Ancelotti shares theory about why Liverpool struggled so much vs Real Madrid

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Real Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti believes Liverpool struggled to execute their pressing game up against Toni Kroos and Luka Modric during their Champions League last-16 exit at the Santiago Bernabeu, speaking to Movistar. 

It almost felt oddly condescending as ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ rang out around the Bernabeu at the end of Wednesday’s 1-0 second-leg defeat. Like a rookie losing in straight sets to Novak Djokovic and being greeted with a pat on the head and a ‘good effort, mate’.

Liverpool were 2-0 up in the tie at one point but ended it 6-2 down; that Anfield collapse a couple of weeks ago preceding Karim Benzema’s late winner in the Spanish capital. 

Liverpool, under Jurgen Klopp, so often fought adversity with fire and iron-clad intensity; flying out of the blocks while swarming their opposition like a pack of furious hornets. This never looked like being one of those ‘great European nights’, however; the experience and poise of the eternal Modric and Kroos partnership – plus the brilliance of Eduardo Camavinga – keeping an ageing and transitional Liverpool side at arms’ length throughout. 

Liverpool crash out of the Champions League against Real Madrid

“We played well,” Ancelotti smiles at full-time, Real cruising through to the quarter-finals. “They found it difficult to press.

“It was difficult for them to press up against Kroos and Modric. They are not afraid or worried because they get the ball out well (from tight spaces).”

There were two near-40-year-olds starting in midfield on Wednesday night. But if James Milner looked every one of his 37 years, you could be forgiven for wondering if the water running through Modric’s kitchen taps comes straight from the Fountain of Youth itself.

Modric was in typically imperious form at the heart of Real Madrid’s midfield. Perhaps the best player on the pitch, however, was a man 17 years his senior; a true coming of age performance from perhaps Europe’s next best string-puller, Camavinga.