Real Madrid is playing Liverpool today in the UEFA Champions League final in Kiev, Ukraine. Madrid is in the final four the third year in a row, and the fourth time in five years. Liverpool last played in the final in 2007.
How to watch: In the United States, the game is being broadcast by Fox Sports and ESPN Deportes. If you’re reading in another country, you can find your viewing options here.
Scare for Liverpool
Mohamed Salah goes off briefly to receive treatment on his left shoulder after falling on it awkwardly. All of Liverpool — and Egypt — holds its breath, but he’s back on after a moment.
But now he’s down again and seems distraught. Uh oh. This is an enormous moment.
Two Turnovers, Two Chances
Carvajal springs Ronaldo down the right after an errant pass in midfield, but his rocket from junst inside the edge of the area screams over the bar. Carvajal then returns the favor for Liverpool, sending a pass directly out of bounds for the game’s first corner. Van Dijk beats Navas to it, but the goalkeeper causes just enough trouble to distract and the header goes over. Twenty minutes in and we have not lacked intensity or chances. Just goals.
Liverpool Stepping on the Gas
Liverpool has been on the front foot early, pressing high and making Madrid work to get out of its end. The intensity led to a dangerous chance in the area in the first minute and an early free kick, but Salah and James Milner failed to turn it into a shot. It’s tough to faze this Madrid.
In the Final Moments
Final thoughts from Rory in Kiev: The Champions League trophy sits at the side of the field, delicately placed there by Andriy Shevchenko, the great Ukrainian striker, and a player who knew what it felt like to win this game — the biggest in club soccer — and to lose it, too.
It’s worth keeping an eye on whether anyone breaks the taboo as the teams file out and reaches out to brush the trophy with their fingers. It brings nothing but bad luck, they say, as Dimitri Payet found out in the Europa League final 10 days ago.
Other than superstition, it’s hard to pinpoint what, precisely, will decide this game. It has been presented in Spain, in particular, as the most ill-balanced in recent years, a far more straightforward affair for Real — aiming to become the first team since 1976 to win the European Cup three years in a row — than beating Atletico Madrid in 2016 or Juventus last year.
Liverpool would contest that, believing Klopp’s intense style — those devastating surges that swept aside Manchester City and Roma on the way here — can do just as much damage to Real. Most finals tend to look, in the build-up, like tense, tight affairs: one goal, one way or the other, could be decisive.
Perhaps that is the way this will go, too, but at the same time it is hardly inconceivable that one or other team will wreak havoc. Real’s star quality makes them favorites — Zinedine Zidane’s players know this stage — but if there is one club that believes itself as touched by destiny in Europe as Madrid, it is Liverpool. That trophy is central to the identity of both of these teams. Neither will give up on it without a fight.
In Europe, the Halftime Show Comes First
The British singer Dua Lipa and the Jamaican rapper Sean Paul are currently on the field in Kiev, making people nervous (O.K., me) that the game won’t kick off on time. At the moment, a giant tarp with a satellite photo, dozens of dancers and some machines shooting flames in the air are covering the entire field.
The players are waiting in the tunnel.
The Stadium Is Filling, the Teams Have Arrived
From Rory in Kiev: The NSC Olympiskiy in Kiev is starting to fill with fans: a few thousand are in the north curve of the stadium, reserved for Liverpool; “Allez Allez Allez,” the soundtrack to the club’s season, is booming out. A vast cheer went up, a little after 8:20 p.m. local time, when Liverpool’s distinctive cherry red bus was shown arriving at the stadium. An even bigger one was reserved for the first glimpse of Mohamed Salah.
There are only a few hundred people, so far, in the bright white of Real Madrid in the south end: many more are choosing to linger outside, in the warm sunshine of downtown Kiev, or (more likely) struggling to make it through stringent, but brisk, security checks.
For all the doubts about the suitability of the city as a venue for club soccer’s biggest game, for all the logistical challenges fans have faced to get here and for all the inflated hotel prices they have had to pay to find a bed, Kiev —now Kyiv, as the locals waste no time in pointing out — has pulled out all the stops. Khreschatyk, the main shopping boulevard, has been closed off as a fan zone; traffic has been barred from much of the center all day. Whitney Houston has been blaring out of vast speakers on Maidan, the city’s Independence Square, all day, for reasons that do not remain entirely clear, as fans passed the long hours before evening, and the moment they have awaited all season.
