Frank Lorenzo
Real Madrid (-450) vs. Liverpool (+1200) (Draw +500)
In the last couple of months, Real Madrid has looked like the best team in Europe. Early in the season, they on top of both La Liga and Champions League Group B. Tomorrow, Real returns to action in the Champions League against a Liverpool side looking to improve on recent results. The game is at 2:45 p.m. Eastern at Santiago Bernabeu Stadium in Madrid.
The Spaniards are heavy favorites to move to 4-0-0 in the Champions League, listead at -450 in the moneyline, while Liverpool is +1200 and the draw is +500.
In the head-to-head history, the teams have met four times in the UEFA Champions League and Liverpool leads the series (3W, 1L). However, Los Merengues dominated the last match (3-0) at Anfield a couple of weeks ago.
After losing against Madrid, the Reds manager, Brendan Rodgers, said he was proud of the way his team battled the whole game, despite being down to a highly skilled group.
“[Madrid] were outstanding. They’ve got many players with big-game experience and they have quality right the way through the group. I don’t think you can say they didn’t play well or they didn’t have to play well, because they did. I’m also proud of my players because even though we lost 3-0, in the first period of the game and the second half you’d see lots of teams maybe crumble at 3-0 down,” said the coach.
On the other side, the Real Madrid coach, Carlo Ancellotti, told the UEFA website that the game was a “very important victory”. Indeed, with three wins in three tries already, Real has virtually assured itself of a place in the next round. They can make that an absolute certainty with a win tomorrow.
Obviously, with their perfect record, Real Madrid is in first place in the group with nine points (3W, 0D, 0L) and a +8 goal difference. The other three teams in the group are all even with three points (1W, 0D, 2L). The Reds are -3 in the goal differential, worse than Ludogorets Razgrad (-1) but better than Basel (-4).
Bet Real Madrid.
(Photo credit: Nigel Wilson [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.)
