The legends match warm up was great. Cafu, Seedorf, Figo still got it. I would definitely pay to watch those guys in a legends league.

Never lose your touch, just lose your legs.

I use to watch that legends 5 a side indoor on sky use to be great to watch.

HALÁ MADRITS

Our madridista hearts will beat as one. Hopefully at 11:30 there will be 12.

My opinion is that it will win Real Madrid , I bet $ 200 to them

You wasted one of your posts every 50 days on that?

Yeah imagine that but more world legends like Figo etc instead of all the more obscure Coventry players from the 80s would be sick.

Odds are amazingly close.

Yeah I would love that too. It's like that soccer aid, you can just tell those guys are just still so freaking good.

Should do a Legends European cup type thing, I'd bet it would sell out.

Have it mixed teams though, so you could get dream teams

Hoping for Juve on pk's with Buffon saving the last pk from Ronaldo. 1 time!!!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

If Juve lose we riot

I've put a tenner on Juve on pens. Buffon being the hero in the shootout is the only thing that's possible to root for in this game.

I went to deposit some money on my card, I had 2.48 ron left, it hit me when I got back home. Let's see if that was a "sign".

Definitely putting some money on SR4 scoring now

Buffon deserves this

I'm very excited and obviously think Juve has quite a good chance unlike two years ago where they had to perform better than expected to make it a good game.

Having said that, I do think Real Madrid has found/stumbled on to something with an Isco type of player, in this case Isco himself, replacing one of three forwards up front.

I was rarely impressed with Real all year. In fact I didn't mind them over quite a few others in the knockout rounds but everything that makes for a better balance, with the ball and without it, has improved with Isco replacing a forward.

That Atletico could not press or bother this new Real Madrid make-up at all for large periods, particularly in and around the midfield areas, was the deciding factor securing Real Madrid their finals spot and on paper at least it also looks like a tough task for Juventus except for when they go more all out for periods, which they're very known to do, and press very high, which was also the only thing that worked for Atletico.

However unlike Atletico, Juventus are much less dependent on creating through sheer pressing or the very risk averse method directly through their number 9 (it's a very fair criticism @Simeone that he had to depend on Torres to play a not even very good version of attacking football) and has a risk barometer that they can turn up and down trying to create through different styles and means. More on that later.

For Real Madrid it has to be mentioned that it also helps that "for once" this very time of year Ronaldo is not so worn down/injured that he is in danger of hurting a team with players among the best in the world at every position instead of being so great that he improves them.

Juve however has also reached a level that I didn't expect when Allegri decided that it was lineups including Mandzukic that was the best that he could offer.

I both had serious lack of pace worries that would help opponents game plan comfortably against Juventus with where and how they could setup their organization, as well as the kind of severe lack of midfield type of players where Isco-Real Madrid on the other side of the spectrum benefit greatly right now.

I still won't rule out that against its greatest opponent tonight, these things will finally seriously surface and be a Juventus weakness and opponent advantage but credit to Allegri with his hybrid lineups either featuring Barzagli or Cuadrado finding either enough threatening pace or solidity in the center through very precise defending to neutralize opponents.

Hopefully Barzagli will start tonight and be part right-back, part right-centreback with Davi Alves performing splendidly once again ahead of him.

With Barzagli there as an extra man and the tremendous automatisms between the defenders it usually allows one of them to continually step up and defend both select opponent attackers as well as half-spaces up the pitch very aggressively, removing a surprising amount of typical undermanned-weaknesses.

Against current Real where Benzema and Ronaldo are more central than ever and despite Isco over Bale stylewise still attack the box quite directly, including with deliveries from several masters, it makes a ton sense to have Barzagli as the extra man there.

Similar story with the ball, where Juventus would be harder to press, that's maybe the most possible chink in the Real Madrid armor that has to exploited to become a favorite, and have more control of when and how to attack.

Then in general there is the whole good in the air aspect where Real Madrid has been pretty much unmatched for a while now while seriously hurting teams with particular weaknesses (and Kroos world class delivery qualities is still not lauded enough) but where Juve with Barzagli, Bonucci, Chiellini, Khedira, Mandzukic and Alex Sandro even at this point, look unusually strong.

The lack of pace without Cuadrado then? So far it has largely been offset by mostly pure precision basically. It's been quite amazing whenever they've been successful at these, really prolonged transitions, where they keep making the right passes and runs, relying more on precision than raw pace simply outsprinting their opponents.

Individually speaking, we're talking Pjanic stepping into a distributor/playmaker role when required. Dybala and Higuain moving and complementing each other better and better in different areas of the pitch and phases of play.

Dani Alves thriving with some freedom and being depended on for attacking.

Mandzukic a lot of time being being a wide defensive forward basically, fulfilling that role, but at very selected times also contributing with his strong points. In the grand scheme of things it's actually a good thing that Mandzukic isn't stationary without acceleration high central of the pitch. That would really help Real Madrid.

Khedira who I'm still not totally comfortably with taking over from Marchisio, who I still think is a better midfielder but who has also struggled finding his former level coming back from injury, but he (Khedira) is undoubtedly very strong positionally both defending with discipline and making his forward movements also with discipline.

For Real Madrid, I also want to single out Isco once again and get in there that as much as he is the hero of the new and in my mind really improved Real Madrid, he is still probably the most likely individual Real Madrid player to make mistakes against the most difficult
of opponents. He is fantastic in many ways but not the expert almost flawless operator that they have in Kroos and Modric. He'll make some mistakes.

Overall, it looks like a close game and a very good one at that with both teams at their best right now.

It's almost as if it will only be if Real score early and Juventus inevitably will start pressing high that all sort of openness and drastic outcomes can come into play, though I do think both teams generally can create somewhat against each other.

Also, very much this!

wow strong rumors that Bale is starting

I had ruled it out almost completely

Isco starts.

K. Navas; Carvajal, Varane, SR4, Marcelo; Casemiro, Kroos, Modric; Isco, Benzema, Ronaldo

Buffon; Alves, Barzagli, Bonucci, Chiellini, Sandro; Khedira, Pjanic; Higuain, Dybala, Mandzukic

Pepe, Coentrao and James not on the bench, they're 100% gone at this point.

We've had a great year, hopefully we can make it amazing. This is probably the most nervous I've ever been, HALA MADRID!

Kudos that they do it live. They still suck balls IYAM.

THE PEAS are straight shredding right now

wow

I thought this **** only happened in American sports

What is this ****e build up all about.

Get on with the game ffs

How does nobody (RITS in particular) post in the CL thread (that we've used for literally all games so no reason to believe the final should be an exception) that a finals thread is up? Some of only look at subscribed threads and don't browse subforums

Juve 2-1 Ronaldo to end up crying