MADRID: After a defeat against Real Madrid in the Champions League, Liverpool’s Georginio Wijnaldum said that overcoming the first leg deficit in the second leg match will be difficult but “not impossible” for his side.

Real Madrid secured a 3-1 win over Liverpool in the first leg of their Champions League quarter-final here on Wednesday. The second leg is scheduled to take place on April 15. During the match, Vinicius Junior scored twice while Marco Asensio netted a goal to hand Real Madrid a big win. Mohamed Salah scored the only goal for Liverpool.

“It’s always good to have an away goal. Unfortunately, they scored one after we scored,” Wijnaldum told Liverpoolfc.com.

“So I have to say it would have been easier if it was 2-1 or we scored [to make it] 2-2. Now we have to score two and make sure we don’t concede. It’s not impossible, [like] we’ve shown in previous years, but it’s difficult,” he added.

Real Madrid had taken a two-goal lead within the first 36 minutes. When asked if he felt the opening 45 minutes was where the game slipped away from the visitors, Wijnaldum said: “Yes, for sure. You saw how we gave the goals away and how we played when we had the ball — it was not good enough. When we recovered the ball we gave it away too quickly and that’s why we had to run a lot and that’s why the first half was really intense, really heavy and hard.”

Goals from Vinicius Junior and Marco Asensio helped Real Madrid thrash Liverpool in the first-leg quarterfinal of the Champions League on Wednesday.

Real Madrid defeated Liverpool 3-1 and as a result, the latter now faces an uphill task of making it to the semi-finals. Jurgen Klopp’s side would be required to score big in the second leg quarterfinal. Liverpool and Real Madrid will now take on each other in the second leg quarterfinal on Wednesday, April 14.

NEW DELHI: Former England skipper Michael Vaughan feels Mumbai Indians will win the 14th edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL), which gets underway from Friday.

While Vaughan admitted that his prediction of the winner of the cash-rich league is quite early, he backed the Rohit Sharma-led side to lift the coveted trophy. The former England skipper also named Sunrisers Hyderabad as the probable winners of the IPL 2021 if Mumbai Indians are not able to replicate their last year’s heroics.

“Early #IPL2021 prediction @mipaltan will win it … if by some bizarre loss of form then @SunRisers will win it … #OnOn #India,” Vaughan tweeted.

Last month, the former England skipper had said Mumbai Indians are a better T20 side than Team India. Meanwhile, star cricketer Kieron Pollard has finished his seven-day quarantine period and will resume training.

Rajasthan Royals witnessed a forgettable season last year as they finished at the bottom of the Indian Premier League (IPL) table. But the team made its intent clear at the auction table itself in February when they made the most expensive buy – picking Chris Morris for Rs 16.25 crore. Add to that a change in leadership with Sanju Samson being named skipper, the Royals definitely mean business going into season 14. In fact, the franchise decided to let go of Steve Smith as well as they look to end their trophy drought – their only win coming in the inaugural season. But whether the chopping and changing gets RR the right results can only be gauged once the tournament gets underway.

Newly-appointed skipper Samson was the team’s highest run-scorer in the last edition, accumulating 375 runs from 14 matches. While he was the team’s highest run-getter, Samson was placed on the 16th spot overall on the list which was topped by Punjab Kings’ KL Rahul with 670 runs. Therefore, it is very clear that Rajasthan Royals’ batsmen will have to put in the hard yards if they are to get the desired results against the top teams.

Rajasthan Royals’ title hunt will depend a lot on the form of England star Ben Stokes. The player has the ability to turn around games single-handedly and the all-rounder’s form will be of great importance. Notably, Stokes smashed 285 runs in the last edition from just eight innings, with his highest being 107*.

Another positive in the batting line-up is the current form of David Miller. The South African is high on confidence, having scored two back-to-back half-centuries against Pakistan in the ongoing three-match ODI series. Moreover, Jos Buttler also delivered some impressive performances against India.

The list of batsmen who can help the team set up competitive totals continues, with Rahul Tewatia and Yashasvi Jaiswal also at their disposal.

