Kroos' most painful time on the bench Real Madrid Surprisingly left out of the XI

The big surprise in Zinedine Zidane's line-up for Real Madrid's match against Manchester City on Wednesday night was the omission of Toni Kroos, who had to make do with a place on the substitutes' bench.

This was the first time that the German midfielder has been left out of the XI by his coach for a Champions League knockout game since he arrived at Real Madrid in 2014.

Kroos, one of the stars of Los Blancos' three successive Champions League triumphs between 2016 and 2018, has always been one of the first names on the team sheet in Europe.

In 2018, in the return match against Paris Saint-Germain, he was a substitute at the Parc des Princes as he was coming back from an injury, a sprain in his left knee that had occurred two weeks prior and made him a doubt coming into the tie.

Kroos has always been a starter in the decisive stage of the Champions League, having started 28 of the 29 knockout games prior to the City clash on Wednesday, with the exception of the aforementioned match against PSG.

Moreover, in almost all of those games, Kroos has played the full 90 minutes.

The last time that Zidane made a surprising decision regarding the former Bayern Munich man in the Champions League was to bring him off during the final against Atletico Madrid in Milan, with Isco coming on to replace Kroos in the 72nd minute.

This season, except in Bruges where he was rested along with many other starters, Kroos had played every minute in the five group stage matches.

Wednesday night was Kroos' most painful time to be amongst the substitutes at Real Madrid.