The big day has arrived, and the final of the 2022-2023 Champions League will be held in Istanbul on Saturday. Manchester City (without winning a trophy in history) and Inter Milan (has three “ears” in the window) will fight to become the new “Queen of Europe”.

Manchester City – Inter, Champions League finalPhoto: Tolga Uluturk / Zuma Press / Profimedia

The match at the Atatürk Olympic Stadium in Istanbul (capacity 76,000 seats) will start at 22:00 and will be broadcast on LiveBLOG on HotNews.ro and live on Digisport 1, Orange Sport 1 and Prima Sport 1.

Istvan Kovac, substitute referee of the match “Manchester City” against “Inter”.

Saturday’s Champions League final will be refereed by Poland’s Szymon Marciniak (he was also in the center at the World Cup final in Qatar), assisted by compatriots Pavel Sokolnytskyi and Tomasz Listkiewicz, assistants.

The team will also include two Romanians: Istvan Kovacs will be the fourth referee, and Vasile Marinescu will be the reserve assistant referee.

Pep Guardiola and 12 years of waiting

Throughout his coaching career, Pep Guardiola won the Champions League trophy twice, each time with Barcelona (in 2009 and 2011).

At the age of 52, Pep has been waiting for a new “colossus” for 12 years, he missed it with “Bavaria” and “Manchester City” (played in the 2021 final, lost to “Chelsea”, score 0:1).

Instead, “Inter” has three Champions Leagues (for the first two triumphs, the competition was not called that). The first two were back-to-back: 1964 and 1965 under Helenio Herrera, and the last (2010) with Jose Mourinho on the bench.

Probable teams

Manchester United: Ederson – Akanji, Diaz, Ake – Stones, Rodri – B. Silva, De Bruyne, Gundogan, Grealish – Haaland. Coach: Pep Guardiola

Inter: Onana – Darmian, Acherby, Bastoni – Dumfries, Barella, Brozovic, Calhanoglu, Dimarco – Lautaro Martinez, Dzeko. Coach: Simone Inzaghi.