Having already clinched a spot in the Champions League knockout round, Real Madrid face a desperate Shakhtar Donetsk team eager for a win in order to stay ahead of Malmo. With Karim Benzema and Keylor Navas occupying the bench against the Ukranian giants, it will be interesting to see if Real Madrid can avenge their embarrassing loss to Barcelona in El Clasico this past weekend.
Here are the Real Madrid Shakhar Donetsk highlights:
After a patient 18 minutes, Gareth Bale finally got free and made a clean strike that only narrowly went wide – but right into the awaiting legs of a hungry Cristiano Ronaldo, who promptly tapped the ball in for his 450th career goal.
A few narrow saves by Shakhtar goalkeeper Andriy Pyatov is all that stopped Real Madrid from doubling or tripling their lead after the first 45 minutes.
In the second half, Real Madrid would start applying the pressure with Ronaldo spending the majority of the time in Shakhtar’s box. From there he contributed two assists – one to Luka Modric and another just minutes later to Daniel Carvajal – to give Real Madrid a 3-0 lead.
Ronaldo added his second goal of the day later on to give Real a 4-0 lead, but Shakhtar managed to cut into it with a score off a penalty kick by Alex Teixeira to make the score 4-1.
In a stunning turn of events, Shakhtar managed to score two more times to the shock of Rafael Benitez. But it wouldn’t be enough as Real Madrid held on for the 4-3 victory
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