Football: Real Madrid make Champions League history
Since the start of the 21st century, Real Madrid have tried to create “the ultimate winning machine”, said Sam Wallace in The Sunday Telegraph. Now, at last, that “dream has been realised”. Last Saturday, a fortnight after becoming Spanish champions, Madrid thrashed Juventus 4-1 in Cardiff to become the first side to win the Champions League two seasons in a row, and for the third time in four years. Juventus had conceded just three goals in their previous 12 European matches, yet they were “ruthlessly exposed” by Zinedine Zidane’s players. So impressive were Madrid, particularly their “dominant” midfield of Luka Modric, Toni Kroos and Casemiro, that there can be no doubt they are “one of the greatest teams in history”.
As always, Cristiano Ronaldo was at the centre of the game, said Jonathan Northcroft in The Sunday Times. He had scored in two previous Champions League finals, but this was his “deadliest European club final performance” yet: the Portuguese forward scored twice, netting his 600th goal for club and country, to win the competition for a joint-record fourth time. To think that some of us had suggested Ronaldo’s best days were behind him, said Sid Lowe in The Observer. “How foolish we were.” True, this was his “worst goalscoring season” in seven years. But that’s only because he has set such extraordinarily high standards – he still netted 41 times, more than any Premier League player, and took fewer shots for each goal than ever before. In the past three seasons, the 32-year-old had “struggled towards the finish line”. But he avoided that this time around, thanks to Zidane: the manager convinced Ronaldo to sit out more games – in the league, he skipped four of Madrid’s final seven away ties – so he could peak in the important ones. In Cardiff, “that plan came together”.
Zidane’s handling of Ronaldo points to the manager’s greatest strength, said James Gheerbrant in The Times: his ability to get the best out of his players. When he took over last year, having only previously coached Madrid’s junior team, few expected him to be a “roaring success”. And it’s true that he’s not a brilliant tactician – 17 months into the job, his “coaching philosophy” remains unclear, and he leaves much of the training work to his assistant, David Bettoni. But that hardly matters. As the greatest footballer of his generation, Zidane commands respect from everyone in this “notoriously mutinous” side, and knows exactly how to talk to them. Having achieved “extraordinary, unmitigated success” – not even Pep Guardiola or José Mourinho can match his successive Champions League triumphs – he deserves to be “bracketed with the elite managers of the modern game”.