Some of the key players of the team are: Sanju Samson, Ben Stokes, Jofra Archer, Jos Buttler, Andrew Tye, Jaydev Unadkat, Mayank Markande, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Anuj Rawat, David Miller, Manan Vohra, Chris Morris, Mustafizur Rahman, Chetan Sakariya, KC Cariappa, Liam Livingstone, and Kuldip Yadav.

Coming to the bowling department, apart from Morris, the Royals also added Bangladesh bowler Mustafizur Rehman to their fast-bowling arsenal for the season at his base price of 1 cr. However, in a major blow, the franchise will not have the service of Jofra Archer in the first half as the player is currently undergoing a period of rehabilitation. England pacer had undergone surgery on his right hand on March 29 and began his two weeks of rehabilitation, with ECB saying that “the consultant will review him before returning to training.”

Coming back to Morris, he picked 11 wickets from nine games in IPL 13 in UAE. Overall, the player has 80 wickets to his name from 70 matches and has scored 551 runs. Therefore, it will be interesting to watch as to whether the new leader and the most expensive buy can combine to help the franchise end the trophy drought.

Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp has said that his side is not looking to take any kind of revenge against Real Madrid in the upcoming Champions League quarterfinal leg one fixture.

The talk about the match between Liverpool and Real Madrid has surrounded around their meeting in 2018 final in Kyiv, which Real Madrid managed to win 3-1. “We are not on a revenge tour here. I don’t believe too much in revenge, but it would be nice to get through, because it would mean we are in the next round My motivation is on the highest level because it’s the Champions League, we play Real Madrid and we want to go to the next round. It has nothing to do with 2018. When we got the draw, of course, I remembered the game because it was the first time we have played each other since,” Goal.com quoted Klopp as saying.

In the 2018 final against Liverpool, Sergio Ramos had a night to remember for Real Madrid and he was the destructor in chief. However, Ramos will miss the fixture against Liverpool this time around due to an injury.

“I said after that 2018 game that if somebody asked me in a press conference a week later or a month later if I would invite Sergio Ramos to my 60th birthday, then I would say no! Meanwhile, I would think about it again. It’s not that he’s not a great footballer but I didn’t like what happened that night. It was a strange night for us, but it’s long ago and I cannot get that feeling, that anger, back,” said Klopp.

“I can only try to prepare my team to show tomorrow how good we are as a football team. It’s a strange season and a difficult season for us, but we want to show how good we are, and if we are better than Real Madrid and can score more goals, then we go to the next round. And if not then Real Madrid will,” he added.

Klopp further said: “Our team is built for these kinds of games, when we face a football-playing side. That’s why we have a chance, absolutely.”

“I heard outside that everybody says Real Madrid is a favourite. Great! No problem at all with that. They are used to the role, and we have no problem with the role of challenger,” he added.

In this edition of the Indian Premier League, the team that has the frontline Indian seamers in the squad will benefit more. Mumbai Indians and Sunrisers Hyderabad are such teams. While Mumbai will profit from Jaspreet Bumrah, SRH will reap glibly from the presence of experienced Bhuvneshwar Kumar and the T20 specialist T. Natarajan. These seamers are in quite a good form. Rest, Siddharth Kaul has also done well in domestic cricket.

Apart from Bumrah, Mumbai Indians have foreign speedsters Trent Boult and Nathan Coulter-Nile in their squad. While Bolt has a very good swing, the positive thing about Coulter-Nile is that he can resort to power-hitting in the lower order. As far as Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) is concerned, I have high hopes from Mohammed Siraj. He can take good advantage of the swing. Nevertheless, Navdeep Saini, who only has pace at his disposal, may prove expensive.

In Chennai’s squad, there is no fast bowler except Deepak Chahar whom the skipper will rely hugely upon. Bravo and Sam are all-rounders, and this team may look like struggling on the fast bowling front.

