Madrid Derby 18/19 - home

Doc wrote:

sportsczy wrote:Godin looks about done to me... which is good news lol. Problem is, they have great young CBs.

I would honestly trade Ramos and an obscene amount of cash for either Giminez or Lucas.

Why not just cut Ramos? No one wants him.

What I wouldn't do for one of Lucas or Gimenez...

I don't think we even had a ton of really dangerous moments... remember Bale, Carvajal and Asensio.  Other than that, saw a lot of open guys that were ignored by slow and bad decision-making.

Edit: Casemiro had good chances. But he airmailed them so bad that I don't think they count lol.

If Bale is also injured, I really hope we start Mariano... i cringe at playing a diamond 442 with Asensio and Benz as the strikers.

Ceballos should be a mainstay for one of the attackers. As soon as he came on we were winning balls in the attacking half and played in Atleti's half pretty much all half. I just don't understand why Lope has him play LM, like seriously you'd want players like him and Isco in the middle doing their stuff. But i understand if Lope feels we have no winger who can take players on so he sticks Ceballos or Isco there knowing they'll try.

Well tbf Ceballos has always been a winger, so he can be used a lot of places when needed. Another reason why I was confused about him not being played last season when we needed width.

Also it felt so nice not worrying about the left side for ONCE this season. Wish Nacho could've played there midwssk

Benz without a single shot on target the past 5 games. FML

BTW was Marcelo dropped due to injury or because of his unbelievably bad performance last week?

I hope it was the latter because he needs someone to light a fire under his ass and make him understand that he's not untouchable.

The Demon of Carthage wrote:BTW was Marcelo dropped due to injury or because of his unbelievably bad performance last week?

I hope it was the latter because he needs someone to light a fire under his ass and make him understand that he's not untouchable.

Injury

Lovely.

The Demon of Carthage wrote:Lovely.

Everything going according to plan

On a positive note Courtois was great, could've been down 2-0 in the first half if not for him and Ceballos was great as well.
Also seems like Carvajal is back to his usual self this season, can't help but think it's due to Odriozola.
Modric has been really lackluster this season, not sure if it's because of fatigue, decline or him being uninspired due to his Inter move failing.

halamadrid2 wrote:Benz without a single shot on target the past 5 games. FML

He looked more likely to score an own goal than one for Madrid with those corner clearances

This is where lopetegui's coaching really comes into play. Not the tactics, not the fancy formations, but how does he get the squad's confidence back on, whilst at the same time making tough decisions regarding senior players.

Even today i still had concerns about our defense. That's ramos' department, how does lope address that? Marcelo's hurt, he was poor before getting hurt and he is the vice captain. Thats another question for lope

If he wants to hold the ball and high press to win back quickly, its something the senior players have to buy into. If we are forgetting simple stuff like maintaining our lines on defense, i dont know how the snr players can buy into more exhaustive styles. I'm not even going to address our attack at this point...they are probably waiting for the next clash of titans with almighty getafe.

Not to take advantage of these barca slip ups worries me. All we needed was 1 bloody goal.

the case for club legends like Ramos or Marcelo is special. I dont think Lopetegui can do much about it unless the club sign quality players to make them compete, and start rotating. It can't be a coach decision to start benching those guys, or at least, he needs the club backing.

If not, he is going to continue trusting them to perform as they have in past years. When you have players like that who have won everything, multiple times, you trust them.

he doesn't have to bench them, that's where the tact comes in. it will be interesting how he handles this, because, frankly all our captains haven't played well in the last two or three games. how he can get them fired up will be interesting to see, or will he make an example out of one of them? and how will his decision translates to the rest of the squad? the cska moskow game will be a big assist for him (i believe we should route them), but its a long season and such decisions will be a bigger headache for him than what style he wants his team to play

Carvajal wrote:Each team play however they want, but when a team wasted time from the first minute and is happy with a draw then it is hard to win.

I will sign up for not winning against them in the Bernabeu ever and to keep winning titles.

Carvajal is becoming a true savage

It's not about benching Ramos and Marcelo... it's about motivating them to do certain things. Not sure Lope has the clout for that. We had the same trouble last season.

Just to keep track
- we started with 6 wins 2 losses and 2 draws last season.
- we're at 4 wins, 1 loss and 2 draws this season.

Difference is Barca was invincible in La Liga last season to start.

The Demon of Carthage wrote:

Carvajal wrote:Each team play however they want, but when a team wasted time from the first minute and is happy with a draw then it is hard to win.

I will sign up for not winning against them in the Bernabeu ever and to keep winning titles.

Carvajal is becoming a true savage

And it's kind of nonsense too.  The Euro, WC and CL winners are all teams that played pragmatic football.  That's not going to change unless someone breaks them down.

We won CL by being very pragmatic for 3 straight years. We attacked only when we clearly got the upper hand.... but always cautiously.

for what it is worth, Ramos was good yesterday, a lot better than he was vs Sevilla.

Also, Marcelo abandoning him in no man's land is not commented enough. A lot of his positional errors are born from him having to cover marcelo on every play.

