Real Madrid will be the heavy favourites when they welcome Celtic to the Santiago Bernabeu for the final Champions League group stage game of the season. Carlo Ancelotti’s side won 3-0 at Parkhead in the reverse fixture earlier on in the campaign, but that does not mean that they are taking Ange Postecoglou’s men lightly though.
Celtic fans will remember that the Bhoys were in the game for a good while. In fact, they outplayed Real Madrid in the first half, and Liel Abada and Daizen Maeda missed golden chances to score, before Los Blancos finally found the back of the net.
The man to open the scoring for Real Madrid on that night was Vinicius Jr. The Brazilian has transformed into a superstar in recent times and even scored the Champions League-winning goal against Liverpool last season.
He seems to have been impressed with what he saw from Celtic at Parkhead though and does not believe that their position in the table reflects their quality. As reported by the Daily Record, Vinicius said:
"“I am not sure Celtic’s position in the group reflects their quality. In the first game, they gave us a difficult first half and it was a tight game. Eventually our quality showed, but the way they played for 60 minutes, I was sure they would pick up more points than they have. Maybe they have just been unlucky.”"
Real Madrid superstar Vinicius makes brilliant Celtic admission
Celtic have performed very well in the Champions League and more than held up their own. They should have beaten Shakhtar Donetsk, and could have gotten results against Real Madrid and RB Leipzig as well.
What has let them down time after time though is their finishing, which has been pretty terrible to be honest. Celtic have scored just three goals in the group stage till now, with even one of them being an own goal. The other two strikes have come from Jota and Giorgos Giakoumakis.
Let’s see if Celtic can bring their A-game when they take on Real Madrid, who also have a lot to play for, with the top spot of the group still to be decided.