Cristiano Ronaldo proved Atletico Madrid's Champions League dream destroyer once more with a hat-trick as Real Madrid took a commanding 3-0 semi-final, first leg lead on Tuesday.
Ronaldo, who scored five times in the quarter-final win over Bayern Munich, has now racked up a record 103 goals in the Champions League and more than half (52) have come in the knockout stages.
However, despite the size of the task and the fact his side failed to muster a shot on target on Tuesday night, Simeone was in a bullish mood.
"It's great to have a player like him", said Real midfielder Toni Kroos. It made uncharacteristic mistakes in a 3-0 loss that left the team needing a historic comeback to avoid another disappointing Champions League elimination against the city rival.
"We played a great game", Zidane said after the match.
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Select the name you want from the list in the poll to your right, we're also looking for your thoughts and views too so do share some of those with your comments below. We try to play our football and enjoy ourselves. Our opening half an hour was fantastic and we had a lot of chances to have got a second, but we didn't manage to do so until after the break. Ronaldo doubled the lead in the 73rd minute with a thunderous strike before tapping one in to complete his hat-trick with four minutes of normal time to play.
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I talked before the match about what big occasions Champions League semi-finals are - but for Real it looked like a normal game of football.
Ronaldo is one short now of reaching 400 goals for Real Madrid.
The second leg is next week at the Vicente Calderon, where Atletico has thrived with 29 wins in 35 games in European competitions.
Atletico saw more of the ball but failed to create chances against a solid Real defense and Diego Simeone reacted by bringing Nico Gaitan and Fernnado Torres on for Gameiro and Saul, while Zidane replaced Isco.
"We know there is a second leg", he said, quoted on the club's website.
Effort: "I always say that with dedication and hard work things work out naturally".
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