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Real Madrid midfielders
Real Madrid dominated Liverpool in the first leg and that was largely due to how good their midfielders were.
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Toni Kroos and Luka Modric absolutely bossed it in midfield and Liverpool will need to restrategize because they cannot afford to give the Real Madrid midfielders the same amount of space and room if they want to turn it around.
Luka Modric has now assisted in three successive Champions League games and despite being 35-years-old, the Croatian has been as industrious as ever in midfield and his contribution will be crucial towards Real Madrid exerting an ample amount of control over proceedings tonight.
Zidane will go with his trusted midfield trio once again. Casemiro will start in defensive midfield and Toni Kroos and Luka Modric will operate in front of him. Casemiro will be crucial to blunting Liverpool's attacking impetus.
If Liverpool decide to go with Fabinho, Wijnaldum and Thiago, Real Madrid could once again replicate their heroics from the first leg. But if Liverpool choose to add someone like James Milner who is hell-bent on hounding his opposition counterparts, to their midfield, something could give for the Merseysiders.
Real Madrid forwards
Zinedine Zidane deployed Fede Valverde on the right in El Clasico this past weekend. However, he is expected to go with Marco Asensio against Liverpool. Asensio has been in great form of late and scored a goal in each of the four games prior to coming off the bench against Barcelona.
Karim Benzema turned in yet another impressive performance against Barcelona and now has 10 goals and an assist from his last nine appearances. Benzema will lead Real Madrid's attack tonight and he will cause a lot of problems to a relatively inexperienced Liverpool centre-back partnership.
Joining Benzema and Marco Asensio in attack will be Vinicius Jr. The young Brazilian has stepped it up in recent weeks and was Real Madrid's standout performer in attack against Liverpool in the first leg.
He scored both their opening and closing goals of the game and his pace was causing all kinds of problems for Liverpool defenders. Even with Eden Hazard out injured, Real Madrid have faced no problems in attack.
In fact, even if the Belgian international was present, Zinedine Zidane would have chosen to go with Vinicius Jr. for just how effective he has been on that left-wing over the past few games.
Zinedine Zidane's defence is injury-riddled but their midfielders and attackers have been playing some great football and that ought to be enough to help them seal a berth in the UEFA Champions League semifinal.
