 "Zinedine Zidane faces toughest test of his managerial career with Real Madrid seemingly in crisis")
Last weekend, newly-promoted Girona FC faced the mighty Real Madrid — who are the reigning Spanish, continental (twice) and world champions in club football — for a league fixture. It was supposed to be a stroll in the park for Madrid even though their opponents had pushed big teams hard at home. Besides, Real Madrid were already five points off the pace in La Liga; they couldn’t afford to be eight points off their eternal rivals FC Barcelona with only nine rounds played in. What transpired in the Estadi Montilivi must have brought joy to various footballing fans and headline writers. Not Real Madrid football fans though; the home team schooled the defending champions and won the fixture 2-1, which was deep in symbolism. [caption id=“attachment_4191131” align=“alignleft” width=“381”] Real Madrids Sergio Ramos looks dejected after their loss against Girona FC. Reuters[/caption] Earlier this year, investors from the City Football Group (which owns Manchester City and other clubs) and another group led by Pere Guardiola (Pep Guardiola’s brother) acquired the Girona football club. The plucky, underdog team from Catalonia was now getting a result against the “establishment” team in the midst of loud calls for a separate Catalonia. That too, the establishment team being General Francisco Franco’s, who had suppressed the Catalan movement and language. In short, this 2-1 win for Girona had as many sub-plots as a Russian novel. For Real Madrid, the UEFA Champions League fixture against Tottenham Hotspur at Wembley couldn’t come soon enough. Their lead talisman, Cristiano Ronaldo, had struggled to score in La Liga, often cutting a forlorn figure as he missed a succession of chances to increase his goal tally. His illustrious rival, Lionel Messi, had already scored goals by the bagful in the league, establishing a more than handy lead in the Pichichi Trophy race. The Champions League was different though; Real Madrid have owned this competition in three different time periods of footballing history, with the theme music bringing out the best of them. Ronaldo was top-scorer in this year’s edition and had scored five goals. Surely they would put the north Londoners in their place? Unfortunately for Real Madrid, they were given a footballing lesson, with Tottenham winning 3-1. This was the first time Real had lost in the group stage in five years. However, with Borussia Dortmund drawing, Real Madrid’s progress to the latter rounds is not under immediate threat.
Offering his viewpoints after the latest defeat, Ronaldo felt that the departures of James Rodriguez, Alvaro Morata and Pepe had weakened the team. He wasn’t completely wrong in his assessment.
Pepe was a 10-year veteran and a key member of the Los Blancos for the better part of the previous decade; under Carlo Ancelotti, he had cleaned up his act and had worked hard to lose his hotheadedness. Morata and Rodriguez contributed 31 goals to the team’s goal tally last season, often in key moments in the latter part of the campaign. They were crucial to Real Madrid’s rotation strategy last season, and it is telling that a team which scored close to three goals per game in last season’s campaign misfired around Ronaldo’s suspension and Karim Benzema’s absence due to injury. The absence of quality options up front from the bench is telling. Morata has scored a handful goals for Chelsea; even Mariano, who was a hardly featured last season has banged in eight goals after moving on to Lyon. Injuries and loss of form have also swamped Real Madrid with problems. Keylor Navas, Gareth Bale, Raphael Varane, Mateo Kovacic and Dani Carvajal’s absences have affected them to various degrees. The ever reliable Toni Kroos was forced into making several errors by Tottenham; the usually solid Casemiro had a rough night; the midfield lacked cohesion and only Isco managed to absolve himself of blame in the defeat against Spurs. Last season, Real Madrid’s full backs were the envy of Europe — both of them totaling four goals and 29 assists. On Wednesday night, Marcelo — the player who was selected to the FIFA FIFPro World XI for the two seasons running — missed 29 passes against a relentless Spurs, a damning indictment of how he has regressed recently. A greenhorn Achraf Hakimi was deputising on the right flank in Carvajal’s absence. But not all is lost if they can solve the jigsaw. Yet. It is worth noting the position they were in last season. In January, Real Madrid lost away to Sevilla in the La Liga and then lost at home to Celta Vigo in the Copa del Rey — this was their crisis last year. Ronaldo had supposedly lost his touch and had scored only two goals in the Champions League in the group phase. They still somehow found a way to put all of that behind them and won key fixtures (with Ronaldo headlining them), lifting two trophies and creating history at the end of the season. There is no saying what will happen this time around, but all that they need to do is to rewind the clock a few months back to find their inspiration. The club is eight points behind, but they have 28 games to make up that difference. To put this into perspective, Zinedine Zidane was a player with Real Madrid when Rafael Benitez’s Valencia overhauled an eight-point gap with Real Madrid with 12 games to play in 2004; Real Madrid made up eight points in 18 games against Guardiola’s treble-winning Barcelona in 2008-09 between the two El Clasico fixtures (where they were duly spanked). Real Madrid have a good number of fixtures left to recoup the points lost as Barcelona are not the juggernaut of the old. But Madrid can’t afford any slip-ups any longer if they harbour hopes of winning the league again this season. An away trip to Atletico in mid-November and the December classic are must-win fixtures (as are the others). With the next game against a Las Palmas side in freefall which has conceded 25 goals (the most this season), it looks like the ideal game to get some confidence back into the side. Zidane has no time left to rest on his laurels — he needs to find a way to reinvigorate his side and get them back on track. Simply put, he faces the toughest test (yet) of his short managerial career.
