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Tue. September 16, 2025
UEFA Champions League - Group D
Dover vs. Real Madrid
Crabble Athletic Ground, Dover, England
Betting Odds: Dover: 6-4 (Favourites) Draw: 2-1 Real Madrid: 13-8
Past Meetings: 1W 0D 2L
We start the Champions League group stage with a match against the largest club in the world. There’s not much to say about these guys: they are 11 time Champions League winners and have won the Spanish LIGA an incredible 39 times, including the last three years in a row. They have huge striker Cheikh Bocande, a former Liverpool player and have talent everywhere. They were relatively modest spenders during the transfer window, spending £27 million on seven players, most notably splashing £12 million on Man City DC Maikel Jungbluth.
We are in a bit of a mess with three players suspended for today’s game (Chiquinho, Jose and Claudio Contreras) and a couple key injuries, including Arsene Bamba and Emmerson Harvey. I think about moving to a one striker formation but with only three MCs available for the game, I decide to go with two strikers and will play Paul Moses up front with Andy Broomes. Mads Pedersen returns from injury and will start today. 16 year old Michel Benard will suit up with the senior team for the first time and will be on the bench today - to be honest, I hope I don’t have to use him! As slight favourites, we’ll stick with our control mentality.
Dover: 4-4-2 Control
GK - I. Wilke
D - Renato Gaucho, M. Mutesa, R. Hamon, S. Loucif
M - M. Pedersen, B. Raab, N. Cairney, S. De la Vega
S - P. Moses, A. Broomes
Bench - R. Lopez, A. Torres, M. Benard, Rafinha, G. Bolis, Z. Bardi, M. Lugo
Madrid come out in a 4-4-2 diamond formation and have Paulista up front with Rodolfo Negrete. Zonzamas Garrido is in goal. I tell the team to perform well for the supporters and pull aside Moses, De la Vega and Renato Gaucho for personal chats.
30’ - We are in complete control of this game and just dominating the highlights but Madrid take advantage of their first chance in the game, with Ingo Wilke pulling himself out of position and Paulista is able to easily head a cross into the open net. Ugly! REAL MADRID GOAL 0-1
35’ - Oh boy. Madrid hit us on the counter and it’s Rodolfo Negrete finding space, taking a great feed and beating Wilke with a shot to the corner of the goal. This is a disaster. REAL MADRID GOAL 0-2
38’ - Mads Pedersen scores on a cross off a failed corner but he’s offside. NO GOAL.
HALFTIME - We deserve better but we’re down two. We held 52% of possession and have an 18-6 (6-5 on target) shot advantage. “Where’s the passion, lads?”
77’ - This just isn’t going our way. Out comes Sergio De la Vega and in comes Rodolfo Lopez.
79’ - Zoltan Bardi comes on for Andy Broomes.
We move to an overload mentality.
This was extremely disappointing and puts us in a bad spot to start the group stage.
Dover 0 - 2 Real Madrid
Goals -
Assists -
Man of the Match - Paulista (Real Madrid ST - 8.2)
Other Dover Notables - Ingo Wilke (5.8)
Attendance - 23,000
Well, we deserved better but we just lack cutting edge this year. Paul Moses (6.0) has been terrible this year except for the one two-goal game and I give him an official warning after the game for his poor performances, which he accepts. He’ll be benched in our next game. Sergio De la Vega (6.0) is also having major troubles adapting to English football.
-- And adding to our misery is the fact that Spartak Moscow annihilate Maribor 6-0 and that won’t help us in eventual tie-breakers, as we’re quickly EIGHT GOALS behind them in goal differential. YIKES.
Injury Update
-- Great. Andy Broomes suffers strained ankle ligaments after twisting painfully during a training session. He’ll miss three weeks.
Next Up
-- We head out on the road to face Reading in Premier League play.
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