Real Madrid vs Man United Match Preview

Madrid vs Man United preview

This Wednesday (February 13th), football fans around the world will gather in sheer excitement and anticipation for one of the biggest matches in football – the mighty Manchester United face the legendary Real Madrid in the next phases of the UEFA Champions League.

The game pits two of the most renown football managers against each other once again in this famous competition – the wise Scotsman Sir Alex Ferguson against the cocky, self assured Portuguese Jose Mourinho. Jose himself has labelled the match as ‘the one the world wants’, which to be fair is hardly overstating it.

Mourinho has of course had success against United before in the Champions League, when he bought his Porto side to Old Trafford several years ago and famously escaped having knocked the English giants out of the competition. Jose of course went on to lead his side to success in the competition, securing a historical treble for his club before leaving for Chelsea. He’s gone on to have European cup success with Inter Milan in Italy, but now severely craves it in Spain with Madrid.

In La Liga Los Merengues have really struggled to halt the uber-talented Barcelona, struggling even to make a dent in the battle for the league. He all but seems to have given up on fighting for the league – an unusual tactic for someone as arrogant and ambitious as “the Special One”, and his role could be on the line if he doesn’t bring the title to Madrid this season.

The bookmakers do agree with Mourinho this time, and his side are clear favourites to win this leg of the tie with odds of around 1.6 currently available. The odds on the draw are about 4, and you can back a United win at as much as 6.

Another sideline of course in this huge encounter is the return of Cristiano Ronaldo to face his former side. Ronaldo famously left the club a few years ago in an £80 million transfer to the Bernabeu, and he’s been in scintillating form ever since. Being deployed in a more attacking role for the side, Ronaldo has gone on to break all sorts of goal-scoring records. Madrid warmed up for this match with a 4-1 demolition of Sevilla at the weekend – and Ronaldo bagged a hat-trick. Man United meanwhile put in a confident performance to sweep aside a resilient Everton with goals from Van Persie and the mercurial Ryan Giggs.

Whatever happens in this encounter on Wednesday you can be sure that there will be fireworks – be it from Ferguson, Mourinho, or Ronaldo himself. One thing that is for certain is that nobody can wait to see the match.

By Matt

Matt is the owner and chief-editor of the Footy Blog, one of the UK's leading football news blogs.