Today, Real Madrid pursues a place in the semi-finals of the Champions League, for the third consecutive season, in a new arena. For the first time in three years, Carlo Ancelotti's team aims to defend an away result, this time at Stamford Bridge where Chelsea are playing their last card to fix a season far from their expectations , with three coaches in the last two weeks.
Rarely have Real Madrid been such favourites. They have a good result, 2-0 in the first leg at the Bernabéu, where they overwhelmed a Chelsea side that could have scored. In addition, the English team has three consecutive defeats and in the last five games they have only achieved a draw and scored one goal.
Chelsea have undoubtedly been the biggest disappointment of this Premier League, in which they are eleventh, with almost no European qualification options for next season; and more disappointing is if we take into account the blues spent almost 700 million on signings since the summer; 300 million this winter market to form a squad that has become more of an extensive collection of trading cards than a real team.
If it suits him to match the result and go on the counter to give the opponent the coup de grace or if, on the contrary, he prefers to win from the start, which he did in the previous tie against Liverpool despite having - won 2-5 in the first leg at Anfield.
But the difference now lies in the field factor. Madrid consummated last season's comebacks by always playing the second leg in the shelter of the Bernabéu. That's how he came back against PSG, Manchester City and Chelsea himself in the quarter-finals, like now.
The precedent of the tie against Chelsea can be equivocal because it happened in circumstances that are now impossible to repeat. Madrid won the first leg at Stamford Bridge (1-3), with a hat-trick from Benzema, but then they were up against the ropes at the Bernabéu, where the team, then managed by Thomas Tuchel, went 0-3 in favor of the marker. Madrid forced extra time thanks to a goal from Rodrygo in the last few minutes and sentenced in extra time with a goal from Benzema.
In the pre-match press conference, Ancelotti assured that his team will win in order not to complicate things, as they are not expecting an easy match.
Madrid booked such important players as Vinícius, Kroos and Luka Modric in Cadiz on Saturday. All will be headlines today. The most predictable is to repeat the team that won in the first leg, which is the one that thrashed Barcelona at the Camp Nou in the Cup.
"Everything is possible in football, and even more so if we work hard. I don't know the history of Madrid from the inside, but what I see from the outside is that they have a great coach and players who have been playing together for many years. They have talent, work ethic and confidence, which is a recipe for success. But Chelsea have already come back several times and I do my job", he said.
Kepa, Chelsea's Basque goalkeeper, also spoke: "We can achieve it, but we need to be more forceful in both areas. This is the way."
