Real Madrid reaches Champions League quarterfinals, but defender Antonio Rüdiger says the team won’t be celebrating
Real Madrid reaches Champions League quarterfinals, but defender Antonio Rüdiger says the team won’t be celebrating
It certainly wasn’t pretty, but Real Madrid booked its place in the Champions League quarterfinals with a 1-1 draw at home to RB Leipzig, scraping through 2-1 on aggregate.
But so disappointed were the team with such an underwhelming performance, defender Antonio Rüdiger said there would be no celebrations for reaching the last eight.
“They played well and we played bad. Simple,” he told CBS Sports. “I don’t think we were thinking about the first game, we were just sloppy. We were slow, zero intensity, we didn’t get in the challenges and, in the Champions League, you can get punished for this.
“At the end of the day, you always have to try and keep your calm … you don’t need to lose your head. They did well, they pressed us behind, they made us stay behind and we didn’t find the right answer today.
“The lesson is that you cannot start and finish a match like that in the Champions League. You have to be switched on for 90 minutes – and plus. We don’t celebrate [reaching the quarterfinals] because it was not a good performance, but we are through.”
After losing 1-0 at home in a tight first leg, RB Leipzig was a team on a mission at the Santiago Bernabéu on Wednesday and thoroughly outplayed Los Blancos for much of the 90 minutes.
The team was eventually made to pay for its profligacy in front of goal as Real Madrid caught Leipzig on the counterattack after 65 minutes, with Jude Bellingham bursting forward and setting up Vinícius Jr. for an emphatic finish.
However, Leipzig finally got the goal its efforts deserved just three minutes later as Willi Orbán stooped to head home David Raum’s low cross.