Gary Lineker, who represented Barcelona among others during his playing days and now hosts BT Sport’s Champions League coverage, was very critical of Real Madrid after their elimination at the hands of Chelsea on Wednesday night.
After a 1-1 draw in the Spanish capital, Chelsea ran out 2-0 winners against the 13-time European Cup champions to book their place in the final, which they will play against Manchester City.
“Finally Chelsea bury the semi-final,” Lineker tweeted after Mason Mount scored the Blues’ second goal of the night.
“They’ve been excellent and a million miles the better side against the poorest Real Madrid team I think I’ve ever seen.”
Rio Ferdinand, a pundit on BT Sport, also criticised Real Madrid’s performance at Stamford Bridge.
“Yes they’ve [Real Madrid] got good players, but they looked tired on the night,” Ferdinand said on BT Sport.
“They looked like an old team tonight and Chelsea looked like a young team who were hungry.
“They could have won by about five or six goals Wednesday night. We said before about them playing quick and in transition and breaking from midfield.
“[N’Golo] Kante did that for the first goal; they did in time and time again after that and they got the job done.”
Former Real Madrid midfielder Steve McManaman, also a pundit on BT Sport, thinks that Los Blancos need to make big changes.
“They got big problems ahead of them,” McManaman said.
“They’re fine in LaLiga, like a lot of the teams in Spain financially.
“They have got to change the team around. They couldn’t keep all the players: Gareth Bale had to go, James [Rodriguez] left and [Martin] Odegaard went out on loan. Luka Jovic, too.
“They weakened the squad that way. They need reinforcements.”