UEFA Champions League Final 2016/17: 5 players who should shine the brightest
There can be no questions about the credibility of this years’ Champions League finalists. With 66 league titles and 25 European trophies between them, Real Madrid and Juventus, the Vikingos of Spain and the Vecchia Signora of Italy, are two of the Europe’s most decorated sides.
Each of them added yet another domestic title to their expansive trophy cabinets this season, fending off the respective challenges of Barcelona and Roma. In Cardiff on June 3rd, one of these champions will complete the herculean task of conquering both their domestic league and the most famous league on the continent.
For Juventus’s impeccably efficient and experienced team it could be their first since 1996 when Marcelo Lippi’s side beat Ajax 4-2 on penalties. Chelsea manager Antonio Conte was one of the medal winners that day.
Of course for Real Madrid’s players, the gleam of the Champions League trophy is one they have become familiar with in recent years, having won the prize in 2014 and again last year in 2016. Should Real be the first team in history to defend the title, it will be manager Zinedine Zidane’s second time thrusting it into the air.
As for the players, some have been here before. Others are yet to compete in the biggest final in club football but will be looking towards it as a platform for future greatness. Below are the individuals Real Madrid and Juventus will be relying on the most come next Saturday.
#5 Dani Alves
Juventus director Giuseppe Marotta one claimed that his best piece of transfer business was signing Andrea Pirlo as a free agent. Should his team be victorious on Saturday evening, it’s likely that he’ll have changed his mind. Since joining the Turin outfit on a free from Barcelona last summer Dani Alves has been a revelation, showing no signs of decline from the tremendously high levels he hit during his eight-year spell at the Camp Nou.
Even a sophisticated squad like Juventus need experience, and the 34-year-old was literally brought into the side to ‘teach’ them how to win the Champions League. His lessons are going well. Alves provided two monstrous performances in the semi-finals against Monaco.
Perhaps the most nimble attacking force in the competition, the Frenchmen may have targeted Juventus’ ageing right-hand side as an area to exploit but it was the Brazilian, still so technically gifted, still able to gazelle up and down the touchline with fuel left to spare, who put Leonardo Jardim’s side to the sword. Having created both goals in Juventus’s 2-0 win in the first leg, it was his sublime volley from the edge of the area that sealed the Italian’s place in the final just a week later. ‘Let this be remembered as the semi-final of Dani Alves’ wrote The Times in the United Kingdom. ‘Did you see him?’ asked a flabbergasted Max Allegri at the final whistle.
In this year’s competition, only strikers Gonzalo Higuain and Paulo Dybala have more goals than his three and no player in Juventus squad has created more chances than Alves. Heading into his third Champions League final – the most of any player in the current Juventus squad – Alves will again be tasked with leading his side into battle.