Rajasthan Royals will miss Jofra Archer. This attack is very much dependent on Mustafizur Rehman and Ben Stokes. Jaydev Unadkat’s performance lacks consistency. On the fast bowling front, this team is also seen struggling. Punjab Kings have bought Riley Meredith at a very expensive price, despite we haven’t seen him playing a lot of cricket recently, however, all the eyes will remain fixated on the expensive speedster.

If Mohammed Shami is fit, he can prove to be a great strength for RCB. It would not be appropriate to rely too much on the rest of the players like Arshadeep. Chris Jordan’s performance will certainly be watched by everyone as he has been continuously playing for England in the T20Is. In KKR, Pat Cummins and P. Krishna are genuine pacers. Moreover, I think Lockie Ferguson will play few matches.

Delhi Capitals’ hopes are set on Kagiso Rabada and Anrich Nortje. Bowling with both foreign players means the balance of the team suffers. Maybe, both of them will play by rotation.I don`t think that Ishant Sharma will get a berth in the playing XI. Umesh Yadav has also joined this team. Apart from being experienced, he is getting into the rhythm.

Writer is a former India fast bowler and a cricket expert

‘We will come back strong. That’s what we are known for,” MS Dhoni had said after Chennai Super Kings’ (CSK) final match last season in UAE. Having failed to qualify for the playoffs of the Indian Premier League for the first time, the intent to come back strongly was clearly visible. Despite witnessing a dismal run in the last season, CSK will still enter the 2021 edition of the IPL as one of the favourites, given the franchise’s track record on Indian soil. Not to forget the experience the side has at its disposal.

The team will step into the new season with several changes as Shane Watson retired from all forms of cricket following last year’s IPL while CSK opted not to retain Harbhajan Singh. Despite the absence of these two, CSK still has surfeit experience in the squad. Also, the Dhoni-led team will see the return of Suresh Raina, who had missed the last edition of the tournament. Raina’s return will bolster the team’s batting line-up.

In the mini-auction, held in February, CSK went all out for all-rounder Krishnappa Gowtham. The franchise bought the player for a whopping Rs 9.25 crore, making him the most expensive uncapped Indian player at the mini-auction. Also, in the absence of Harbhajan Singh, CSK had to add an experienced spinner to the team, and the team ironed that problem out with the addition of Moeen Ali.

The team also has Sam Curran and Shardul Thakur and both of them will be brimming with confidence as they were at their best in last month’s ODI series between India and England. Hence, the duo will look to continue with their recent form, heading into the IPL.

On paper, CSK’s squad looks solid. However, while many players have been in action recently in some or the other tournaments, the stumbling block for the team will be the lack of game time for players like Dhoni, Jadeja, Raina. Dhoni and Raina retired from international cricket last year while Jadeja is returning from an injury setback. Given that these players form the core of the team, Dhoni, Raina and Jadeja finding rhythm as soon as possible will be the key or else it could scupper their plans.

South Africa’s Faf du Plessis has also been a very consistent performer for the side. The batsman was the highest run-getter for CSK last season, amassing 449 from 13 matches. Another South African, Lungi Ngidi, will also give strength to the team with his lethal bowling. The pacer’s stats in the shortest format of the game is quite impressive.

Ngidi has 28 wickets under his belt for South Africa from 16 T20I matches, with the best figures of 4/19. The same dominating performance was on display in the last edition in which he scalped nine wickets from only four matches. However, CSK will be without the service of Josh Hazlewood in the upcoming edition as the Australian pacer pulled out of the tournament earlier this month.

In the mini-auction, the franchise also picked Cheteshwar Pujara, who last played an IPL match in 2014, bringing the batsman on board for Rs 50 lakh. Moreover, Ruturaj Gaikwad earned a lot of praise after his remarkable debut in the last season of the IPL. Gaikwad fell early in the first three outings before scoring 65 not out against Royal Challengers Bangalore, 72 against Kolkata Knight Riders and 62 not out against Kings XI Punjab (renamed Punjab Kings) to sign off on a high.

But most importantly, the tournament is back on Indian soil and nothing like watching Dhoni marshal his resources on low and slow turners.