In my history Zidane's Real Madrid is the worst footballing side I've seen

Why don't you care about the record? A Madrid manager is putting himself in the record books and you don't care? It's not worthy of notice by Real Madrid fans?

Would rather win trophies. I would gladly choose winning trophies over breaking records any day of the week.

I remember Carlo's Madrid also broke a record by going on a 21-game winning streak. But they finished the season trophyless and that record didn't matter then.

Totally get you DoC with not caring about these records. It's not boast worthy material in my annual argue with Barca fans at season's end. However, in relation to Zidane, this is incredible. The man has made his 1st official year in top class management and has guided this team to a UCL whilst maintaining an unbeaten run that began all the way in Feb or March.

As a fan of this club and a fan of Zidane himself, it is pause worthy to take note of it and be like "Hey, awesome stuff. Please beat Sevilla though ".

Here are Zidane's stats since taking over (one full season now)

53 games
40 wins
11 draws
2 losses
150 GF (average of 3 per game)
49 GA (conceding 1 per game)

The last time we lost was April 6, 2016 at Wolfsburg.  Our last La Liga loss was on Feb 27, 2016 against Atleti.  In fact, these are the only 2 losses we've had under Zidane period.

Incredible. Honestly an incredible record when you consider how the team was under Rafa and Zidane's previous tenure with Castilla. Hoping we pull off wins against Granada and Sevilla to end the year on a nice note (minus the CWC win which really was not anything to boast about).

it's not incredible to me, incredible would have been winning with a team full of fauberts and gravesen. But instead, and i have said this before, we have a team of super talented players, mostly top 3-5 in their roles and most in their primes.

They meeting expectations, we gathered talents the right way and it paid off. Zidane has managed to not allow ego to get in the way, which is what so very often happens.

If anything what they did under Rafa was sabotage. They did not like him, so they threw a feat to have him booted out.

Disagree, Navas when we got him was about to go and sit on a cosy bench at Bayern, Marcelo we got when he was still a toddler, Varane was playing division 2 football, Carvajal is from our academy, Casemiro was playing for Castilla, Modric was considered a big game flop, Morata is from our academy and so is/was Lucas/Mariano/Mayoral/Jese.

The only ones that came when they were already big were Ronaldo, Bale and Kroos. Benzema, Ramos, Pepe were considered super talented when we got them but that was before we got Mourinho even so they have been with us forever. Isco, Kovacic, James again very talented but they dont even start and some of them barely play. We stuck it out with Benz for 7 years when it was time to move on years ago. If anything ZZ has managed to get everyone playing the best they can. Nacho is playing the best he has in years. ZZ is counting on Llorente to come back next season instead of buying a ready made DM.

It's very disrespectful towards ZZ to only credit the players for our success and not ZZ when he has basically laid the foundation for our current form. We have been without every single one of our starters this season (sometimes a bunch of them all at once) and we have still not lost, if you can't see the work has done and is currently doing then that's on you

I think we can all see that he is not the best tactician but he is evolving in that department. In the last 2 games we have been in a losing position he has switched our formation to 352 and we have managed to turn a losing position into a win. As months go by he will no doubt improve even further and have us switch tactics mid game

About the "we only win because the players would run a mile for him" argument I ask you to go back and watch our capitulation under Carlo who they all loved too

There is an aspect of sabotage that could be talked about but I don't wanna take away the credit of Rafa literally losing every piece of the plot. And I wanted him to work out too.

Anyway, we can finish with not a single major trophy so keep in mind that me saying the record is incredible is based on the happenings of the now. That being said, I can't just not give the man real credit for it.

Very right and I also understand where DoC is coming from. Nobody is going to remember some worthless record if we come out empty-handed at the end of this season. But it's nice to see the good work of ZZ being recognised which it only will if he breaks records.

Nobody is going to admit he is doing good things if his team is not breaking records left and right. That's the reality of his situation atm and I understand it, he is a new coach in a very demanding club like Real Madrid with many fans of other teams and media ready to belittle anything he does as soon as we hit a rough patch.

