After a couple of days to think about, Real Madrid and Liverpool’s Champions League final in Kyiv might have been the weirdest final in the history of football.
The Premier League will have to continue to wait for a Champions League title. Real Madrid’s 3-1 win in Kyiv on Saturday keeps the Spanish streak alive. Spanish clubs have won the last five Champions League titles, with Real Madrid winning four of those five.
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Real Madrid already had a dynasty, but this win means it is one of the greatest in football history. This win might also be the strangest in football history. In fact, it is. The mixture of events in this game has never been seen in a final, let alone in any football match ever.
Some of the occurrences have happened in finals before, but none at a rate like we saw in this game. Let’s break down how strange this match really was.
Injuries
In the first half, Mo Salah and Dani Carvajal left the final with injuries. Both sent the footballing world spiraling with ‘get well’ tweets and prayer emojis. Salah especially received an outpouring of support from the entire football community. His injury was a dislocated shoulder and he could miss the first game of the World Cup for Egypt (June 15th vs. Uruguay).
It was a very tough night, but I'm a fighter. Despite the odds, I'm confident that I'll be in Russia to make you all proud. Your love and support will give me the strength I need. pic.twitter.com/HTfKF4S70e
— Mohamed Salah (@MoSalah) May 27, 2018
Salah’s injury was the story of the game, but let’s not forget Dani Carvajal. For the second final in three years, Carvajal went down with an injury that forced him to be taken out of the game. In both instances, he cried off the pitch and it was in a year of an international tournament.
Luckily this time around, Carvajal looks like he will be fit in time to put the Spain shirt on for the World Cup. In 2016, he missed all of Euro from his UCL injury.
We’ve seen injuries in finals before, like Cristiano Ronaldo coming off early in the Euro 2016 final with a moth on his face. To have two of these injuries in one half of football, that is weird.