The Lineups Are Out
✅ ¡Nuestro once inicial para la Final de Champions contra el @LFCEspanol! #APorLa13 | #HalaMadrid pic.twitter.com/KZDSyZXArP
— Real Madrid C.F. ⚽️ (@realmadrid) May 26, 2018
Real Madrid: Keylor Navas; Dani Carvajal, Raphael Varane, Sergio Ramos, Marcelo; Casemiro, Toni Kroos, Luka Modric, Isco, Karim Benzema, Cristiano Ronaldo
Bench: Kiko Casilla, Nacho Fernández, Theo Hernández, Mateo Kovacic, Marco Asensio, Lucas Vázquez, Gareth Bale
The Spanish news media had been suggesting that Zidane would go with the BBR front line of Benzema, Gareth Bale and Ronaldo, but even Isco for Bale (who is available as a sub) sends an aggressive signal. It also suggests Zidane has supreme confidence that his world-class back line, protected by Casemiro, is capable of shutting down Salah and Co.
Tonight's #UCLfinal line-up...#WeAreLiverpool pic.twitter.com/3lkznSLDkH
— Liverpool FC (@LFC) May 26, 2018
Liverpool: Loris Karius; Trent Alexander-Arnold, Virgil Van Dijk, Dejan Lovren, Andy Robertson; Jordan Henderson, James Milner, Georginio Wijnaldum; Sadio Mané, Roberto Firmino, Mohamed Salah
Bench: Simon Mignolet, Nathaniel Clyne, Ragnar Klavan, Alberto Moreno, Emre Can, Adam Lallana, Dominic Solanke.
As expected from Klopp, whose front three takes a backseat to no one, even today. He will need big nights from Henderson, Milner and Wijnaldum; if Liverpool gets overpowered in midfield, it could be a long night.
One more note: Real Madrid named the same 11 players as its starters in last year’s final. (It worked out pretty good for them that day.) None of the Liverpool players has ever appeared in a Champions League final.
“Experience is really important,” Klopp said Friday. “A second before the game Real will be more confident than we are, but it doesn’t matter because the game isn’t decided in that second. Real are really strong, but they’ve never played us.”
What to Expect in the Champions League Final
• Goals. Liverpool set a tournament record this season with 46. Their player to watch is Mohamed Salah, the Egyptian striker who led the Premier League in scoring and has 44 goals in all competitions. Real Madrid counters with its Portuguese star Cristiano Ronaldo, the leading scorer in Champions League history (120 goals in 152 appearances).
• Ronaldo scored 15 goals in 12 Champions League games this season. One more on Saturday would make him the only player to score in four Champions League finals.
• Today’s referee is a Serb, Milorad Mazic. He is no stranger to big games, having worked four games in the Champions League this season and last year’s Confederations Cup final between Germany and Chile. Next month, he will call games in his second straight World Cup. If his day goes well, you won’t notice him.
• Real Madrid is looking to extend its record by winning a 13th Champions League title, and to become the first team since Bayern Munich (1974-76) to claim three in a row.
• “We’ll never live this again,” Real Madrid Manager Zinedine Zidane said Friday. “We’ll live other moments but we’ll never have today and tomorrow again. We need to take advantage. If there’s pressure, well, that’s life. It makes it better.”
• Liverpool is chasing its sixth Champions League trophy, which would move it ahead on Bayern Munich and Barcelona on the all-time list. Only Madrid and A.C. Milan, with seven, have more. The Reds’ last visit to the final was in 2007 (a loss to Milan). Their last triumph was in 2005, when Liverpool rallied from a 3-0 halftime deficit to beat Milan on penalties — a game that has become known as the Miracle of Istanbul.
• “This club has it in its DNA to win big things,” Liverpool Manager Jürgen Klopp said Friday. “We are here because we are Liverpool. We cannot try to fight on their level, but tactics in football are there to bring an opponent onto your level.”
• “You’ll Never Walk Alone” is Liverpool’s most famous song, but you may hear another one over and over today. It’s “Allez Allez Allez,” and Rory tracked it to its source in 1980s Italian disco earlier this week.
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