If we win the league we are all going to look back at this record and deem it the reason why we won the league. ZZ has instilled a never say die attitude into our players the sort that will help us in the latter part of the season when our players start getting tired

The one thing he has to improve though is our leaky defence. Casrmiro needs to start playing himself into form asap, he was quite poor in the final. He needs to tell the plsyers to not lose their concentration and intensity as soon as we go 1-0 because we have shown that we can concede the most peculiar of goals. It's fine and dandy fighting back and winning/drawing with last minute goals but why not go for the jugular and just kill of any fightbacks from the opposition team.

I hate using Barca as an example but as soon as they go 1-0 up I switch off the game because I know teams will never come back from that. While us; Dortmund 2-0 uo finished 2-2, Legia 2-0 up finished 3-3, Sporting 1-0 up 2-1 (Sporting had a penalty miss when it was 1-1), Depor 1- 0 up then 1-2 we had to rely on a last min goal to bail us out and even now against Kashima we were 1-0 up but then found ourselves 2-1 down and having to fight back from that. Just too many mistakes our defensive players make currently and we need to cut it out if we want to win the CL this season

So if Zizou is only performing as one would expect...  every manager in Real Madrid's history were abject failures and even more inept than he is since ZZ is breaking club records.  Correct?

halamadrid2 wrote: It's fine and dandy fighting back and winning/drawing with last minute goals but why not go for the jugular and just kill of any fightbacks from the opposition team.

I hate using Barca as an example but as soon as they go 1-0 up I switch off the game because I know teams will never come back from that. While us; Dortmund 2-0 uo finished 2-2, Legia 2-0 up finished 3-3, Sporting 1-0 up 2-1 (Sporting had a penalty miss when it was 1-1), Depor 1- 0 up then 1-2 we had to rely on a last min goal to bail us out and even now against Kashima we were 1-0 up but then found ourselves 2-1 down and having to fight back from that. Just too many mistakes our defensive players make currently and we need to cut it out if we want to win the CL this season

Pretty much this. Beautiful and constructive criticism.

I'm very pleased with the record, but as impressive as it is, it'll be worthless if we end up empty-handed. That's why I don't place too much emphasis on records, and value trophies above everything else.

Most people no longer remember our 22-game winning streak, but they sure as hell remember who's the 11-time European champion.

Hala hit the nail on the head with his criticism of Z's Madrid. My criticism stems mainly from the fact that we have a hard time killing off teams and are usually coerced into relying on a last minute goal to bail us out, and this regardless of the opposition's caliber. This is a problem, and it needs to be dealt with sooner rather than later. We need to become ruthless. Once we go 1-0 up, we need to continue pushing and scoring until the opponent is psychologically demolished.

We criticize Z, not because we want to, but because we have to. We're extremely grateful to everything he's done so far, but there are certain things that he needs to take care of so we can rely less on luck and more on our strength. If we want to have a chance of winning the CL, we need to stop winning games in the dying minutes.

@Hala, You can't spend half your post telling me the success story and development we saw with each of our players pre Zidane (over 4+ years), then attempt to credit him for them being in their primes. It doesnt work like that.

In my opinion, Here are the core players that make up our team:
- CR7: in madrid since 03 and he has been great since he arrived. he is in the back side of his prime but still top 2 players in the world. He did not need Zidane to be good.
- Bale: built himself at spurs, then came to madrid and kept up, with up and downs, but an elite player nonetheless. He did not need Zidane to be good.
-Modric: only Mole called him a big game flop, i dont care about what mole thinks, he was great at spurs, and he continued being great since what, 06? he did not take long to adapt to madrid He did not need Zidane to be good.
-Kroos: played the last world cup and looked like  the best midfielder in the world. He made his own name before arriving in Madrid when he was ripping shit up in Germany. He did not need Zidane to be good.
-Ramos: With his faults, he is still a top defender, and a big big moment player. he won CLs and NT tourneys with his country, just a world cup and a few euros, no biggy. He did not need Zidane to be good.
-Pepe: another one, with his fault but elite defender with a proven track. He did not need Zidane to be good.
-Benzema: another one as you described has been through the grind for a long time, he established who he is as an elite forward. he did not need zidane to be good.
-Marcelo: While he is not the most balanced fullback in europe, he is by far the most dominant in offense. Overall he is a great fullback, and i dont think maybe will argue otherwise. Again, he built up his level overtime and he did not need ZIdane to be good.

