t getting forward just because he enjoys it (though he really does seem to enjoy it); he’s doing it because he’s one of Real’s most talented and unpredictable playmakers. In Real’s six knockout games so far, he has three goals and an assist. Whatever they lose at the back by giving him the license to do whatever he wants going forward, they gain at the other end of the pitch.

When Marcelo does get forward, it will be Trent Alexander-Arnold’s responsibility to deal with him. The 19-year-old is in the midst of a breakout season, highlighted by his performance in the quarterfinal against Manchester City, when he dominated his head-to-head with Leroy Sane, despite being targeted as Liverpool’s weak link by Pep Guardiola. He has, however, looked at other times this season like what he is, a very, very talented teenager, mostly good but occasionally careless.

Marcelo will pose a very different kind of test to Sane. Not only is he significantly more experienced and significantly less predictable, he’s also a left-back playing in a (most likely) 4-4-2 diamond, not a winger playing in a 4-3-3. Alexander-Arnold is going to have a lot of difficult decisions to make: when Marcelo drifts centrally, as he inevitably will, does he track him or hand him off? How does he respond when Real’s attacking midfielder (likely Isco) and/or forwards (Cristiano Ronaldo and, probably, Karim Benzema) cycle out wide to create overloads on the wing? If Marcelo doesn’t track him (Alexander-Arnold) when he gets forward, will he keep getting forward anyway, or will he drop off in preparation for the counter?

Alexander-Arnold won’t have to do this alone — Salah will offer some support, Liverpool’s central midfielders will offer more — but he’s going to have to be decisive and brave. The last time questions were raised about his competence and focus at this level, he delivered the two best performances of his career. He may very well need to top them to ensure Real’s most entertaining player is kept in check.

Roberto Firmino vs. Sergio Ramos

Roberto Firmino has scored 26 goals in all competitions this season, and his 10 in the Champions League are level with Salah for the most by a Liverpool player in a single European campaign. Those would be impressive numbers for anyone, and yet they hardly scratch the surface of what makes the Brazilian so valuable to Jurgen Klopp’s side.

Firmino is a number 9, technically, but it’s his ability to drop deep and operate as a 10 that is the key to unlocking the Reds’ attack, and Salah in particular. Add to that his exceptional workrate off the ball, the intelligence of his movement, his understanding when and where to press and his ability to hold-up play and spin out of pressure, and he’s one of the most complete center forwards in the world.

On Saturday, he will come head-to-head with Sergio Ramos, one of the best center-backs in the world. When Firmino drops deep, he forces defenders to decide whether to track him or to pass him off to a midfielder. Ramos, never one to take a wait-and-see approach, will, wherever possible, track his man.

Real’s captain is superb in the tackle, and more than happy to foul when he doesn’t win the ball. He’s also athletic enough to stick with Firmino, more or less, when he does get beaten. If he’s able to get the better of his duel, it will go a long way to shutting down the Reds’ attack. If he can’t, even if he allows Firmino to slip past him once or twice, Liverpool’s front three will be running at speed toward Keylor Navas’ goal. No pressure, then.

Jordan Henderson vs. Isco

The biggest difference between the two sides is in midfield, where Real have three of the most technically gifted players in the world — Luka Modric, Toni Kroos and Isco — (and Casemiro) and Liverpool have a slightly makeshift trio of players (James Milner, Georginio Wijnaldum and Jordan Henderson) who can struggle to keep the ball, but who routinely outwork their opponents, pressing them into submission to give their front three the platform they need to do their thing.

Real have been, somewhat strangely given their talent in the middle, happy to get drawn into open, end-to-end games throughout this season’s competition. That probably benefits Liverpool, who could get passed off the pitch in a slower, more tactical game, but it doesn’t mean they won’t have serious problems to deal with.

None will be more serious than those posed by Isco, who missed the second leg against Bayern with an injury, but is expected to be fit for the final. The Spaniard has become frustrated with some of Zinedine Zidane’s decisions this season, but has started every big game when fit, and has been one of Real’s best players over the past two seasons.

If he plays, he’ll operate in a mostly free role behind the two strikers, creating overloads out wide, keeping possession in midfield and generally making impossibly difficult things look easy. It will be Henderson’s job to stop him.

The Liverpool captain has been something of a divisive figure over the past couple of years (strangely so, considering how much he obviously cares and tries) but he’s been excellent again this term, especially over the past few months. He sets the tone for the Reds in holding midfield, and is likely going to have a lot of fires to put out if the game becomes as stretched as the teams’ recent history suggests it might.

