Inter and Shakhtar Donetsk make up the remainder of a finely poised group in which all four teams can still qualify for the knockout rounds. Real trail group leaders Gladbach by one point and can guarantee a 24th consecutive season of Champions League football after Christmas with a victory in midweek.

Marco Rose’s Monchengladbach only needs a draw to qualify. A share of the spoils would see both Madrid and the Foals advance if Inter beat Shakhtar at San Siro, but given the Serie A side’s shaky record in the competition of late, Zinedine Zidane’s Spanish champions can hardly pin their hopes on the Nerazzurri.

Madrid should be able to welcome back their talismanic captain Sergio Ramos, who has returned to training, after five games bound to the stands following an injury he sustained on international duty in November.

However, the 13-time European Cup winners will be missing energetic midfielder Federico Valverde and are likely to be without Eden Hazard after yet another fitness setback. Both Dani Carvajal and Mariano Diaz are also doubts for Los Blancos.

Rose is likely to reinstate Marcus Thuram – scorer of two goals the last time the sides met in October – to Borussia Monchengladbach’s lineup after starting the French forward on the bench on the weekend. Left-back Ramy Bensebaini is unlikely to feature as he recovers from illness and Jonas Hoffman is also sidelined with a thigh injury.

The Foals are also set to be without their brilliantly consistent center-back Nico Elvedi who has missed the last two games with a muscle injury.

Madrid’s sequence of results this season suggests Zidane wasn’t wrong when he described the attitude of his players earlier in the campaign: “When they have to turn it on, they turn it on.” On each of the three occasions Madrid have gone into a fixture following two winless games, they have prevailed; beating Barcelona, Inter and Sevilla all away from home.

They may go into Wednesday’s match off the back of a win but it is most certainly an instance where Madrid’s players ‘have to turn it on’. However, Gladbach have proven themselves to be anything but hapless bystanders in this European campaign and will pose a number of questions Madrid have struggled to answer in recent weeks.

A draw seems a likely outcome but whether that is enough to send Madrid through depends on Inter’s result against Shakhtar.

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Madrid are bad, it is true. Their “shit season” in Dani Carvajal’s words, is over in March, thanks to three home defeats in seven with an aggregate score of 8-1. But it is also true that Ajax are very good. Goals from Hakim Ziyech, David Neres, Dusan Tadic and Lasse Schöne were the consequence of a collective superiority that was startling and they are deservedly through: too fast, too incisive, too well organised for a team that is disintegrating, a generation that has come to a close.

Santi Solari said afterwards “so much had happened”, and he was right. Madrid suffered three injuries, Lucas Vázquez and Vinícius withdrawn within half an hour and Gareth Bale limping through the final minutes. They also hit the post twice. Nacho was sent off in added time. And there was a five-minute wait for the VAR to allow Ajax’s third goal – the kind of delay that makes technology more a hinderance than a help. And yet sometimes for all the analysis, all the detail, there is a simple truth and that was the case here: Ajax were better than Madrid.

Somehow, Ajax lost 2-1 in Amsterdam, the chance to progress seemingly escaping them against team that has shown a remarkable ability to prevail. No team has ever gone through after losing the first leg 2-1 at home and Sergio Ramos considered Madrid’s passage so certain that he sought a deliberate yellow card and a suspension. That decision looks daft now; he from the stands as watched Ajax won in a manner that was entirely incontestable.

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Real Madrid is hoping Bale is ready to fully evolve into the player they signed for a world record fee in 2013.

The 33-year-old Ronaldo ended a nine-year spell at Real Madrid by recently signing with Italian champions Juventus.

“We’re scoring goals and we’re winning matches, so we’re doing well,” Bale said. “We have to keep improving and we’re really looking forward to starting the new season.”

Asensio, with his third goal of the preseason, opened the scoring just two minutes into the contest. Bale delivered a brilliant pass to the foot of Asensio and he found the back of the net.

Real Madrid struck again in the 15th minute as Bale would score this time, taking an equally superb pass from Dani Carvajal. Bale walked in and beat goalkeeper Robin Olsen to make it 2-0.

Real Madrid wasn’t nearly as dominant in the second half as most of their starting squad was subbed off.

Kevin Strootman made it interesting by scoring in the 83rd minute for Roma.

Strootman was left wide open off a throw-in and headed pass and all he had to do was hammer it past the startled Real Madrid goalkeeper.

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The Spanish giants are targeting their fourth Champions League title in five years and their third in a row in the game, which kicks off at 1845 GMT.

The last team to win three in a row was Bayern Munich over 40 years ago.

None of Klopp’s players have appeared in a Champions League final before.