These are bonafide world class players who are super elite in their positions and established themselves throughout a lengthy career. They have a proven track record and they are not as good as they are because of Zidane is sweet talking them.

All the other players that you mentioned, from Nacho to Morata, Lucas etc... are peripheral players that are helping our core. They are not the key figures around which this club is currently built. We have had other peripheral players overtime like Callejon, Albiol, Sahin, and others that i forget.

I do not purposely seek to disrespect or belittle Zidane and the work he has done here. I am just trying to remind people of facts they seem to want to forget because we are winning NOW, and the culture of the now has become awfully prevalent in football.

I also would like to remind you that most of this group of core players has won a champions league in 2014 with Ancelotti, experience which is invaluable, and gives more explanation to the success we have now than to simply say "Zidane is awesome".

If we want to go back in time, we can root the success this team is having to the first year of Mourinho. The core was different then, but almost all of the names i listed up there were already present. It has has evolved but the quality of the core has improved as well. They built up massive experience overtime and they are leveraging it all now bag trophies.

Now Zidane is almost the dream man manager for these players, it's his talent. He is taking advantage of it and turning all of this massive talent and experience he has in hands into trophies. He wasn't first in this run/era but he is doing it at a rate we had not seen before.

Congratulations to him it's impressive in itself. But He is not achieving it because he is drawing some kind of unseen level or unseen quality out of these players. That's my point. Our guys are ripe with experience and talent, and they have the exact type of management they are are most in tune with.

Again, i am not trying to belittle Zidane, simply to put him in context. Because if he had taken this team like Mourinho did and achieved the same results, then i would be singing a different tune.

I disagree.  He is forcing all our players... and I mean the entire squad... to play up to the needed level.  Most every manager I've seen at Real Madrid has catered and entirely focused their attention on the starting 11/star players.

That's why he's breaking records.  

When you have the entire squad playing at a high level, injuries... even numerous ones...  get absorbed.  You get results with key players out.

He's also implemented a style/system where everyone needs to fulfill a clear role.  You may not like the style.  But it's important for players to know their roles.  Managers get into trouble when players aren't sure about what they're supposed to do.

The fighting spirit he's instilled in our players and the belief is unbelievable.

Finally, he's the only manager I have seen at Madrid that is the uncontested boss in the locker room, the media and with the club president.  There is absolutely no doubt who is in charge.  He's achieved that by gaining the respect of his star players, squad players, fans, reporters and the executives.

I don't see how you can ask more of him.

You forgto players. It's the little things that makes the difference. An opportunity infront of goal or a tackle the saves us or a headed gaol at 90th min that win us the trophy.

You did belittle Zidane effort, by hiding the players that filled the gaps when our starters were injured or out of form.

Mou, benetz and especially ancelloti failed cuz they didn't trust thr squad players and when the injures and fatigue came we lost the league. Ancello ti, mou didnt trust casimero and benetz didn't like anyone and when our midfield was in shambles they didn't had cas and kova to bail them out.

Zidane dI'd develop kova, he did trust cas and nacho and vascuez and morata and isco and assenio, and even marino against the likes of barca and almost made the difference, infact it did.

Again, it's the little things, if ur team is not motivated it's useless, just ask benetz but there are different types of motivations, there is mou type whixh is to become a solder and win the war for me. and there is anchellotI type which is be a deseplind and a hero. Zidane Brough them both, work hard, never give up and be a hero to all.

People talk about tactics. So far he perfected both 433 and 442 in terms desipline and defence. He had a couple of draws due to no attacking plan and pass less and movement less game plan but every recent games we see that is being fixed and there is passing and movement.

He made the team invlouranble to injures of its top players, including Ronaldo, benzema, bale, modric, casimero, kroso, pepe, ramso which practicaly our whole team. That's how strong he made our team.

These little things makes him a huge coachING talent and those little things made us the strongest team in the world.

Thesend little things in reliaty a huge difference and u guys just don't appreciate him, perhaps u would rather have mou or benetz or anchellloti or some unproven dude.

Sorry for spelling mistakes. Writing this from my phone.

sportsczy wrote:I disagree.  He is forcing all our players... and I mean the entire squad... to play up to the needed level.  Most every manager I've seen at Real Madrid has catered and entirely focused their attention on the starting 11/star players.

