Manchester United legend Wayne Rooney makes bold prediction on Manchester City-Real Madrid Champions League tie

Wayne Rooney: (Image Source: Twitter)

Former Manchester United star Wayne Rooney has tipped Manchester City to bear Manchester City comfortably in their upcoming UEFA Champions League semi-final encounter this week. Previewing the first leg of the time in his latest column for The Times, Rooney said, "Manchester City will not just beat Real Madrid in their Champions League semi-final — they'll blow them away," adding that Madrid's experience and history in the competition is formidable but City were on another level this season.

"From the start of the season I felt this would be the campaign where Pep Guardiola would finally conquer Europe with City and the football his team are playing in recent months and the way they are peaking at the right time has only reaffirmed that thought," said Rooney in his column.

Unsurprisingly, Rooney has singled out in-form Manchester City striker Erling Haaland as the key factor in deciding this tie. He explained that Madrid would struggle to contain the Norwegian, who has already broken the Premier League goal-scoring record in his first season in English football.

"A year ago, Real Madrid knocked City out, but now the dynamic is different. City are better defensively and are a more patient team, but the biggest change is Erling Haaland," he explained. "Last season at the Bernabeu the team had five crazy minutes that lost them the tie. With Haaland it wouldn't have happened.

"Real Madrid could not have played the same way. In both games they had periods where they took the ball away from City and they were able to do that because City had no real counter-attacking threat."

Rooney also pointed out that Madrid would be missing Eder Militao in the first leg of the time, which means that Antonio Rudiger would probably have the task of marking Haaland in the game. He added that while Rudiger was a great competitor who liked to take players on one-on-one, there was no center-back in the world who could deal with Haaland's speed, power, and movement in the box.