Real Madrid v Tottenham Hotspur – UEFA Champions League: Half time review - Part 1
The first leg of the UEFA Champions League quarterfinal kicked off on 5th April, 2011 at Santiago Bernabéu between Real Madrid and Tottenham with the news that http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Aaron-Lennon-c3062 had been pulled out of Tottenham’s starting lineup due to illness.
Lennon’s exclusion allowed Redknapp to bring in http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Peter-Crouch-c29741 as his team’s sole striker, whilst Real Madrid’s ex-midfielder Rafael Van der
Vaart was deployed in a trequartista role.
http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Michael-Dawson-c25288 began the match as Tottenham’s captain.
On the other hand, Real Madrid was buoyant with the news that http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Emmanuel-Adebayor-c12526 started as their front man whereas, Ricardo Kaka was not in Real’s starting lineup as Mourinho opted to keep
the Brazilian international on his team’s substitute bench.
Real initiated the proceedings at their home stadium as they retained the possession of the ball. Madrid soon made Tottenham pay for their negligent defensive marking in the 4th minute after Angel Di Maria’s shot was deflected out of play for
a corner kick. Los Blancos’ set piece was taken by Mesut Ozil, whose corner kick was met with force by Emmanuel Adebayor’s header as the former Arsenal striker opened the scoring against Tottenham. The goal came as a real shock to Hotspur who struggled to
settle into the match throughout the first 45 minutes.
In the 7th minute, the visiting side saw their first yellow card of the night as Peter Crouch was booked for a late challenge on http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Sergio-Ramos-c33096 down the right hand side of Real Madrid’s defence. In the 12th minute, Adebayor became the
first Real Madrid player to go into the referee’s book on Wednesday night as his reckless tackle on http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Benoît-Assou-Ekotto-c7520 was duly punished by the referee with a yellow card.
Shortly after, disaster struck for Tottenham as Peter Crouch was shown his second yellow card of the match for his rash sliding tackle on Marcelo. The Englishman pleaded his innocence, but the referee took notice of his studs-up tackle and gave the former
http://www.senore.com/Football-soccer/Liverpool-c39809 man his marching orders. With Tottenham down to just ten men, Real Madrid moved in for the kill as Mourinho’s team started to dominate the possession of the ball.
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