Real Madrid hosts Borussia Dortmund at the Bernabéu tonight, in what is a repeat of the last Champions League final, played in London four and a half months ago. The match comes to the whites in the midst of a debate about their poor level of play and five days before the classic. The unexpected defeat in Lille on the second day makes victory more necessary for them.
Ancelotti insists on working to achieve greater defensive solidity because his team concedes too many chances and often survives protected by Courtois’ saves. Bellingham has not yet scored and Mbappé is performing, but he is not the differential footballer that was expected. Vinícius is little by little recovering his form and has been less conflictive for a few weeks. The club is sure that it will win the Ballon d’Or on Monday.
New tactics
A defense with three centre-backs
Dortmund’s visit catches Ancelotti in the middle of tactical testing, looking for solutions to find the balance he longs for. The last one has been to bet on three centre-backs, inserting Tchouaméni between Militao and Rüdiger, in certain phases of the game, when his team had the ball, or throwing Jude Bellingham to the right side to help on a wing in which he has lost leadership by Dani Carvajal. The team tends to the left, where Vinícius and Mbappé move, with a tendency to fall on that side, the position they like the most.
What everyone agrees on is that Madrid is greatly burdened by the absence of the now retired Toni Kroos, the player with the most tactical sense on the squad and the one who was most capable of unblocking games in which the opponent was locked in behind. Modric played the last minutes against Celta, and at 39 years and one month he broke Paco Gento’s record as the club’s oldest player. His contribution was decisive.
Dortmund
A new coach, Nuri Sahim
Dortmund is doing poorly in the Bundesliga, but leads the Champions League. He has changed many players and comes with a new coach, Nuri Sahim, who went through Madrid without success. Apart from the coach with whom he played in the final, Edin Terzic, Dortmund lost two of its most charismatic players in the summer: Mats Hummels and Marco Reus.
In the new Dortmund there are three German internationals who played in the last European Championship: Waldemar Anton, Pascal Gross and Max Beier, and one of the best strikers in the Bundesliga, Serhou Guirassy. The latter has seven goals. However, Sahin will miss one of his stars at the Bernabeu, the injured winger Karim Adeyemi. His replacement, Julien Duranville, is also out, as is the Brazilian Yan Couto, victim of muscle problems in the first training session after the international break.
Dortmund have never won at the Bernabéu. There will be about 5,000 fans in the stands, more or less what Stuttgart had. The security device will mobilize 1,800 agents.
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