Europe

It shouldn’t come as a surprise but El Clasico is lit. Barcelona began the match on the front foot with Lionel Messi getting on the ball in some dangerous areas for the champions-elect. 

However, the opening goal was started and finished by Luis Suarez, the Uruguayan releasing Sergi Roberto on the wing before expertly finishing the Spanish full back’s immaculate cross in the 10th minute.  

Roberto’s final ball was spectacular, but this is just brilliant forward play from Suarez. 

Although Barcelona has already celebrated its La Liga title, the stakes are as high as ever ahead of this spring's edition of El Clasico. Real Madrid will almost certainly finish the season in second or third, but they'll be plenty motivated to keep Barcelona from joining the ranks of invincible soccer teams. 

Neymar is reportedly back in Paris today, and while he’s not expected to return to action immediately, there’s still hope he can play in PSG’s final league game, away at Caen. Neymar has been out injured since the end of February after fracturing his fifth metatarsal and flying back to Brazil to have it surgically repaired and treated.  

Beşiktaş is one of Turkey’s greatest clubs, having won 15 Turkish Super League titles, most recently in 2017. The Black Eagles have won nine Turkish Cups and eight Turkish Super Cups. But the club chose to throw away a chance at the next two Turkish Cups by choosing not to show up for a match on Thursday — and many have applauded the Beşiktaş forfeit. 

Make no mistake, Chelsea’s Premier League title defense has been nothing short of a disaster. In fact, their season as a whole could be summed up as outrageously underwhelming on all levels. They sit in fifth place and face an extremely difficult task in trying to catch London rivals Tottenham in fourth. 

Spurs are five points ahead and there are only three games left to play this season. Also, bigger foundational problems loom for Chelsea in the offseason — problems that no doubt contributed to the malaise and poor form throughout the campaign.

In the aftermath of Real Madrid’s extremely fortunate 4-3 aggregate victory over Bayern Munich and Liverpool’s bonkers 7-6 win over Roma, expect two storylines to dominate the headlines in the buildup to Kiev: (1) this is a very different Real Madrid side than previous incarnations (let's be clear here: they’re charmed, not favored — they haven’t gotten the help that Barcelona got against PSG in 2017) and (2) if defending is an art, Liverpool is Jackson Pollock — their backline