It’s the final that’s not technically a final.
Bayern Munich are set to take on Real Madrid in the Champions League quarterfinals with the first leg taking place in Madrid, and the return leg in Munich at the Allianz Arena. It’s hard to argue that this couldn’t be the matchup for this year’s final in Budapest, Hungary, but such is the way the cards were delt as the La Liga giants had to advance to the knockout stages via a playoff win over SL Benfica over two legs.
Heading into leg one, Bayern had
their late, come-from-behind 3-2 win at SC Freiburg while Real Madrid lost to Mallorca at the Estadi Mallorca Son Moix as their fleeting hopes of catching Barcelona at the top of the La Liga table dwindled away. None of that matters now. It’s all on the two legs between two of Eurpoean football’s most storied giants.
Ahead of the first leg, former Bayern keeper and CEO Oliver Kahn warned the German Rekordmeister of what the atmosphere at the famous Santiago Bernabéu can do, which Bayern are no stranger to. Memories of the 2018 semifinals will come to mind and the Sven Ulreich error that led to Madrid winning and going on to win the final in Kyiv, Ukraine against Liverpool and likewise the late Matthijs de Ligt goal that was ruled out in the 2024 semifinals after Joselu’s super-sub brace.
“90 minutes at the Bernabéu are more exhausting than anywhere else. The crowd in Madrid is much more intense than in Barcelona, you have the feeling that everything is pushing you down. The atmosphere can be intimidating. And now, with the roof, that’s even more reinforced,” Kahn stressed in a recent interview with Süddeutsche Zeitung (via Tz).
Of course, Bayern have cracked the code of the Bernabéu before a la the 2012 penalty shootout in the semifinals where Bastian Schweinsteiger, Mario Gomez and David Alaba made their penalties, but all of Sergio Ramos, Philipp Lahm, Toni Kroos, Kaká, and Cristiano Ronaldo didn’t. Since then, Bayern has failed to win in Madrid the four times of asking in the Champions League, all of which were semifinals bar the 2016/17 quarterfinals.
