Champions League: Real Madrid Take Control In Europe With Smooth Shakhtar Win

Real Madrid established a stranglehold at the top of their Champions League group with a 2-1 win over Shakhtar Donetsk on Wednesday, which should have been far more emphatic. Carlo Ancelotti's reigning champions have a 100 percent record in the competition and made light work of their Ukrainian opponents, who had to travel 10 hours to get to Madrid because of the war in their homeland.

Rodrygo and Vinicius Junior's goals made the difference but the record 14-time winners were dominant and only profligate finishing -- and fine goalkeeping from Anatoliy Trubin -- stopped them from racking up a big lead.

After three games Madrid have a five-point lead on second-placed Shakhtar, with RB Leipzig, third, beating Celtic 3-1 in the other Group F match.

"There are days like this, when the ball doesn't want to go in," said Madrid midfielder Toni Kroos. "It was a game we could have won 7-1 or something like that, but in the end it's three points, that's the important thing.

"The idea is to qualify as soon as possible, we've got all the points we can, it's not possible to do better. We want to win next week too (against Shakhtar) and seal qualification."

Karim Benzema led the line again on his second match back after injury and although he was still rusty, it didn't matter on a mostly comfortable evening.

Rodrygo broke the deadlock with a low effort from outside the area, curled home after 13 minutes. He was not punished for a loose first touch as the ball bounced back to him and stroked it past Trubin.

Benzema, sniffing around for a goal to ignite his season, fired in a low effort which Trubin parried, as Madrid pinned the visitors back.

Vinicius, who left two Shakhtar defenders for dead by scooping the ball through the gap between