FC Barcelona vs Real Madrid

As soon as benzema came off, we played much better. Not a coincidence

halamadrid2 wrote:God how much i despise him. Can ZZ put Mariano on already. Sick and tired of seeing him dragg his arse around like it weighs a ton

Yea, his style of play is so nonchalant. He doesnt seem to put his all into it.

Very annoying game from benzema.

Zidane took too long to sub him.

Our confidence level went down unbelievably after Suarez goal. Extremely bad game from Ronaldo and Benzema. I really think both of their time is up. We seriously need to train our players to keep the head when we are down. Marcelo was a disgrace.

Over all apart from Modric everyone flopped.

Benzema hands down the worst player on the pitch.

Wasn't really surprised. The second I saw Benzema among the starters, I knew we were going to either draw or lose.

Z has only himself to blame here. A draw is not the end of the world, especially with our 6-point cushion, but we might've gotten more hadn't Z had a tactical brainfart. oh well

some of our players were absolutely terrible, i'm sure we know who they are....but at this point i think i have to exonerate ramos from the title of blockhead. talk about being clutch. i hope he gets more clutch on defense as well. but certain players need to start looking in the mirror, and management needs to assessing those players' situation at this club

How about the tactics though? When only one player had a good game out of eleven then the tactics are wrong. It took Zidane so long to sub.

Benzema is so gonna get booed in the next home game. The Bernabeu would not be forgetting this performance. Ronaldo also had a stinker of massive proportions. Why exactly did Zidane take so long to make those necessary switches is a real mystery.

I ain't afraid to call no name, Benzema absolutely needs to get his shit together now and James just taking up wage space. A noob in Mariano got a sweat in a Clasico over him.

Anyway, not happy we let them get the better of us in the midfield at all but I am glad we got the point. On to the next one...which is Dortmund.

no matter if you get tactics from heaven, its not going to save some of these players based on what i'm seeing. its why i wasn't as confident as many of you going into this game. the transfer ban came at an absolutely terrible time

Every chance fell to Ronaldo. He might have been bad on the ball but every single good chance we had was due to him. Imagine him having to carry his striking partner for 7 long years. At some point it starts to weigh you down. Nobody has ever mentioned Messi flopping for like 4 straight Clasicos. In fact that's quickly forgotten after a nice hattrick against Arsenal or City or PSG. Ronaldo played as good as could be expected next to a waste of space. All I know is with Casemiro back we can finally drop him.

You are assuming Benzema would be dropped there Hala. Casemiro would probably replace Kovacic.

@hala, you'll probably see a unicorn before zidane drops benzema. he has been his biggest supporter (nothing wrong with that) since we signed him at madrid in 09/10. i did not want him dropped for this game though, he's had a good record against them so i expected more, but alas

We got a draw at Camp Nou and people are upset...

I don't really find fault with anyone, other than Benz and Zidane (for starting him and then not subbing him out earlier).

However I found the game very evenly matched and the result is fair and just.

I found the constant dribble re ref ridiculous, particularly the two obvious fouls by Mascherano that should have resulted in penalty shots. It's real ironic all this ref corruption by Harmonica and others when these two calls plus the perfectly legal goal by Juanmi denied last weekend are perfect examples of corruption or incompetence in favor of Barcelona.

Doubt it was with the draw but more with certain players performance people are upset with though it was just Benzema I honestly was upset with today.

titosantill wrote:@hala, you'll probably see a unicorn before zidane drops benzema. he has been his biggest supporter (nothing wrong with that) since we signed him at madrid in 09/10. i did not want him dropped for this game though, he's had a good record against them so i expected more, but alas

I disagree, it's wrong on so many levels. Benzema should no longer start for Madrid. His laziness is hurting us greatly and we would be way better without him.

The guy must be dropped. Not today. Not tomorrow. NOW.

i meant nothing wrong with him supporting a player, my point there in particular was how he helped benzema in mou's first season, when he was being ostracized, and was working out with him in the off season to better his fitness levels. on the whole, nothing wrong with a manager supporting his player especially if he thinks he can still get the best out of that player in comparison to others....there's a thin line between support and favoritism, i get that, but for now, we still have only one cf (with morata injured). not to mention bale out as well, i don't think zidane wants to field a side primarily with midfielders and cristiano

You're dismissing Mariano too easily Tito. Sure he is only on the squad for emergency, but he played well today and in copa game this week. The team was much much better once he came on today. The first choice should be Ronaldo , then Mariano and finally Benz, based on performances. Just wait until you hear the jeering on Wednesday in Bernabeu!

Mariano brought the energy that was ridiculously needed to trouble the Barca back line that always prefers to pass out the back first. But I would not replace Benzema with him and I appreciated his CDR and brief La Liga appearance.

The talent gap is too huge even if the Frenchman is just in rotten form this season.

lol yes i am dismissing mariano a bit easily. a second leg game against cultural where we won the first leg by five or six goals is different from starting against barcelona or any top league side. mariano will have to work his way up slowly. he can come on as a sub and impress, no doubt. but to suggest that benzema should play third fiddle to mariano is pushing it

i get it, we don't like the way he's been playing. i totally understand that, but come on, let's be serious, you think mariano right now should be ahead of benzema? in a years time, two years time, three, maybe. but right now, i don't think so. he can get some games, but not benz playing second fiddle to him.....and zidane gets to see mariano and all those boys play and train more than we do

Men and their emotions...

lol

I hope he doesn't get in trouble for that.

It's not like we have anything to lose if we played Mariano. Benz has 4 goals this season. And there won't be Bale there anymore to share the goalscoring load with Ronaldo. We won't suddenly start to lose if we start Mariano in fact we continue to win with 10 men and having a striker that gives a damn will allow us to utilise all 11 players on the pitch you know like against Atleti or LaReal

Lol Carvajal. Clos will probably write in his report that he saw the incident and thinks Carvajal should be banned until the end of the season

James at the back probably forced by Ramos to be in the pic

Adit wrote:How about the tactics though? When only one player had a good game out of eleven then the tactics are wrong. It took Zidane so long to sub.

Modric, Kovacic, Isco, Varane, Marcelo and Lucas all had great games imo. If you remember, we dominated the first half, Barca came back in the second and got a goal that should have been disallowed.

We had the chances that could have put this game away early, it's not ZZ's fault we didn't finish our dinner.

sportsczy wrote:We got a draw at Camp Nou and people are upset...

RM fans. I can understand a bit, because we did dominate the first half and could have/ should have put the match away in 45 minutes, however Barca played much better in the second - The result in the end I think is fair even though Suarez was offside.