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Three talking points ahead of Olympiacos vs Real Madrid | UEFA Champions League
Tensions are running high in the Spanish capital as Xabi Alonso, the Real Madrid board, and the dressing room appear to be in a three-way battle for power at the club.
Adding to the tension is the fact that the team are winless in three games with two draws and a defeat across competitions. For Real Madrid’s standards, such a run of form is simply unacceptable.
Tomorrow night, Los Blancos return to action, this time against Olympiacos in the UEFA Champions League as their gruelling away schedule continues. The pressure, needless to say, will be on them as they enter the game as favourites.
Madrid Universal brings you three talking points ahead of Olympiacos vs Real Madrid.
Pressure mounting on Alonso
If Real Madrid’s recent slump in form has made one thing clear, it is that Xabi Alonso is not as internally supported as many expected at the beginning of the season.
Recent days have seen several reports emerge over the doubts beginning to creep in about the new manager’s project, and while these are still early days, the extent of scrutiny is worrying.
For starters, it is rumoured that the board themselves are beginning to question Alonso’s credibility and whether he is the right man for the job. Their concern, however, is only fuelled by the deeper lying root cause which is the rift between the players and the manager.
Alonso seems to have lost the locker room with his methods, and some big names in the squad are said to be against him.
With the pressure mounting on Alonso internally and in terms of results, the manager will hope that the team can pull off a win on the night to help take some pressure off his shoulders.
One man standing
While it will indeed be Alonso’s idea to get three points by hook or by crook tomorrow against Olympiacos, the situation at centre-back does not help him in any way.
Ahead of Real Madrid’s game against Elche at the weekend, the coach had just two fit senior players in the department available for selecation – Dean Huijsen and Raul Asencio.
The former, however, experienced discomfort in the buildup to tomorrow’s game and is ruled out of the game. With Antonio Rudiger, David Alaba, and Eder Militao still out, that leaves Asencio as the only fit available centre-back.
Hence, Alonso finds himself in a fix as he must work out a combination that can fill the void and stay solid enough to propel the team to a win. His options, needless to say, are limited.
Aurelien Tchouameni, who is just returning from injury, is an option to fill in alongside Asencio in central defence. Ferland Mendy is another option, although the manager is unlikely to turn to him given his lack of match fitness.
Shifting someone like Alvaro Carreras to centre-back is a third option. In any case, the defence will be fragile come Wednesday and Alonso must be careful picking his lineup.
No room for error
With nine points in four games, Real Madrid currently sit in seventh place on the UEFA Champions League table and are three points behind leaders Bayern Munich, Arsenal, and Inter Milan.
After all, they have won all their games in the competition this season barring the defeat to Liverpool on the last match-day – a result that set off their poor run of form which they are yet to recover from.
With four more games to go in the league phase, Real Madrid are currently well-placed to finish in the top eight and directly advance to the knockouts. That, however, will change dramatically if they drop points tomorrow.
While a defeat against Olympiacos will not directly threaten Real Madrid’s chances of direct qualification, one must remember that they are yet to play against Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City.
Given the team’s current run of form, a win over the Premier League giants is anything but guaranteed and Real Madrid must thus look to win the three remaining games to stay on the safer side. Tomorrow’s result, therefore, becomes crucial.
For a team in jeopardy both on and off the field, it is easier said than done to win away from home and under pressure, but the men in white have no choice given that future opponents including Benfica and Manchester City pose more serious threats.
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Clean sheet at last, Vinicius’ moment of madness | Three takeaways from Real Madrid 1-0 Villarreal
Real Madrid took all three points against Villarreal on Saturday night to get back on track after the international break, and thus ensured they did not continue sinking after the defeat at the Madrid derby.
Jose Mourinho made some bold decisions in his starting XI as he benched Vinicius Jr., playing Yan Diomande on the left-flank and Arda Guler on the right flank.
The dynamics worked out decently well, and it was eventually the new record signing who scored for the club to hand them the lead and the win.
Compared to performances before the international break, there was an improvement in terms of Real Madrid’s level, but the team are still far off from where they must be to make a strong case to be title contenders.
Madrid Universal brings you three takeaways from Real Madrid 1-0 Villarreal.
The struggle continues
All of Real Madrid’s season so far has been of struggles and difficult wins, and the same theme continued last night as the team returned from the international break.
Los Blancos have failed to look convincing for a long time now, and they did not dominate Villarreal in any capacity last night as well.
Continuing with the same theme of winning by narrow margins and scraping past the finish line, they registered yet another 1-0 win that did not leave anyone convinced.
Yan Diomande’s goal was the only positive takeaway from the night, and even that was made possible only after a narrow offside decision went in their favor. With the firepower they have, struggling to create chances to such an extent seems inexcusable.
With a difficult month ahead, last night’s game did not give fans any reason to believe matters have changed after the international break. At this rate, the coming month could be a bleak one for Los Blancos.
Vinicius’ moment of madness
Of all the events that transpired at the Santiago Bernabeu last night, the most memorable one was the incident involving Vinicius Jr.’s goal, and embarrassingly so.
Having seemingly scored a great goal ten minutes after Diomande’s opener, the Brazilian star was on his way to celebrate the achievement, but what unfolded thereafter was embarrassing.
The VAR found an incident of Vinicius pulling the hair of a Villarreal player for no apparent reason in the build-up to the goal, and at this point there can be no arguments defending the player’s behavior.
As one of the biggest names of one of Europe’s biggest clubs, there has to be a sense of responsibility in one’s role – something Vinicius simply does not seem to have. What he did last night was simply inexcusable.
A lot can be said about VAR’s selective interference, but what cannot be argued is that what Vinicius did last night was a clear red card offense.
He will now miss El Clasico and will serve at least a two-game suspension. Whether that is a boon or a bane for Real Madrid, at this point, remains unknown and only time will tell.
A clean sheet at last
Ahead of last night’s win over Villarreal, Real Madrid had only overseen one clean sheet in eight games across competitions.
In that sense, simply keeping the opposition from scoring last night was an achievement in itself for Los Blancos, and it could not have come at a better time.
Real Madrid entered the game without many of their regular defenders available, especially with Dean Huijsen suspended and Eder Militao and Raul Asencio out through injury.
Ibrahima Konate and Antonio Rudiger, thus, started in central defense on the night and both did phenomenally well for Los Blancos. They were joined by Alvaro Carreras and Trent Alexander-Arnold, both of whom complemented the duo well.
The right-back was a relatively weak link defensively, but Konate and Rudiger were spot-on with their reading of the game to keep the Villarreal attack from scoring. They both did eventually pick up yellow cards, but Villarreal finished the game without a single big chance created.
Finding defensive stability, which is the cornerstone of Mourinho’s project, is massive for the manager, and he will be pleased to have a new working formula.
What happens after Huijsen’s return, however, remains to be seen, as the manager may well like to hand the new duo some more chances to prove their consistency.
