4 March 2025
Real Madrid will host city rivals Atletico Madrid in the Spanish Derby this evening, Tuesday, at the "Santiago Bernabeu" stadium in the first leg of the round of 16 in the Champions League for the current season. Real Madrid, the defending champions of the Champions League, qualified for this round after a difficult group stage and played the qualifying play-off against Manchester City of England, defeating the English champions with a score of 6-3 on aggregate.
While Atletico Madrid qualified directly to the round of 16 after finishing the group stage in fifth place with 18 points.
The newspaper "Marca" went on to write a title describing the "derby" as the best in Europe, referring to the competitive levels of the two teams and the names that each team includes from the most prominent stars in the world.
The newspaper "AS" headlined: "The European Derby" with a picture of the Frenchman Kylian Mbappe and the Argentine Julian Alvarez.
It is worth noting that the winner of Real Madrid and Atletico Madrid will meet the winner of the Arsenal and Eindhoven clash in the quarter-finals of the tournament, according to the draw that took place earlier in February.
