Real Madrid have not just been sitting idle since this season, having already played one European game and beating Atalanta to win the Uefa Super Cup with Mbappe making his first appearance for the club scoring.
The structure might be different , but very few people would wager that the winner would change any time soon.
As if 14-time winners Real Madrid’s chances of winning the Champions League were not good enough already, they now possess the most feared striker in the game who is Kylian Mbappe.
German side Stuttgart have the honors of facing the reigning kings of Europe in the opening week of the competition, traveling to the Santiago Bernabeu on Tuesday.
Last year, Los Blancos triumphed over Borussia Dortmund in the Wembley Showpiece to pocket the trophy for the six of the first eleven.
Carlo Ancelotti, the head coach holding most trophies of this competition, 5 to his credit, prepared his Mbappe for offensive actions in the tournament but so far has not discovered how to set him loose yet.
At age 25, the player performed arguably at his best for the team as he helped to secure a 2-0 La Liga victory over Real Sociedad in the match on Saturday where he posed threats to the Basque side with his speed as well as linking up with Vinicius Junior in attack.
At a penalty kick, there was no doubt that Mbappe was going to score; now he is eager to experience the Galactico white at the Santiago Bernabeu in his very first Champions League game as an Atletico player. “For me it will be huge – as I said on the very first day I am in Madrid to experience these kinds of nights and Champions League– I came to Madrid to experience them,” the forward clarified. “Quite honestly I am very much aware of what we need to complete, remembering that this is the UCL, the UCL is not what it used to be, and this is something new, and we are not in a position to lose to begin with.”
The revised configuration has given rise to venues for Madrid hosting Dortmund in a blockbuster rematch featuring the last season Champions League final and travelling to face Liverpool whom they overcame to be crowned European champions League last year.
At first, it was Stuttgart on the run of German teams Los Blancos went on after they had knocked out Bayern Munchen in the semi finals and then played against Dortmound in London.
Los Cules already had one outing in this year’s European cup when they played Atalanta in August to win the Uefa Super cup, with Mbappe scoring on his debut.
Madrid centre back Antonio Rudiger was raised in Stuttgart’s Football Academy and featured for their senior team for 4 seasons.
The midfield was a rare bust for Ancelotti, as Eduardo Camavinga, Dani Ceballos, Jude Bellingham, and Aurelien Tchouameni are out injured, though with some luck, the last two should be fit to face the Germans.
As much of the focus is shifted towards Madrid’s purchase of Neymars dibble doodley possum Mbappe, Ancelotti has enough other performers up his sleeves who are capable of turning losses into draws and draws into wins, which is quite a habit with the club, especially during midweek matches in Europe.
Bellingham was of great use to Madrid during the first part of the last season, even helping to the team right upon his transfer to the Spanish from Dortmund.
He has gone on to reassure us with his performance in the final where he scored one after scoring a couple in the semis with Bayern.
This season the forward has not been able to perform at his desired level but the bench will be quite lenient.
‘’We value him here since even though he is not at his best right now, with Vini we have achieved the winning of 2 champions league, nobody can erase that over looking,” said Ancelotti last week.
Mbappe says he’s trying to improve the way they play together in a game which saw both score penalty kicks, with Vinicius and Mbappe both scoring from the spot during the win over La Real.
‘’We keep trying to train in a way that we can look for each other in matches in order to fill in the gap and assist the team’’ was how Mbappe ended that answer.
’Everyone knows he is an enormous player and I don’t mind playing with him in Real Madrid-Great, it is goals, champions league ambitions and not penalty takers which is important’’.
Mbappe has three La Liga goals in the current 4 matches played this season and couple of them were penalties, while VInicius has scored two goals and both are penalties.
As soon as both these forwards start contributing to open play in addition to scoring Madrid’s already high chances of winning the Champions League at least once more, would increase even further.