• Chronicle: Di María and Tuchel sweep Madrid
  • Reactions.Zidane, very critical: "We lacked everything"

The building of the new Real Madrid offices in Valdebebas could pass through the headquarters of a technology multinational or a large banking entity. Open spaces, natural light, avant-garde design, warm colors, a garden that overlooks the football fields of the Sports City ... The difference is that the company's whip does not depend on the success of the latest mobile model launched, but from the football game last night. Soccer, that is, feet, heads, lungs, spirits, a rival who wants to hurt you and an unpredictable and capricious ball.

The company yesterday morning continued with its management routines, but the Parisian 3-0 at the premiere of the Champions ached in the brand new heart of the white club. Bad result, poor feelings and pessimistic overall prognosis. Zinedine Zidane , the legendary coach, has not yet managed to reactivate the team, after a few months of landing last season, a strange summer and a shaky start to the course, both in the League and in Europe. He and his superiors insist on highlighting the value of the squad, among names loaded with awards and young people with good looks, but the truth is that Real Madrid continues to give off a worrying air even 300 million euros in signings later.

The dressing room and the high command of the club look towards the technician, overwhelmed in Paris by the approach of his colleague Tuchel , who is not to discover the tactical penicillin with his approach. He analyzed the weakest line of his rival and there he accumulated the ships. In the absence of offensive stars, he sought the victory dominating the wide area, the same place that Zidane used to sign his best nights with Madrid in his first stage on the bench. Cristiano scored, but the authority was Casemiro, Kroos, Modric or Isco , for reciting the quartet that led the core in the successful 2016/17 campaign (Champions and League).

The four are still in the locker room, but with more years and kilometers, being two of them, the Spanish and the Croatian, now injured. Their losses and the movements (or not movements) of the market have left the center of the Real Madrid field very depleted. In just 12 months, three substitutes left who, with more or less brilliance, gave their revenues to the team: Kovacic, Ceballos and Llorente .

The first, on the edge of depression (he argued), wanted to play more, and the two Spaniards did not have the approval of Zidane, who thought to replace them with an exhausted name of using it so much in vain in recent months, Paul Pogba. The coach was enrolled in the request of the powerful Manchester player, confident that his countryman's interest in coming to Madrid and Florentino Pérez's persuasion with the English team would make the signing possible.

Bettoni's influence

However, in Old Trafford they did not even get on the phone, slipping away crazy purchase figures (200 million). The operation did not go beyond media noise, while the club looked for alternatives. It was obvious that the engine room needed reinforcements. Hence the negotiation with Ajax by Van de Beek, a young travel flyer for which Zidane showed no interest, leaving his signing signed for next season. The French chose, not to come Pogba , for betting on his usual men for creation, the same with which he built an empire in the Champions League. The titular trio (Casemiro-Modric-Kroos) plus Isco and the Valverde canterano.

They tell Valdebebas that in this decision, as in most of the last ones taken by ZZ (the recovered faith in James and Bale, for example), the opinion of his assistant, David Bettoni, has gained a lot of weight. team management in the second stage of Marseille. A promotion that looks strangely in the locker room. In Paris, Madrid broke down through the center, as Zidane himself criticized: “We lacked intensity. We have lost duels in each divided ball ». Kroos and Casemiro were overwhelmed by the push of the PSG. "All the rivals are going to do it to us," they predicted in the expedition at the end of the match.

Dangerous calendar for Madrid and Zidane

Madrid began in the worst possible way a very demanding stretch of matches. The first duel of the Champions League ended in ugly defeat, bad appetizer to go next Sunday to the always complicated Pizjuán, where he expects a Sevilla League leader and a rival coach, Julen Lopetegui, eager to show things to his former team. Then the Osasuna arrives at the Bernabéu and four days later, the first derby of the season. The whites will measure their strength with those of Simeone in the Wanda, still remembering the friendly preseason in Washington, that rojiblanca 7-3 win. Zidane needs to shake his team if they do not want to be in trouble in the League and also in the Champions League, where they will have the opportunity to score the first points against Bruges, at home in two weeks. The third day will take you to Istanbul, before the Galatasaray, another rival to defeat so as not to complicate your life. In the League, October will end with the Classic in Barcelona, ​​a destination that ended Lopetegui. ZZ hopes not to repeat the same path.

UPCOMING MATCHES

League : Seville (Sunday), Osasuna (September 25), Atlético (September 28), Granada (October 5), Mallorca (October 19), Barcelona (October 27).

Champions: Bruges (October 1, Santiago Bernabéu), Galatasaray (October 22, Istanbul).

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

  • Real Madrid
  • Zinedine Zidane
  • Paris
  • Isco Alarcón
  • Luka modric
  • Gareth Bale
  • Europe
  • sports

LaLiga SantanderZidane: "I don't know why we have so many injuries. I trust my people"

LaLiga Santander Return to the past: Zidane placed the same attack as Ancelotti five years ago

LaLigaModric: efforts with Croatia and pain in Madrid