Lahm no longer a sheepish teenager

London: Philipp Lahm recalls his first start in the Champions League as vividly as if it were yesterday. He was 19 and far less celebrated than the prodigy he had to mark. Lahm was picked at left-back, a novel role for him then, for Stuttgart against Manchester United. Cristiano Ronaldo would be bearing down on him.

Lahm, now 28, felt nervous. "I only had a couple of Bundesliga games under my belt and I was up against the wunderkind from Portugal," he recalls.

"But after a good first contact with the ball I had no real problems and even had some chances to join the attack." Stuttgart claimed a surprise win, albeit in a group game.

As his career progressed, as he grew into both one of the game's finest right-backs or left-backs, duels against Ronaldo would recur at more important stages of competitions. And the captain of Bayern Munich and Germany would learn that whatever the many difficulties presented by the man from Portugal, Ronaldo's tracking back tended not be among them.

The fall-guy for Real Madrid's defeat last Tuesday in the first leg of their semi-final has been Fabio Coentrao, the left-back picked ahead of the Brazilian Marcelo, and outfoxed by Lahm when he delivered an excellent cross for Mario Gomez's late goal, the difference between 1-1 and the narrow lead that Bayern take to the Bernabeu.

Short of excuses

Coentrao had been short of excuses for a while, since the €25 million (Dh121.4 million) Madrid paid to Benfica for him last summer began to look too much.

And neither was Ronaldo much help last week. As Marcelo would testify, Ronaldo can be a wonderful team mate when you are the Madrid left-back marauding in the opposition's half of the field; he is not the staunchest ally in defence.

The full-back roles have become something of a puzzle at Madrid in Jose Mourinho's second season there. Initially suspicious of Marcelo, the Portuguese coach has now said that he is the "best left-back in the world". Then he bought Coentrao.

Sergio Ramos, Spain's right-back, had been Madrid's, too, until the form and fitness of Ricardo Carvalho declined, Ramos moved to centre-half and Alvaro Arbeloa took over on that flank. Arbeloa can expect a tough evening's work on Wednesday, with Arjen Robben returning to the stadium he once called home and Franck Ribery encouraged by the discomfort he caused Madrid in Bavaria.

"In Robben and Ribery, we have two of the best wingers in the world," Lahm says. "They have the element of surprise, the capability to create a goal at any moment."

— The Times Newspapers Limited 2012