And Carlo also broke records with Bale injured and CR out, he brought in players off the bench and did the very same thing.

So again, It's nothing we have not seen before, from this very same group.

He is breaking record yes because he is doing some very good man management (excellent even), but he also is working with a world class team that has won before and done it before.

For the rest about the system and what not, he did not invent anything, i wont even waste time arguing this...

I am not asking anything of Zidane, i appreciate the level of man management he is bringing to the team, he does have complete mastery of his surroundings. Yet at the same time i am critical of him because he is not exactly breaking records here with a team we have never seen break record before, or beat barca, or win a champions league... This very same group did it two years ago.

If Zidane was coaching 2011 Madrid and destroying teams in the same way, my tune would be very different. but no, 2016 RM squad is top 3, if not the best squad in football if we are being objective.

Minus the invulnerable to injuries line which is hilarious, Mag with an actual non-extravagant, pretty docile post which actually has some actual nice points. Well done I guess.

Nick, you are missing somthing when you call the "rest" fringe players. The difference between Zidane and Carlo or Mourinho is he uses his the entire squad. Everyone of them except Coentrao have contributed and Zidane has instilled confidence in them and it shows. Several of them especially Carvajal, Casemiro, Varane, Isco, Morata, Lucas are much more than fringe. Sure some of them as you pointed out the other day with Lucas are average talent, but they do contribute. With Carlo and Mourinho none of that happened beyond the 12 or 13 chosen. You may call that man management as opposed to good coaching!

However, you have to agree thst his tactics have been improving as well as his basic coaching skills. Hell, last month Zidane said basically the same things as you. That winning now means nothing if you don't finish up the season on a winning note. He said he was a rookie coach and wanted to continue to improve.

The guys here may be over emphase his coaching skills, but you have to agree his man management is outstanding, probably the best we have ever seen and the rest of his coaching pedigree is still developing.

You and DoC are right to say let's make the judgement call at end of season.

@Nick, again I disagree. The main reason we went on our crusade last season was because Zidane TRUSTED inexperienced Casemiro to play that DM role and relieve Kroos of his defensive shackles. In turn Kroos is playing his best football he has in years. The best thing to happen to Bale was Zidane. Under Carlo he was asked to run up the wing and put crosses in like a one tricky pony. Benitez wanted him to play AM and be given a free role. Under Zidane he was asked to play as an inverted RW who would drop down into the midfield and participate in build ups. As a result he too is playing the best football he has in years.

When Modric got injured under Carlo we couldn't win to save our lives. If it was as easy as just sitting on the bench like an ornament and letting the talented players do the winning by themselves why couldn't we win then? When we were without Modric this season we barely noticed it. When we were missing Ronaldo we barely noticed it and now without Bale we are barely noticing it.

Benitez the "superior" tactician wanted Isco to be a RW and score more. He wanted to teach record breaking Ronaldo how to score by showing him videos of other inferior players scoring. His idea to get the best out of Bale was to give him a free role in the center of the pitch like there werent about 10 better alternatives for the AM spot already in the team. No it wasn't the players failing him it was just the fact he was a shit coach. He tried to make us into a Newcastle. He was waaaay out of his depth

Carlo again "just a nice coach" but superior to rookie Zidane took 6 months to find the best formation and combination. Zidane took ONE loss to sort the line up out. Carlos record against our rivals was atrocious. I think the only points we picked up were against Barca away. This season we're umbeaten against all of them. We had more seasoned players then like assist master ADM, DLP master Xabi, WC goat James compared to this season were we are relying on average player Casemiro, average player Lucas, rookie boy Mariano

I can't believe you're still continuing to argue such an imcredible logical fallacy ffs

I wonder who you'll credit next summer when ZZ boots out benefit cheats like Coentrao, Danilo etc and promotes/recalls average players like Archaf and Llorente to the first team. Will probably credit the board for being nice enough to call them back excellent work while poor ZZ will be told to go to holiday. I mean he is just the face right. A guy who is just respected by the entire team, 99% of the fans, the board, is a former player (legend) and is unbeaten has absolutely no influence on the players....right

Mr Nick09 wrote:

sportsczy wrote:I disagree.  He is forcing all our players... and I mean the entire squad... to play up to the needed level.  Most every manager I've seen at Real Madrid has catered and entirely focused their attention on the starting 11/star players.

