THE Champions League It generates attraction in the world football environment and, specifically, in Argentina. Even more so when there are players involved and it is strengthened with the recent World Cup title in Qatar 2022. The other half of the first leg of the round of 16 will be played between Tuesday and Wednesday and there will be an Albiceleste presence, for what it is worth reviewing the intersections that will attract attention.
The duel of the 20 ‘Orejonas’ that repeats the last final between Real Madrid and Liverpool, the moment of Lautaro Martínez with Inter Italy and the illusion of Julián Álvarez with Manchester City are the main attractions of the four games that will be played for the most important club tournament in Europe. Let’s go one by one…
Liverpool vs Real Madrid
This Tuesday, starting at 5pm (ESPN TV or Fox Sports), the majesty of Anfield, where Liverpool reside in a complex season, receives a duel which, based on the finals (3), has become a classic of European football in which Real Madrid acted as kings of Europe.
The most repeated Champions League final, with two recent conquests for ‘Merengue’, make it the great rival to beat for the ‘Reds’: Loris Karius’ failures and ‘Mo’ Salah’s injury pain in 2018; and four years later, in Paris, he crashed into a wall called Thibaut Courtois.
Months later they meet again in the first exchange, where coach Carlo Ancelotti will be unable to count on two of his three starting midfielders affected by the flu: Aurélien Tchouameni AND Tony Kros.
The defending champion, winner of the European Super Cup and the Club World Cup this season, was first in his group in Europe’s top competition, not even his sporadic seasonal fluctuations nor the distance from leaders Barcelona in the Spanish league cloud the indisputable figure of Real Madrid, with only five defeats in 36 matches, albeit four since November.
On July 30, when they won the Community Shield against Manchester City (3-1) in their first competitive match of the season, nobody knew that Liverpool would go through the season in an unrecognizable slump of performances and results, with the exception of the Champions League. .
By the time the first stage of the tournament was over, save for a 4-1 defeat by Napoli on Matchday 1, Liverpool were all winners in that competition, also scoring 16 goals in their last five games. The problem was the rest of the tournaments, because those five victories represented half of the duels won up to that point: 10 out of 19.
The group of Jurgen Kloppwhich put the Dutchman in his shortlist for this tournament Cody Gakpo and to the hopefuls Stefan Bajceticby the way, in this recess he only won seven games out of 15with three draws and five defeats, they have been knocked out of both the League Cup and the FA Cup and are ninth in the Premier League.
Eintrach Frankfurt-Naples
The same Tuesday will have an attractive crossing to Germany, starting at 5pm (ESPN TV or Fox Sports). He Naplesabsolute leader of the Italian Serie A with a fifteen-point lead, tests his level in the visit to the a Eintrach Frankfurt trying to break predictions.
with the Argentine John Simon As replacements, the Southern Italy team returns to the match with all the ambition, confidence and steadfastness of an unstoppable block. Until November, with five wins from six matches in the first phase of the Champions League (they only lost in their last match against Liverpool, 2-0, but were top), they were an overwhelming side, winning 15 of his 18 accidents.
Even since then he hasn’t slowed down, with ten wins in twelve games, of which he suffered only one draw (2-2 with Cremonese which eliminated him from the Italian Cup) and one defeat, 0-1 with Inter.
The litmus test now is the Champions League, in which it has never gone beyond the round of 16, in which it now competes with Eintracht, irregular, and sixth in the Bundesliga.
The German team, which has Luke Alario in their ranks and last Europa League champion, they started the season with disappointments (they won six of their first fifteen competitive matches), until they reemerged and lost barely one of their last ten games.
Leipzig-Manchester City
For Wednesday (17:00) there will be a crossing with a reserved forecast. is that the Manchester City is an unknown factor in the midst of the Premier League investigation and the draw against Nottingham Forest at the weekend which saw him lose the leadership, contrasts with the good overtaking of Leipzig.
Giuliano Alvarez He has had very few starts since becoming world champion, eclipsed by the Norwegian Erling Haaland, scorer of 32 goals in 31 games this season. The team have lost just six of their 35 matches, although three of those have been since competition resumed following the 2022 World Cup.
Last weekend’s 1-2 defeat by Unión Berlin, recovered on the final day of the Bundesliga with a 0-3 win at Wolfsburg, was Leipzig’s only match lost since 17 September.
If the season started with just three wins in the first eleven competitive games, with as many draws and six defeats, it continued from there with a reliable team, who have only lost in one of their last 20 games, of which they won fifteen.and draws four, and which put all doubts in the Champions League with four consecutive victories.
Since the end of the group stage, at the same time, the fifth in the current Bundesliga table, out of places that give the right to play in the Champions League next year, has added seven wins in ten games, with two draws and one loss, in also awaiting the quarter-finals of the German Cup.
Inter-Porto
Without new entries in the Champions League list, Inter overcame their early season anxiety to continue in the round of 16 of the top European competition, to be champion of the Italian Super Cup, to occupy second position in the current Serie A table and waiting for the semi-finals of the Italian Cup.
The five defeats with which he went through the first ten official matches put everything in doubt in the ‘neroazzurro’ group, which reacted from October onwards, also in the Champions League, after a 1-0 draw against Barcelona, with 16 victories , three draws and only two defeats in that group.
Since November, when the group stage ended, they have not slowed down. They have won ten of their 16 duels, with two draws and two defeats, with Lautaro Martínez becoming captain and leader of football.
On the other side there will be Porto de Portugal. He won a tough group with Bruges, Leverkusen and Atlético de Madrid, in which he lost his first two games but bounced back with four wins.
Today it retains its firmness from then and an appearance of invinciblewith an unbeaten record of 22 official competition matches, of which 19 were won. They have not lost since 21 October, when they fell 0-1 to Benfica, the only side topping them in the Portuguese league standings, two points clear with one game to spare.
Since qualifying for the Champions League, which culminated in November with the 2-1 with which they eliminated Atlético not only from that tournament but from all European consolations, they have played 19 games, with 17 wins and two draws. This Saturday, in their last duel before visiting Milan to face Inter, they beat Río Ave 1-0 with goals from Toni Martínez.
Source: Clarin
Jason Root is the go-to source for sports coverage at News Rebeat. With a passion for athletics and an in-depth knowledge of the latest sports trends, Jason provides comprehensive and engaging analysis of the world of sports.