Peter Crouch On Duel With Marcelo In 2011: “I’ve never wanted to punch anyone more in my life!”

In the 2011 Champions League quarter-finals, Tottenham faced Real Madrid. It was a tie that Real ultimately went on to win pretty comfortably against Gareth Bale, Luka Modric and co.

Spurs striker Peter Crouch did not make things easier for his team. In the first leg, he was sent off after 14 minutes due to two terrible tackles on Sergio Ramos and Marcelo respectively. Tottenham went on to lose that first leg 4 - 0.

On the ‘From the Horse’s Mouth’ podcast, Crouch reflected on that red card.

“The first yellow card was me being excitable, so I can give the referee that,” Crouch said.

“For the second one, I went to block a ball down the line from Marcelo and I did dive in a bit, but I didn’t touch him.

“He’s jumped up in the air and rolled around, and there is a camera angle where you can see he looks at the referee and celebrates as the red card comes out, then he jumps back up.

“I’ve never wanted to punch anyone more in my life! For them, that was seen as a win.

“They’ve won the game and they played me. I was naive to let myself get caught up in that.”

Crouch says that he felt the guilt with every goal that Real Madrid scored that day:

“The dressing room is underneath the stadium and there are tiers upon tiers of fans and you can hear them,” he said.

“I’m sat in the dressing room with a towel over my head, hearing goal after goal after goal going in and I’m thinking, ‘That’s down to me’. That was a low point and a big regret.”