And Carlo also broke records with Bale injured and CR out, he brought in players off the bench and did the very same thing.

So again, It's nothing we have not seen before, from this very same group.

He is breaking record yes because he is doing some very good man management (excellent even), but he also is working with a world class team that has won before and done it before.

For the rest about the system and what not, he did not invent anything, i wont even waste time arguing this...

I am not asking anything of Zidane, i appreciate the level of man management he is bringing to the team, he does have complete mastery of his surroundings. Yet at the same time i am critical of him because he is not exactly breaking records here with a team we have never seen break record before, or beat barca, or win a champions league... This very same group did it two years ago.

If Zidane was coaching 2011 Madrid and destroying teams in the same way, my tune would be very different. but no, 2016 RM squad is top 3, if not the best squad in football if we are being objective.

maybe it's just me but his 'excellent man-management skills' has more to do with his name not that he's a some kind of master motivator and psychologist.

to me, Z, whom i like personally because he seems like a nice, hardworking fella, looks a bit clueless on the bench when things don't turn out as planned.

There are plenty of times where things haven't turned out as planned and ZZ has made the necessary changes to turn the results on its head. Against Depor he took out Danilo, put on Marcelo and switched our backline to a 352 to give Marcelo more freedom. Against Roma last season we were finding it hard to break their defence because we were too narrow, he changed the outcome by putting an out and out winger in to get some crosses into the box. Against Barca last season he took out Benz and put on Jese because we needed speed again that resulted in a win.

He isn't afraid to sub out Bale, Benz, Modric, Kroos if he needs to change things up at all. He will continue to improve his tactical expertise if he continues to change things up the way he wants it when he wants it

Some of his subs are weird but normally at least one of the subs ends up being influential in a turn around

Some of those wierd subs are simply giving the "fringe" players playing time. That's how he builds up their confidence. It's called man management. It applies to entire squad not just the starters!!

I dont know why you are trying to turn this into a Zidane vs Benitez vs Carlo conversation when it's not the point of this discussion.

My argument as to say that Zidane is showing remarkable man management skills with this team, regardless of the reason, it doesnt matter, i can only commend him for what he is doing.

In terms of tactics, i have seen nothing impressive, and sorry but throwing attacking subs off the bench to overturn a poor result late in the game is not exactly blowing me away. More interesting to discuss why this team is having such a hard time killing off games and taking unnecessary goals forcing us to scramble for a result.

In terms of his results, however impressive they are, i simply said that the success he is having is also mitigated by the level of the team he is coaching. THis group, although it has evolved has been through the grind since 2013, this is the CR Era. The grind started with Mou and continues up to today. Zidane is not taking over some blank project, he is taking over a club with multiple world champions, euro winners who just won the Champions league two year ago.

I praise his work and his records, we are genuinely in good health, but this team is fulfilling a potential we saw them reach before, i.e. win records under Carlo, winning the champions league under Carlo as well, hopefully we will see them win the league as they did under Mou.

and @bill, i said about 10x times up there Zidane is showing great man management, i dont know what else you expect that i write. yes he is managing the whole squad very very well, but he is also coaching superior talents that more often than not get the job done.

Zidane has won more trophies than he has lost games.

So breaking records is just what this team is "supposed to do".

No it's not, and to a large extent "breaking records" is anecdotal without the main trophies i.e. la liga and CL (again carlo broke win records yet still missed out on the big trophies).

But being great is what this team is supposed to be, due the level of the players we have assembled. Now great "coaching" can put all the talent together, which is what zidane, through his man management skill, is achieving. But he is not breaking record with Getafe here, come on now, as a matter of fact, this very team broke records and won a CL here before Zidane arrived. I love how you guys all conveniently forget that we won the CL in 2014, it's cute, i get it though, it's easier to make zidane look like he replaced vandelei luxemburgo and is making of champions about of players like faubert or what not.

Can't wait till we sack Zidane and make George Osborne our coach now that he is out of a job and all. It ain't going to make a difference thankfully, we are still going to win because we have recruited well. No manager in the world can screw that up.