Carlo Ancelotti has been around long enough to know these are the games that really matter at Real Madrid.

A Champions League last-16 tie against Paris Saint-Germain, with all the noise, the drama and the intrigue, will carry greater significance for Madrid’s president Florentino Perez than any of their other 39 fixtures so far this term.

In 2018, Zinedine Zidane launched his entire coaching career off winning titanic battles like these.

No matter that Real Madrid finished almost 20 points behind Barcelona in La Liga. Zidane marched his team past four European heavyweights in the knock-out stages – PSG, Juventus, Bayern Munich and, in the final, Liverpool – and was instantly hailed a genius.

 

Continue reading this article on Sports Desk, the new sports website by Times of Malta

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