In Luka Modric, Loris Karius can find solace

While it might now seem an age away to those who have trundled back Merseyside way, Liverpool began a night that ended in despair firmly in the ascendancy.

Belief poured from the stands with a ferocity matched only by the early intensity of a Reds side that had Madrid, a team so attuned to evenings of such pressure, corralled and on the backfoot.

Such was the effectiveness of the gegenpress, the normally unflappable Toni Kroos slid a pass, intended for Karim Benzema, no more than 10 yards to his left, straight out of play. The blight seeped through the team, with Madrid's play awash with errant passes.

Dani Carvajal, under limited pressure, lofted a rudimentary pass high and wide of Sergio Ramos and out for a corner.

Madrid's forward line were faring little better, as Liverpool harassed, harried and harangued their far more experienced - and fancied - opponents into a first half an hour of discontent.

Yet, amongst this disarray stood a calming, unperturbed influence. Luka Modric, as ever, picked up pockets of space, with the game - even whilst dominated by Liverpool - seemingly slowing, on his whim, to his pace.

Then Mohamed Salah happened. His departure from the game cannot be overstated, Liverpool, shorn of their reference point, relinquished the initiative but managed to get to the interval at parity.

As Madrid began to dominate, Modric's level remained constant: exceptional.

Then the focus shifted once more, this time to Karius, whose error of judgement gifted Benzema an opener.

The Liverpool keeper, in hindsight, inexplicably, tried to set in motion a fast break with the Frenchman fatally close. What happened next will, unfortunately for Karius, go down in the annals of Champions League football.

Yet, Liverpool responded through Sadio Mane, and, buoyed by their own response, went into gegenpressing overdrive, perhaps naively, allowing Modric to pick up pockets of space - that were growing as the Reds tired - to drive Madrid forward.

Almost inevitably, Madrid re-took the lead, this time through the athleticism, ingenuity and guile of Gareth Bale. Jurgen Klopp's men could not fashion a response, and Karius' torrid night was complete when he allowed a speculative Bale effort through his grasp.

Bale, Karius, Salah and Sergio Ramos garnered the headlines but, if measured by game-wide consistent excellence, then the man as responsible as any for Madrid's 13th European Cup was Modric.

And in that Karius - a 24-year-old who was not first choice at the season's start - can draw solace.

For Modric, in an era when judgement is often premature and absolute, is evidence that failings, even those perceived of great magnitude, are not irredeemable.

The Croatian, a four-time European Cup winner, was, upon completion of his first season at the Bernabeu, voted Liga's worst signing. Ignominy among Galacticos in a changing room dominated by hierarchy represented a fairly sizable examination of his character but he certainly emerged a more formidable player.

Of course, the comparison is not linear, Karuis' misfortune was on a far grander scale but the point holds. Modric has proven that ultimately, talent prevails, and, while Karius' talent ceiling might not be as high as the Real Madrid playmaker, Saturday's ongoings are not as terminal as they have been presented.

He has, in his nascent career, already shown remarkable strength of character to emerge from a torrid start at Liverpool to become number one. How he reacts to this setback will dictate the trajectory of his career but in Modric there is a precedent of sorts.