The Reds have also enjoyed a memorable continental campaign, scoring a tournament record 46 goals and beating Manchester City and Roma en route to the Ukrainian capital.

“We are Liverpool and we are not just a good team. This club has in its DNA that we can really go for the big things. Nobody expected us to be here but we are here because we are Liverpool.”

– Salah’s ‘fantastic potential’ –

Klopp agreed that his job in the build-up has mainly involved taking the pressure off his players, and that meant playing down suggestions that this was Salah’s chance to break up Lionel Messi and Ronaldo’s grip on the Ballon d’Or.

“It’s not important in the moment, no manager is interested in that. I’m interested in performing.

“Lionel Messi and Ronaldo deserve all the praise they have had in the past because they were constantly all those years on that level.

“Religion is private, that is how I understand it, so nothing to say about that,” he stated.

– Ronaldo targets new landmark –

Meanwhile, Ronaldo could win his fifth Champions League, a landmark reached by only four players before now.

The Portuguese star has found the net 41 times this season, and his coach is confident he will be at his very best again.

“He’s fine. You have to know something, he lives for games like this,” said Zinedine Zidane, who can become the first coach to win three consecutive Champions League titles.

The path to Kiev has also been difficult for fans, due to the exorbitant cost of flights and hotel rooms.

Around 1,000 Real fans handed back tickets, while a number of Liverpool supporters’ flights have been cancelled due to insufficient landing space at Kiev’s Boryspil Airport.

Those who have made it after often arduous journeys will be hoping for an unforgettable occasion.

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Real Madrid suffered at times but they will not relinquish their European title without a fight. “This club has 12 Champions Leagues and there is a reason for that,” Zidane said. “We can be very happy with what we did against a very good team tonight.”

If much of the buildup to this game focused on the trios up front, it did not follow the script exactly. Ronaldo scored twice and Neymar ran at Madrid repeatedly, as well as producing a lovely flick for the opener. But Kylian Mbappé, whose delivery helped make it for Rabiot, missed wonderful opportunities and Edinson Cavani and Karim Benzema were withdrawn early. Gareth Bale was a surprise exclusion and though he got on it was Asensio who really won the match, even if Emery was left lamenting the role of the official.

“It was a repeat,” Emery said, when the 6-1 defeat at Barcelona last season was brought up. He was not talking about the result or the collapse but refereeing which he said “damaged” PSG, his focus drawn to the penalty Madrid were given and one his side were denied, as well as an “inclination” against his side. It did not convince and will do little to reduce the pressure on him. If PSG’s elimination is confirmed, his will surely follow. Exciting though they are, the vulnerability is still clear.

Leaving Bale out was another big call and what it means for Zidane’s relationship with the Welshman remains to be seen. Under pressure, he placed his trust in those who won the double last season: if he was going down, it would be with his team. He will feel that the decision was vindicated and he was swift to praise Isco, who he called “phenomenal”. His late substitutions were even more decisive. “We changed because we knew PSG couldn’t keep it up for 90 minutes, so we put on width and directness, with Lucas, Asensio and Gareth,” Zidane said.

With the inclusion of Isco, Zidane sought to reinforce the midfield, prioritising control over the counterattack that, later, would decide it. It meant outnumbering PSG there, and applying pressure on Lo Celso, playing in the deep role which is not really his, and Madrid began on the front foot. Yet PSG’s threat was always there, especially when they found Neymar.

The breakthrough came with Mbappé on the right. His ball was let go by Cavani and, with Nacho sliding in, Neymar flicked it into the path of Rabiot to score. Next Neymar provided for Cavani, whose shot floated just over. Madrid were shaken and wanted the half-time whistle. Before it came, though, Karim Benzema drew a superb save from Alphonse Areola and from the short corner Toni Kroos tumbled under pressure from Lo Celso. PSG protested, Ronaldo smashed in the penalty.

Lo Celso and Neymar created an early second-half chance for Mbappé, saved by Keylor Navas, and Dani Alves pulled the ball back for Rabiot, whose shot hit Sergio Ramos’s arm. PSG seemed more comfortable in possession now, Madrid more inclined to break. Anything felt possible, and on the touchline the men who would tip the balance waited. The surprise was that when Emery made his first change and took Cavani off, it was the full-back Thomas Meunier who came on. Bale followed soon after, replacing Benzema at centre-forward.