Keeping tabs on Isco won’t be easy given how much freedom the Spaniard has in Real’s system, and Henderson will at times pass him off to Milner and Wijnaldum when he goes out wide. This is unlikely to be the most obvious head-to-head matchup on the pitch given the fluid nature of both teams’ midfields, but Isco’s free role causes problems, and it will be Henderson’s job, more than anyone else’s, to solve them.

Virgil van Dijk (and Dejan Lovren) vs. Cristiano Ronaldo (and Karim Benzema)

Cristiano Ronaldo, barring a six-goal performance by Salah or Firmino, will end the season as Champions League top scorer for the sixth season in a row. That’s a remarkable achievement even before you consider he turned 33 in February, and shows next to no signs of slowing down.

Ronaldo’s continued dominance has much to do with his switch to a traditional number 9 role. He doesn’t do nearly as much as he used to, he barely runs around when the ball’s not in the final third, but when there is a goal to be scored, a move to be finished, he’s the fastest, most lethal player in the world.

When Liverpool paid £75 million for Virgil van Dijk in January, it was for moments like this, matchups like this. Given the way Ronaldo now plays, it’s unlikely he’ll give van Dijk much to do — at least not in the way Firmino will give Ramos much to do — but he will punish the Dutch center-back (and his partner, Dejan Lovren) for any mistakes he makes.

Real like to get the ball out wide, and van Dijk and Lovren will have to be impeccable defending crosses to keep Ronaldo quiet. Any sort of hesitation, any slow reactions and Ronaldo will punish them. If everything goes well for the Reds, this will be the duel you notice least, but there’s going to be an awful lot going on in Liverpool’s 18-yard box, whether you can see it or not.

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Jurgen Klopp vs. Zinedine Zidane

The one area Liverpool clearly outclass Madrid, the thinking seems to be, is in the dugout, which, depending on how you look at it, is either a compliment to Klopp or an insult to Zidane, who, lest we forget, is vying to win his third Champions League in only his third season as a manager.

There is, however, something to this. Klopp, after all, is working with a significantly weaker team, a team who sold their best player in January, a team with a 19-year-old right-back, a left-back relegated with Hull last season, a cobbled together midfield missing two likely starters and starring a 32-year-old James Milner. Outside of the front three (and van Dijk), these are simply not the sort of players we expect to see in a Champions League final.

But this is Klopp’s great talent, building a team that’s more than the sum of its parts, whose collective whir of energy and emotion is sufficient to fill in any cracks left by a lack of individual quality.

Real, of course, are quite the opposite, a team of 11 individuals so good, the easiest thing to do is to ignore everything else, and to blame all this victory on their aura of greatness, or something, in the face of which lesser teams simply collapse, especially when those lesser teams are the soft power interest of Middle Eastern governments. Never mind Zidane, who has the task of (a) managing all these notoriously easy-to-handle superstars and (b) getting none of the credit.

But he has had a crucial role to play in this year’s competition, making key personnel decisions throughout, particularly in his use of Lucas Vazquez and Marco Asensio, not to mention his faith in Karim Benzema, whose two goals in the semis secured Real’s passage to the final. Suffice to say, Klopp won’t be the only excellent manager in the dugout in Kiev.

As for the game itself, Liverpool, as they often do against opponents who are better at keeping the ball than them, will likely start slightly deeper, picking their moments to break forward on the counter-attack, and then pegging their opponents back for as long as they can. The Reds’ press has taken them this far, and they’re not going to abandon it now.

But they’ve never faced a team with the supreme confidence of this Real side, who seem flat-out incapable of losing their composure, their trust in their own ability. They also don’t obsess over possession the way City do, and will be happy to play more direct if the situation calls for it. How Real respond to the first flurry of Liverpool pressure, whenever it comes, will be as good an indicator as any of the sort of match to expect.

Finally, if there’s one thing Real have that Liverpool don’t, it’s a bench. Vazquez, Asensio, Gareth Bale and Mateo Kovacic all offer useful options off the bench, whether Los Blancos need a goal or want to see out a lead. Klopp — whose bench is likely to comprise of Danny Ings, Dominic Solanke, Ragnar Klavan and, if all goes well, a half-fit Adam Lallana and Emre Can — simply doesn’t have that luxury. If his starters don’t get the job done, it’s hard to see Liverpool winning.

That gives Zidane a huge tactical advantage, the ability to adapt his team based on the shape of the game in the knowledge Klopp can do almost nothing in response.

But that has been the model of Liverpool’s success in this competition all season: score early, score often and then, when fatigue kicks in, when the press drops off, hold on any way you can. It’s going to be a bumpy ride.