CARDIFF – And so it ends, with a bravura final between two giants of the European game, a 90 minute culmination of a thrilling Champions League season that always carried the danger of attrition and pervasive dullness with an all too familiar bracket in the knockout phase, but delivered enticing football that fortified the great narrative arc shaped by mega-sized clubs.
The Champions League, and in particular its final, is now but a part of the machinations of global capital. At Cardiff’s Roald Dahl Plass, a public plaza with sumptuous views of the city’s Bay area and the Celtic sea, the ‘festival of champions’ is the apex of modern-day consumerism, where fans are shepherded, like cattle, from Gazprom’s stand to large megastores in UEFA’s corporate world view. Products must be paid with the right credit card and drinks can only purchased from the right top tier sponsor.
The final is for the happy few, many of whom have slogged their way across land and sea at extortionate prices. They will attend the showpiece game of European club football, in which two clubs sustained by debts meet. For years Real Madrid has been run along the economic ‘principle’ - too big to fail. At the turn of the century the city of Madrid bailed out its famed club by buying Real’s old training ground and since then Florentino Perez has become a galactic spender. Real Madrid had a cumulative debt of €603 million on their books this year. Juventus, fortunately, has only a debt of €199.4 million.
Final far removed from candid fandom
The final is stained by ordinary commercialism, the clubs by colossal debts. It seems all far removed from candid fandom, from the beautiful game, from the land of dragons and Welsh myths. Yet the final is still the pinnacle of ‘our game,’ a storybook encounter between dream finalists.
It will be attack versus defense: BBC, perhaps with Isco as a suave interloper, against a Pretorian guard of Andrea Barzagli, Leonardo Bonucci and Giorgio Chiellini, Juventus’ very own BBC. They have elevated defending to artistry, muzzling MSN in the quarter-finals and schooling the talented boys of Monaco in the last four.
Juventus triumphed, not so much in achieving outstanding results, but in the manner of their game. In a world of resplendent attacking football, ‘The Old Lady’ provided a beautiful antidote, a brilliant “alternative fact” to the singular Cruyffian truth, a varied explanation of how football ought to be played – there is another way of playing after all, proffering a beautiful version of Catenaccio, with defenders who know how to defend.
Zidane is responsible for Madrid’s form, or not
They were immovable in defence, ‘Gandalfing’ their opponents. “You shall not pass,” bellowed Barzagli, Bonucci and Chiellini. On Saturday they face Cristiano Ronaldo, the ultimate striker whose hysterical gallery play chaperoned his Merengues team to another final. The Portuguese croons about self-improvement and his transformation into a conventional centre forward has been mesmeric.
The goals from Madrid’s overlord have injected the team with a new attacking gravitas and a source of direct aggression. Zidane’s rotational policies and the physical coaching from Antonio Pintus have allowed CR7 to produce supershows against Bayern Munich and Atletico Madrid. In eleven of Madrid’s 59 matches this season, he didn’t play.
Perhaps Ronaldo is surrounded by inferior pugilists. Marcelo, Toni Kroos, Luka Modrid, Isco, Casemiro nominally no longer embody Madrid’s Galaticos of the first years of Perez’s reign, but they still dominated La Liga’s duopoly and crafted a ruthless, but mundane, outfit that is now on the cusp of winning ‘La DuoDecima.’
Much is down to Zidane – or maybe not. He remains an enigma, a curated personality, both as a player and coach. Casemiro, a classic midfield enforcer and Isco, that frisky and floating attacking midfielder, have blossomed under the French coach, but his team has neither a philosophy nor a tactical blueprint. They are non-descript and yet clinical, with winning as their main commodity. Zidane’s tenure has been an unmitigated success. He can win the Champions League consecutively, which may not elevate him just yet into the superclub of spangled coaches, but speaks of his magnetism.
Indeed, Madrid’s identity has been forged around the European Cup, Juventus’ very existence plagued by it. Massimiliano Allegri’s team is resilient – micro-managed but not ossified, ‘five star’ facilitating but not unbalanced. His team play with a distinct fire, set-up to maximize their own strengths. They have proven their strength at every stage of the competition, against every opponent – and they may do so again against Real Madrid.
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