By: Abdulmalik Abdulwahab
Bayern Munich sets to host Real Madrid on Tuesday at the Allianz Arena for a decisive showdown in the semifinals of the UEFA Champions League race.
The two teams will roar in front of spectators, battling for a crossover in the competition.
Real Madrid commenced the 2023/2024 UCL with a thrilling form, winning every of their group stage matches. Meanwhile, Thomas Tuchel’s men are not pulling back as well, displaying a wonderful performance in the tournament as they eliminated Arsenal in the quarterfinals.
Head-to-Head
The Reds have a slight lead in the overall head-to-head record between the two European heavyweights. The German champions have won 12 of the 26 meetings while Los Blancos claimed 11 victories, and three draws were recorded in their previous encounters.
Bayern Munich and Real Madrid had met for the eighth time in the final four of the Champions League. Having come out on top in four of the five semi-final encounters between 1976 and 2012, Bayern have been swapped out by the Madrid outfit in the last two (2014 and 2018).
Injuries
The beginning of the season saw Madrid summer-signing versatile defender David Alaba become the third Madrid player to sustain an ACL tear this season. The Austrian international ruptured his ligaments during a 4-1 win over Villarreal in December, and will miss the rest of the campaign.
Courtois was dealt another devastating blow of meniscus injury as he entered the final stages of his recovery from an ACL tear. The Belgian was set for a return after the international break, but he’s now unlikely to feature again this season. However, he could return towards the end of the campaign with La Liga concluding on 26 May and the Champions League final taking place on 1 June.
Similarly, Thomas Tuchel’s Bayern Munich did not also escape from the injury storm when their 24-years Matthijs de Ligt and Konrad Laimer were subbed off due to injury during Saturday’s Bundesliga home game against Eintracht Frankfurt. Matthijs was feeling ligament pain in his knee. Konny twisted his ankle and suffered a capsule injury while Laimer was forced off the pitch following a dangerous challenge after 28 minutes.
Ultimately, as the match is too big to decide the winner, Bayern Munich is expected to win the game with a probability of 40.8% according to FootballWhispers while Sportmole was saying that Madrid must win the match by 1-2 because they were counting their lucky stars to come away with all three points from their battle with Sociedad.