Meunier’s introduction released Alves and he went at Marcelo, whose energy levels seemed to be dropping until he burst forward in the 87th minute. Before that, a scramble ended with Ramos throwing himself in to stop a shot and then Neymar’s tantalising pass just evaded Alves. PSG took a step forward again but the space that left suited Madrid and Zidane sent men streaming into it, introducing Asensio and Lucas Vázquez. Lucas found Bale with his first intervention, Areola out to block. Then suddenly Asensio was sprinting up the other side. His first ball was cut out but PSG made a mess of the clearance and Areola could only push the next delivery against Ronaldo for 2-1. Three minutes later, Asensio was running again and Marcelo joined him to finish the move.

It could still have been different but, one on one, Mbappé ignored Alves and shot at Navas. Then Neymar guided the last kick over the bar. “This is how Madrid win!” chanted the Bernabéu crowd. It is how PSG lose, too.

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The last time these two teams met, back in August, Gerard Piqué admitted feeling inferior to Madrid. How quickly things change. Twenty-five games have passed since, Barcelona have lost none and by the close here the superiority was theirs, imposed almost by stealth, bit by bit until it was complete.

“It’s a defeat that hurts,” Zidane said. “They were sunk [in August], people said; tomorrow, we’re the ones that are ‘sunk’. We accept that, that’s football. We’re pissed off but Madrid never surrender, no matter what. People can think the league is over but I don’t think so and I don’t think the opposition coach thinks so either.”

The game ended with the ball in Real’s net; it had started with the ball in Barcelona’s when Cristiano Ronaldo’s header went in off the bar only for the linesman’s flag to be raised for offside. Then Ronaldo swung and missed by the penalty spot. Ten minutes had gone and with Mateo Kovacic a surprise inclusion detailed to prevent Sergio Busquets from bringing the ball out and Messi from finding time or space the visitors had barely had possession.

“We struggled to overcome that pressure,” Valverde said, yet it also appeared they were in no hurry. They arrived with an 11-point lead over their hosts, after all, and as Valverde had warned: “It is when you think you’re on top that Madrid hit you.”

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Often symbolised as pitting the pride of Catalonia against Spain’s capital, the ‘El Clasico’ between Barcelona and Real Madrid is a match laced with political and social as much as sporting tension.

Even more so this week when the sides face off in Madrid on Saturday lunchtime just over 36 hours after polls will close in local elections in Catalonia that were called over the crisis caused by the region’s drive for independence.

“They have a very strong ideological connection,” political scientist Pablo Simon told AFP.

“On the one side are Real Madrid, who normally can be said to have a more conservative and nationalist fan base.”

By contrast, Simon cites Barca’s ‘more than a club’ motto as being rooted in a sense of Catalan identity.

The sights and sounds of their Camp Nou and Santiago Bernabeu stadiums reflect that difference.

In Barcelona, Catalan flags, including the independence-supporting Estelada, are commonly flown, while the crowd at Europe’s biggest stadium chant in favour of independence in the 17th minute of each match to mark the fall of Catalonia in the Spanish War of Succession in 1714.

“It is the derby of Spain and it feels like it is impossible to be neutral,” Sid Lowe, a Spanish football journalist and author of the book “Fear and Loathing in La Liga” on the rivalry, told AFP.

“It is a unifying event. No-one wants to lose this game, even in the event of Catalan independence.”

– No Clasico not contemplated –

La Liga president Javier Tebas has repeatedly warned Barca would not be allowed to continue playing in the Spanish league if the drive for independence is followed through.

However, that is a scenario both clubs refuse to envisage with many believing threats from Tebas, who attended a nationalist march earlier in the year, are aligned to his own political beliefs.

“I want to tell all members that the intention of the club is to continue playing in La Liga. Right now our participation is guaranteed,” Barcelona president Josep Maria Bartomeu told the club’s AGM in October.

Barca played Las Palmas behind closed doors on October 1 in protest at the violence at the polling stations.

However, even outspoken pro-independence campaigners like former Barca president Joan Laporta have called for Barca to remain in La Liga.

“No one at Barcelona wants to lose this game even though that potentially contradicts their political or social position,” added Lowe.

The most-watched football match in the world will attract a potential TV audience of 650 million people who will tune in to see five-time Ballon d’Or winners Cristiano Ronaldo of Real and Barcelona’s Lionel Messi.

“It paralyses normal life in Spain,” added Simon. “That’s why we always recommend to go to the theatre or the cinema at that time because they will be empty.”

Yet, the fact that what could happen to Barca, and by extension El Clasico, has played such a big role in the independence debate is a sign of the match’s deeply-rooted importance to Spanish society as something more than just a sporting event.

“On the face of it the fact we are concerned about the impact for football from Catalan independence is absurd because there are so many other things to be worked through,” added Lowe.

“Yet, it is the one that has occupied people the most. Will Barcelona still be in the league? Will there still be a Clasico? And no one wants that to be lost.”

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