Match date: 9 April 2013

Galatasaray had it all to do with Real Madrid enjoying a 3-0 lead on aggregate after putting in a comfortable performance at the Bernabeu.

Despite Real Madrid using the wide areas to good effect in the first leg on the tie, Fatih Terim opted to continue with his diamond midfield that, in theory, exposes his makeshift full backs in Eboue and Riera, but in the end, he again changed his system as he brought on his subs.

Real Start Well, Galatasaray Settle

As mentioned, Galatasaray’s diamond midfield leaves both Riera and Eboue rather exposed up against Di Maria and Ronaldo, respectively, and the late, supporting runs of Essien and Coentrao.

In the opening 10 minutes of the match, Madrid again looked to exploit this as well, mostly attacking down the right against Riera as they had done in the first leg with success. As it did then, it worked well for Madrid after the lack of pressure on the ball on that side eventually saw Khedira get in behind Galatasaray’s back line and play a square ball to Ronaldo.

They continued to look relatively comfortable as they were able to get free in the wide areas as they trend of getting the ball high and wide up the field to Di Maria continued with Essien and Arbeloa combining well with him. On the left, Ronaldo would drop deeper than Di Maria to receive the ball as he looked to be more involved in the build up play.

After their quick start and goal, Real were content on letting Galatasaray have more of the ball, unlike in the first leg when they would press the Galatasaray centre backs and get tight on Inan, Melo, and Altintop, who were now able to receive the ball much easier from their defenders and look to get Galatasaray forward. Inan especially was able to get the ball from Kaya and Riera on his side of the pitch, those being the top pass combinations as well.        

Terim Makes Changes

Just as he did in the first leg, Fatih Terim’s personnel changes meant a significant change in their formation. They started both games in a 4-1-2-1-2, a diamond midfield. In the first leg, he changed to a 3-5-2 and a 3-4-3 throughout the second half as Galatasaray looked for an away goal. This time, with his introduction of Amrabat for Alintop, it gave them more of a 4-3-3. Inan took Melo’s place as the deepest midfielder, with Melo and Sneijder in front of him. Amrabat played on the left side of Drogba with Bulut going out to the right, who would later be taken off for Sabri Sarioglu.

After both of those changes, which both proved to be significant, Galatasaray’s shape looked more like this:

At this point, with Ronaldo staying high, Galatasaray were finding a lot of freedom down the right side of their attack. Many times, Coentrao would drift inside with Sarioglu or Bulut and Eboue would have plenty of freedom to move into the space he left. Even when Coentrao stayed out wide, Eboue still found the ability to get in behind him.

Eboue’s goal came from a very late run by the Ivorian to get on the end of Sneijder’s pull back. He was unmarked by the time he met the ball at the top of the area. Sneijder’s goal also came from a start on the left hand side, starting with Eboue passing into Sarioglu who drifted infield and found Sneijder’s feet, who then put the ball through Varane’s leg and finished well after missing a great chance earlier in the half.

Drogba’s goal was more of the same as the ball was passed out wide to Eboue, this time combining with Amrabat, who had drifted to the left. Amrabat passed Pepe and drove the ball in for Drogba to finish.

Mourinho responded to this, putting Di Maria on the left to track the runs of Eboue, Ronaldo through the middle as he was usually the highest Madrid attacker anyway, and Ozil on the right. This, combined with an injury to Eboue, eased the pressure on Real Madird who looked more comfortable after Mourinho’s changes.

Conclusion

For the first leg and most of the first half of the second leg, Real Madrid seemed to really comfortable in dealing with Galatasaray’s attacking threats, especially with Drogba and Sneijder drifting in and out of both matches.

Just like in the first leg though, once Terim made changes and changed the system, Galatasaray looked more of a threat going forward and the more numbers they were able to get forward, the less comfortable the Madrid back line looked.