Hello,

Hello, Hello everybody and welcome to the Total Soccer show.

My name is Taylor Rockwell.

And on today's episode, we're going to be doing some Champions League reviews, a lot of plurals in there.

We've got the UEFA Champions League.

We've got the Concaf Champions League here to help me break down those games, the games from those games, is the champion of Europe. It's Graham Ruffin. Hello, Graham. That is the first time, other than Andy Robertson, that Annie Scott has been called the champion of Europe, but I will take it. How are you? It's a fitting title. I am well. I'm excited to talk about these games. I'm excited to talk about the Cocky-Cath Champions League as well. To do that, we have, not surprisingly, the champion of the Americas. It's Joe Lauer. Hi, Joe. Hey, Taylor. I'm going to take that with pride. I got a favorable introduction, just like Ryan gives me when the three of us are doing a show, so the trend continues. Yeah, and the trend of Americans declaring themselves the voice of all of the Americas continues, where I name you the voice of the Americas, Joe. So I'm happy that you're willing to roll with that one. We are going to get to the Cuck Gaff Champions League in a little bit. I'm very excited to hear about Graham's thoughts, because I don't know if he's ever watched it before, but we'll find that out later on. Right now, we're going to talk about the UAFA Champions League. We're going to

start with Real Madrid's victory over Liverpool, a victory that I will say confused me sort of from

start to finish, mostly that first half in particular. Joe, Graham and I talked a little bit about

Liverpool at the weekend. For you coming

into this game, what were your expectations in terms of the approach for both teams?

So for Liverpool, to start with them, I thought they'd come out and play almost exactly like

Yergen Klopp has had this team playing for quite some time. Yeah, it's looked different this

season at times without Virgil Van Dyke, but they still press high, they still play that high line. And we saw that in this game. We did see that in moments, especially in the first half. But I was confused as well, Taylor, by their lack of pressure in midfield. So they played a 433, same standard shape, largely the same personnel. Yeah, it was Diogo Jata in for Formino.

Yeah, it was Nabiketa in for Tiago.

But, I mean, it was a familiar look with familiar players against Real Madrid's 433.

That also had largely familiar players with the exception of Adair Militou and Nacho starting over Raphael Verand and Sergio Ramos in the back, in the middle of the back line.

So it was two mostly familiar squads, but Liverpool, whenever Real Madrid would advance and

get the ball into Liverpool's half, in the first half, it looked to me like Liverpool was far

too passive. And I guess I kind of just dumped way into the tactical game side of this, but

that resulted in multiple goals, essentially.

Yeah, they were a little bit different in the first half.

But Liverpool's slowness to react, their passivity in midfield resulted in not

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