Wednesday night's game took us to Santiago Bernabe'u, Real Madrid's home ground where they faced Liverpool. Both the Spanish side and the English side were 7 points behind the league
leaders in their respective groups, but Real Madrid were in top form of late which added onto their advantage of playing at home to win the game. But Liverpool have done exceptionally well especially in the Champions League matches. The match started with the usual procedure of the captains exchanging their respective club's flags and the photo session. 'The Reds' were led by their local boy Carragher as captain courageous Steve Gee was not yet 100% fit to start and Rafa did not want to risk playing Steve Gee and getting him injured because Liverpool have to face their bitter rivals ManU on 14 march. Liverpool started with lone striker Torres and five midfielders. Real Madrid's defender, Pepe had vouched before the game to mark Torres continuously and to physically tussle him out. The fun part was the match was played in Spain against a Spanish team , the English team having more Spanish players than Real Madrid ( which had nearly 7 Dutch players in their team). The first half went quite well, both the teams showing the urge to win the ball from one another and keeping possession. Torres had a wonderful opportunity of taking Liverpool in front but was denied by Cassilas. The Liverpool defence was strong enough to prevent Raul from taking any advantage and slotting the ball into the net. Higuine and Robben threatened Liverpool a couple of times, Higuine striking the side netting and Robben hitting the ball just over the cross bar. Both teams went into the half time with the score 0-0.The second half was getting hotter by each minute, Liverpool showing the urge to get the crucial away goal. Let me explain why the away goal matters so much. if a certain team scores a 2-1 victory over another team on foreign soil but lose with them 0-1 on home soil, the team which scored away goals marches on to the next round because they showed more quality by beating the opponent away from home, with not much of fan support. Now coming back to the match, Real Madrid's Left back Heinze gave a free kick to liverpool about 32 m from goal in the 82nd minute. Fabio Aurelio the left footer curled the ball into the 6 yard box where Israeli midfielder and playmaker Benayoun headed the ball into the net and taking Liverpool ahead. Surprisingly the Spanish team was not marking him, Higuine who was in front of Benayoun did not budge to clear the ball, giving Benayoun a free unmarked header. The whole stadium was stunned when Liverpool scored ( barring the travelling English fans) and a deadly silence fell over for a couple of minutes. Madrid tried hard getting back in the game but with Liverpool's strong defence and sheer determination to win the game they held Madrid from scoring any.
It was a wondeful night for the Scousers and Liverpool go into the second leg with greater confidence,Steve Gee will be joining the side to play Madrid at Anfield. If Liverpool make it to the next round it will be totally 14 times they would have reached this stage in this competition and 4 times out of 5 under Rafa. CHEERS LIVERPOOL!!!
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