- Liverpool Vs Real Madrid Premier League Football Match Score 2023
Real Madrid with be without two key midfielders for their trip to Liverpool, with a 23-man travelling squad confirmed on Monday. Real are on their way to Merseyside ahead of Tuesday’s Champions League last-16 opener, on the back of a four-game winning streak.
That includes triumph at the Club World Cup, and on Saturday a 2-0 victory over Osasuna saw them maintain their hunt of LaLiga leaders Barcelona. Karim Benzema missed that game, raising concerns over his involvement at Anfield, but the French striker was part of the 23-man squad confirmed to be flying to England. However, midfielders Toni Kroos and Aurelien Tchouameni both miss out having failed to rejoin training in time due to fitness problems.
Thibaut Courtois has recovered, though, and will start, with Ferland Mendy the only other absentee from the senior squad.
Familiar foes Liverpool and Real Madrid serve up a repeat of the 2021-22 Champions League final when they renew hostilities at Anfield on Tuesday for the first leg of their last-16 tie.
Jurgen Klopp’s crop placed second in Group A behind Italian powerhouses Napoli to set up a reunion with the holders, who beat Celtic, Shakhtar Donetsk and RB Leipzig to first place in Group F.
While Vinicius Junior’s winner and Thibaut Courtois’s sensational string of saves dominated the on-field talk of last year’s Champions League final between Liverpool and Real Madrid, the contest at the Stade de France will forever be overshadowed by the harrowing scenes of Reds supporters being penned in outside the gates and subjected to tear gas prior to the match.
Baseless allegations emerged from the authorities’ side of late-arriving fans with fake tickets causing the disruption, but an independent report has since cleared Liverpool supporters of any wrongdoing – insisting that the “primary responsibility” lies with UEFA – and Klopp’s loyal fanbase can look forward to Tuesday’s contest with a renewed sense of hope.
Very few teams will proudly boast to get the better of Napoli this season, but only goal difference separated the two sides in the Group A standings as Liverpool collected 15 points from a possible 18, winning five in a row after their humbling 4-1 loss to the Partenopei on matchday one. Back-to-back Premier League wins over Everton and Newcastle United – the latter coming courtesy of Darwin Nunez and Cody Gakpo’s efforts – means that a top-four finish is not beyond the realm of possibility for Liverpool, who appear to have turned a corner after a disastrous start to proceedings in 2023.
Klopp’s team have suffered just one Champions League last-16 exit in the last five years – going down to Real’s near neighbours Atletico Madrid in 2019-20 – and Liverpool’s unbeaten run at Anfield now stands at a respectable seven games, but their wretched record versus their esteemed visitors is well-documented. Another blockbuster Champions League tie pitting Liverpool and Real Madrid against each other takes place at Anfield for the first leg of their last-16 showdown on Tuesday night.
The two familiar foes are renewing hostilities less than a year after Los Blancos defeated the Reds 1-0 in the 2021-22 final thanks to Vinicius Junior’s winner, collecting their 14th European crown while preventing Liverpool from clinching their seventh. Since that fateful night in Paris – which was marred by the ugly scenes outside the Stade de France prior to the match – a troubled Liverpool qualified for the knockout rounds by finishing second in Group A, while the holders beat Celtic, Shakhtar
Donetsk and RB Leipzig to first place in Group F. Here, Sports Mole takes a closer look at Liverpool and Real Madrid’s head-to-head record ahead of Tuesday’s first leg, which precedes the second leg at the Bernabeu on March 15. Tuesday’s crunch clash will mark the 10th meeting between Liverpool and Real Madrid in the upper echelons of European football, with the Reds winning each of the first three with three clean sheets in tow.
However, Los Blancos have since strung together a six-game unbeaten streak against the Merseyside giants, winning five and drawing one Champions League contests since the 2014-15 group stage. Following Alan Kennedy’s winner in the 1981 European Cup final, Rafael Benitez masterminded 1-0 and 4-0 wins over his future club in the 2008-09 group stage, with Yossi Benayoun scoring the only goal of the contest in their Bernabeu triumph.
That trio of wins has counted for nought in recent years, though, as in the 2014-15 season, Real Madrid – under the tutelage of Carlo Ancelotti as well back then – won both of their Champions League group games over Liverpool by an aggregate score of 4-0.
Not until the 2017-18 final would Real Madrid and Liverpool lock horns again, but in a game that has gone down in history for Loris Karius’s horror show as well as Gareth Bale’s tremendous acrobatic goal, Zinedine Zidane led the Spanish giants to a 3-1 success.
Karius’s disastrous evening in Kyiv remains the goalkeeper’s most recent game for an English club, but rather appropriately, he could make a sensational return for Newcastle United in next weekend’s EFL Cup final against Manchester United, with Nick Pope and Martin Dubravka both unavailable.
That means the likes of Luka Modric, Vinicius Jr., David Alaba, Eduardo Camavinga, Federico Valverde and Rodrygo all make the trip, with a strong Real side expected. Eden Hazard is also among those to travel, but the Belgian is no longer a key player having seen his reputation fade drastically since leaving Chelsea.
Carlo Ancelotti is likely to make a handful of changes to the side that overcame Osasuna at the weekend, having shuffled his pack with the first leg in mind. Dani Carvajal is already confirmed to be retaking his place at right-back, while both Benzema and Camavinga could also be brought back in.
