Real Madrid repeated the 2018 defeat of Liverpool in Kyiv to lift their fourteenth Champions League trophy in Paris, thanks to Vinicius Junior’s 59th-minute goal at the Stade de France, Saint-Denis, France.
Both teams have started on a good note, gunning for the European club’s most revered trophy but were unable to find the back of the net in the highly competitive final.
Liverpool were gunning for their third trophy to complement last week’s Premier League title miss to Manchester City having started the season’s campaign on a quadruple target.
On the other hand, Madrid were in search of their third for the season to round up a treble campaign having won LaLiga and Spain’s Supercoppa.
However, English pundits have predicted Liverpool to win the duel between the topflight European clubs citing Jurgen Klopp’s tactical impact to be the cutting edge to the decisive match and this is reflected in the 24 chances created by the Reds against Los Blancos’ four.
However, just like every other unpredictable outcome, Liverpool’s quest to lift their seventh UEFA Champions League trophy, after winning the Carabao and FA Cups, never came to fruition as the Spanish giants coasted home a 1-0 victory.
Meanwhile, Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp has vowed to be in next year’s UEFA Champions League final, boasting that Liverpool will come back stronger.
In a post-match interview with BT-Sports, he said, “It’s not bad to get to the final – it’s kind of success although not the success you want to have.
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“I have a strong feeling we will come again. The boys are really competitive and are an outstanding group – they will be that again next season. And we go again. Where is it next season? Istanbul? Book the hotel!
“The mood in the dressing room makes it feel like not a great season at this moment – we’ll need a few minutes or hours for that.
“We played a good, not a perfect game. A perfect game wouldn’t have been possible with how the opponent set up with the deep formation, counter-attacks and long balls – that was tricky.
“Like the disallowed goal in the first half was a long ball that we couldn’t defend in the first place. We had a lot of shots but not the clearest – only three forced (Thibaut) Courtois into top saves.
“We conceded a goal from a throw-in. (Federico) Valverde wanted to shoot, Vinicius was there and that’s it.
“The boys tried everything, especially at 1-0 down. We wanted to be braver in the second half. That’s what we said at half-time. We played around them. We should have played more in the formation than around them,” Klopp added.
Following the UEFA Champions League triumph, Real Madrid boss Carlo Ancelotti has likened himself to the ‘record man’ after attaining such a fantastic feat.
The excited Ancelotti conceded that they were forced to defend in the first half but recovered with a goal lead which was ghosted in by Junior to lift their fourteenth Champions League title.
“I can’t believe it. We’ve had a fantastic season,” the Real Madrid boss said after the victory.
“We suffered a lot in the first half but in the end, we deserved to win this competition.
“I am the record man. I had the luck to come here last year and found as usual a fantastic club with a really good squad with a lot of quality and mental character. The season was top,” Ancelotti added.
The Trumpet reports that Carlo Ancelotti, who coached Chelsea for two seasons before switching to Paris Saint-Germain, won his second Champion League title for Real Madrid having first won it in the 2013-2014 season during his first spell in the club.
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