Real Madrid claimed a fourth Champions League title in the space of five seasons with a crazy 3-1 victory over Liverpool, bringing a bizarre campaign for Los Blancos to a suitably strange end.
Here are the game’s three big talking points.
Zidane rides his luck
It has regularly been asked whether Zinedine Zidane is a good manager or just a lucky one. The answer, surely, is that he is both – and his team certainly had a few more doses of fortune to lift the trophy after a campaign full of strange incidents.
Firstly came the first half injury to Mohamed Salah which significantly altered the pattern of the game, forcing Liverpool onto the back foot as the English team were denied the services of their most potent forward.
Then Madrid took the lead with a freakish goal as Loris Karius inexplicably ignored the close proximity of Karim Benzema as he rolled the ball out, allowing the Frenchman to stick out his foot and incredibly send the ball trickling apologetically over the line.
If that was one of the strangest strikes in Champions League history, Madrid’s next was one of the best as Gareth Bale – introduced by Zidane just a few minutes earlier – met Marcelo’s cross with an outrageous overhead volley which made Cristiano Ronaldo’s strike at Juventus a few weeks ago look commonplace.
The result was then sealed when another horrible error from Karius allowed Bale to net again, and the fact it took an injury to the opposition’s best player, two horrendous goalkeeping errors and an absolute worldy to lift the title says everything about Madrid’s campaign.
Zinedine Zidane.
Bale makes his point
A few weeks ago Bale appeared to have no future at Real Madrid, having dropped down the pecking order to fall behind Marco Asensio, Isco and Lucas Vazquez as the attacking partner for Cristiano Ronaldo and Karim Benzema.
It seemed certain that the Welshman would be sold in the summer, and he was so far out of favour that he didn’t even really feature in conversations about Zinedine Zidane’s strongest eleven. But an excellent goal to earn a draw against Barcelona reignited his season, and he headed into the final with confidence renewed after a strong run of form.
But nobody could have predicted the incredible impact he would make upon the final, netting a stupendous overhead volley which would have been decried as unrealistic if it had been scored on PlayStation. And although Bale’s second goal was largely due to Karius’s horrible mistake, the fact that he was prepared to shoot from long-range showed how good he was feeling – and now maybe he will still be in Spain next season, after all. Some big decisions lie ahead for him and the club.
Gareth Bale.
Karius costs Klopp
It’s impossible not to feel sympathy for Loris Karius after his two terrible errors played a major part in losing Liverpool the title, and the German keeper’s tearful reaction at the final whistle made it perfectly clear just how bad he was feeling. He does not need anybody to tell him how costly his mistakes were.
Nevertheless, there’s no escaping from the fact that Karius was the weak link in this contest, and sadly that will not surprise too many people after he struggled to convince throughout the campaign despite managing to displace Simon Mignolet as Jurgen Klopp’s first choice.
Klopp’s decision to stick with his compatriot ahead of the Belgian will undoubtedly be questioned, but the most important thing now is the future and it’s clear the Reds need to recruit a new keeper during the summer.
Atletico Madrid’s Jan Oblak would be the best possible option but he is far more likely to join Paris Saint-Germain if he does leave. Roma goalkeeper Allison is another name linked, along with Gianluigi Donnarumma from AC Milan. But whoever the new keeper is, one thing is clear: it has to be someone.
Loris Karius.
