Chiellini gives shock name for RMD’s ‘unstoppable’ player during triple UCL run

The former player praised the Malaga native's role in the 2017 Champions League final, which saw Madrid beat Juventus 4-1.

Former Juventus star Giorgio Chiellini recently opened up about his career on Sky's podcast The Overlap. Among other things, he discussed the two Champions League finals he lost with the Italian giants: one in 2015 against Barcelona and the other in 2017 against Real Madrid in Cardiff.

The experienced defender was full of praise for Isco Alarcón, who started the decisive match in Wales: “He was the one who broke our game plan; he really was unstoppable.”

Chiellini recalled that they had already beaten Real Madrid two years earlier, in the 2015 semi-finals. At the time, Carlo Ancelotti preferred to start James Rodríguez. The Colombian had an impressive debut season at the Santiago Bernabéu, but Juventus exploited the defensive weaknesses of a team that fielded Rodríguez alongside the BBC trio (Bale, Benzema and Cristiano Ronaldo).

Chiellini calls Madrid's 'truly unstoppable' player

Things were changing in Cardiff. “When they played with Casemiro and Isco instead of Bale… Isco was the player who broke our game plan. Isco was truly unstoppable as he caused overload left, right and centre. It was not easy for us to stop them,” Chiellini admitted.

The former Juve player explained that no matter how difficult it was, they were able to stop Bale's 'predictable' moves, but were not prepared for the Malaga player's unpredictable talent: “An unpredictable player is better than anyone Whose moves do you know, even if he's really good.

Real Madrid won that final 4-1, capping off a near-perfect season in which they won both the Champions League and LaLiga titles. Cristiano Ronaldo scored twice for Madrid, while Mandzukic scored a memorable goal for the Italians, although this had no significant impact on the outcome.

Original article written by Álvar Gutiérrez, translated with the help of AI and edited by Joe Brennan.