You can lose El Clásico, but you must never walk away. Real Madrid is looking for a way out of the crisis

COMMENTARY – Real Madrid put in one of their worst performances of the season and virtually handed the Spanish Super Cup trophy to Barcelona. The loss will be understood by fans, but the El Clásico that was missed must never be conceded.

In the last El Clásico, Real Madrid clearly had the upper hand. Of the last 10 matches, Barcelona have won six, Barcelona have won four, and one match has ended in a draw. It was even more pronounced in the last 5 matches, when Real Madrid dominated four duels, Barcelona only one.

For this reason, one can understand that you cannot beat a rival every time and once in a while a loss can come. But never in this way. In duels against a hated rival, you have to leave everything on the pitch and fight like hell, but that’s not what happened from the Real players.

What does it matter that this is not a prestigious Super Cup played in Saudi Arabia. A trophy is simply a trophy and a match with Barcelona must never be walked away from.

Professor’s performance

But Real Madrid gave an absolutely professorial performance. The players didn’t even seem to care about the result, the pressing was non-existent, there was no fight, the players were losing fights and comebacks, not to mention those.

The whole defence was a complete failure, Dani Carvajal seemed to have his head somewhere else, Militao, Rüdiger and Mendy were also completely off. Luka Modric was practically nowhere to be seen, even Valverde didn’t put in his traditional performance. The only player who could bear some measure was Courtois despite the 3 goals he got, that’s saying something.

Attitude has been a huge problem for Real lately. Players are playing at half throttle after returning from the WC, they can’t bring themselves to work.

Los Blancos worked hard to win against Valladolid and managed to score towards the end, then they clawed their way to a 1:0 win against a team from the fourth league, then came a 1:2 defeat to Villarreal after a very poor performance. In the Super Cup semi-final against Valencia, they had to help themselves to penalties and the final was a shock.

Crisis

All in all, 5 bad performances, 2 defeats and a lot of fears and doubts. What a difference from the start of the season when Real were pulling off a run of 11 wins in a row and breaking club records.

Even individual performances have dropped extremely. Vinícius is a shadow of the player from the autumn, where he accumulated a record of 10+4. After returning from the World Championship, he has neither a goal nor an assist in four games. Even Benzema is not in Ballon d’Or form after his injury, the same can be said about Valverde, Kroos or Modric.

And the defenders, that’s a chapter in itself. Add to that the injuries to David Alaba and Aurélien Tchouaméni, and we can safely say that Real Madrid are in crisis. Carlo Ancelotti must find a way to re-motivate the players and get them back to their former form, otherwise the season could end in a fiasco.

On the other hand, we also need to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Real Madrid is such a specific club that even if it often does not play well, it can manage the matches of the season. Just think of last year’s Champions League.

Real were very poor in the first 8th round against PSG and were ripe for 5 goals, but eventually advanced thanks to a 17 minute miracle from Benzema. In the rematch with Chelsea, they were asking for another drubbing, but somehow got through in the end.

In the semi-final with Citizens, he could have easily lost the first leg 1:6, but he won 3:4, and in the return leg he was not very dangerous, but then Rodrygo sent the game to extra time with two goals in stoppage time.

Real under Ancelotti is simply not a club that rolls the opponent and if things were not going well, they would not know how to cope. The White Ballet know how to handle difficult situations and it is this ability that they need to show again.

Source: Real Madrid, La Liga