I guess you’ve watched the 2018 Champions League final when you’re reader of this blog. The biggest match of the season on club level, was a final between Liverpool and Real Madrid. As a Dutchman with a fascination for the Premier League my sympathy was for Liverpool. Unfortunately, it was once again Real Madrid that won this tournament. It was their third consecutive Champions League title, which is of course an amazing achievement. Nevertheless I have enough of them and hope it’s done with their dominance in the Champions League. in this post I will discuss a few subjects that stood out for me in this match.

2018 Champions League final

Sergio Ramos

I can’t help to start with discussing Real Madrid’s captain. For me he is the most dirty player in Europe for years now. Three moments in this final showed what a dirty player Sergio Ramos is. We’ve all seen the injury he caused on Liverpool’s star Mo Salah. People are discussing if it was intentional or not, I am convinced it was. This player hasn’t got an inch of sportsmanship in his body and does everything he can to eliminate his opponents. The second example of this was the elbow he gave Liverpool keeper Karius. The third moment was when he simulated getting hit by Sadio Mane. The guy that’s slapping and kicking his opponents regularly, went down like he was shot. He tried to fool the referee in sending Mane off the pitch. I really think it’s time the UEFA bans this guy for awhile.

Gareth Bale

This is of course one of the big guys from this final. His first goal, the 2-1 of the match, was an amazing bicycle kick. When he came from the bench, I already expected he would be able to make a difference. We all knew the Real Madrid bench was much stronger than Liverpool’s bench. But nobody expected this goal.

Loris Karius

This is the sad side of the 2018 Champions League final. The German goalkeeper made two errors you’re probably not going to see for a long time. The first error was when he threw the ball against Benzema, which was the 1-0 for Real Madrid. He completely mistimed a shot by Gareth Bale, which led to the 3-1 for the Spanish side. With two errors in a 3-1 loss, we can say that Karius is responsible for the defeat. It’s a sad conclusion that he was this poor in the biggest match of his life.