Marcelo is a huge defensive liability but we have made it work over the past years. He also starts the season slow so hopefully his own performances are going to start picking up. I think the club is responsible to sign a big name LB, like in the time of Coentrao, to make him work hard for the job again. If that comes from Reguilon whom we havent seen so far, then fine, but he needs it

Ramos was good compared to what he was. Positionally, he was very poor in terms of keeping a line. But without Marcelo to worry about, Casemiro was able to drop back into the areas that Ramos left vacant.

Atleti's style is good for us. They're not looking to gain control of the midfield and pressure. They want to counter. Simplifies things a lot for a defense. Opportunity for error is far less since you're facing far fewer chances against you.

sportsczy wrote:
Just to keep track
-  we started with 6 wins 2 losses and 2 draws last season.
-  we're at 4 wins, 1 loss and 2 draws this season.

Difference is Barca was invincible in La Liga last season to start.

Let's talk about this for a second because I think what you wrote is inaccurate as it stems from an unfair comparison.

Since you chose the first 10 games to base your assessment on, I took the liberty to do a little checking. Let's look at the teams Zidane played against in his first 10 league games last season:

1.  Deportivo La Coruña   ( W )
2.  Valencia CF                ( D )
3.  Levante UD                ( D )
4.  Real Sociedad            ( W )
5.  Real Betis                  ( L )  (with Ronaldo)
6.  CD Alavés                  ( W )  (with Ronaldo)
7.  Espanyol                    ( W ) (with Ronaldo)
8.  Getafe CF                   ( W ) (with Ronaldo)
9.  SD Eibar                     ( W )  (with Ronaldo)
10. Girona FC                   ( L )  (with Ronaldo)

10 games, 6 wins, 2 draws and two losses.10 points dropped in total

Now, let's take a look at the quality of the teams he played against. Of those ten teams, only Valencia and Sociedad are considered tough. And here's the best part, he had Ronaldo for six of those games and a stronger bench.

You're comparing that to Lopetegui who so far has had to play Bilbao (away), Sevilla (away) and Atlético at home,  without Ronaldo and with a much weaker bench?

And here's a little extra something for you:

Lopetegui has played 7 games so far. Out of 21 possible points, he has won 17, which means he has dropped only four. Four points dropped with a much weaker attack and a much weaker bench.

Zidane in his first seven games, and even though he had a better attack and a better bench and a much weaker opposition, only managed to take home 14 points, which means he dropped 7 in the process.

So even  if you ignored the quality of the teams and the fact that he had a better attack (which you shouldn't because that would make the comparison unfair) he still loses out to Lopetegui.

And you shouldn't compare the two anyway because Lopetegui has been forced to work with a weaker team overall and lost the player that was the cornerstone of Zidane's success. So your comparison is logically unsound from the jump.

This is why I'm still a little lenient with him by the way because it would be unfair to blame him for not winning with Benzema and Asensio.

Who have we beaten exactly to date?  As far as I can tell, we're 0 wins, 3 losses and 1 draw against decent opponents.  Are you saying Zidane wasn't a big match manager??  That's an argument that I will absolutely crush you in...

And we won the spanish supercup over Barca and the UEFA supercup over Man U.

And do you not remember what a pile of shit CR was to start the season?  I think he was sitting on 5 La Liga goals come January.

BBC were literally all a no show until January and only CR had a respectable season by the end of it. Ramos, Marcelo, Carvajal, Modric, Casemiro and Kroos forgot the season started. etc.

My point is we're no better than last season. We're the same. The only bright spots for me are Ceballos, Odriozola, Mariano and maybe Vinicius.

You're shifting the argument now which (again) is an unfair thing to do. You started by saying that Lopetegui wasn't better than Zidane. I gave you stats and facts to prove you otherwise.

You completely ignored that and started talking about something completely different and unrelated. But since you went there, I'll play:

So far Lopetegui hasn't beaten a single big team. You know who else didn't? Zidane in his first seven games. The big teams he had played against at the time were Valencia which ended in a draw and Sociedad which ended in a win. So you'll have to wait and see how will Lopetegui do at the Anoeta (and please don't forget, without Ronaldo).

Now, let's see the big teams both played against so far. That's Atlético at home and Sevilla away. They both drew Atlético at home and lost to Sevilla away. So again, you're coming a little bit short.

Lopetegui has accumulated more points than Zidane in his first 7 games. That literally means we're better off than last season. I don't know why you keep on flagging a dead horse here. Zidane loses to Lopetegui in pretty much every single department even though the Spaniard is working with a weaker team.

He beat Barca in the supercup handily...  when Barca was actually gunning for us.  Destroyed them.  We also beat Man U in the UEFA supercup. That was a great start...  and a false hope.  We thought Asensio was the next coming and never bought anyone.  Our downfall.

I read your post.

We didn't have a better attack.  Ronaldo was out to lunch until January.  Again, he had 5 goals come January in La Liga.  Bale was injured and Benzema was even worse.

Your whole post is inaccurate.