When Cardiff City beat Real Madrid

Next Tuesday Cardiff hosts Real Madrid and Sevilla for the European Super Cup. This will be the first time Los Merengueshave played in Cardiff for 43 years. In 1971 petrol was 33 pence per gallon, a house would cost you all of £5,500 and the world’s first microchip processor had just been invented.Real Madrid’s visit was to play the quarter finals of the European Cup Winners Cup against the un-fancied Cardiff City AFC, then playing in the old English Second division, but eligible for entry into European competition through winning the Welsh Cup.

The Real Madrid team packed with members of their European Cup winning team, were outplayed by Cardiff City and lost 1-0 to a powerful first half Brian Clark header. Unfortunately, the dream of a semi-final for Cardiff ended in the return leg when Real Madrid employed less than gentlemanly tactics to win through 2-0 on the night.

Tuesday night will see an array of global talent in the shape of Ronaldo, James, Benzema, Kroos, Khedira and of course a return for local Cardiff boy, the world’s first €100 million player, Gareth Bale.

Sevilla, all too aware of the gulf in finances, are talking a good game. President, José Castro said, “Real are undoubtedly the favourites, due to the quality in their team and their financial might. However, I insist, football is football and it’s anybody’s game. Once the game kicks off, we’ll see who has the better team, has had the better pre-season and has assimilated their manager’s instructions the best.” He added somewhat despairingly, “Hopefully the game goes our way.”

Real Madrid will be hoping for a better result than the last time they visited the Welsh capital.