Copa del Rey pursuit

Freeza wrote:

Mr Nick09 wrote:

Doc wrote:
It really is true. Why in the world would Zidane and his coaches think this is a good idea?

He watched Rocky over christmas and thought "hey look, Rocky did a comeback after training all over phily, maybe... "

We beat Leganes in copa so he succeeded technically

Rocky lost

what a prediction

Best result ever.

If he had won the cup, and even though it's a meaningless trophy, Florentino would've kept him.

But with this CDR exit, it has become patently obvious he'll end up trophyless. In other words, his head will roll  at the end of the current season at the most.

well, to quote porky pig "that's all folks"

titosantill wrote:well, to quote porky pig "that's all folks"

Sounds more like you're quoting a Zidane statement regarding transfer ambitions

Th...th...th...at’s all folks!

Listen, Zidane hands are clearly tied when it comes to transfers and he could not get to sign his 5 world class players to fill the bench. We were just unlucky today.

Thimmy wrote:

titosantill wrote:well, to quote porky pig "that's all folks"

Sounds more like you're quoting a Zidane statement regarding transfer ambitions

forget about transfers, they'll come in the summer, just charge this season to the game. that's what loyalty gets you in the business of sports, he was ridiculously loyal to this squad, practically bent over backwards for them, but alas. at least we can be sure uncle flo will open the cheque book now, and scrub back up experiments will be no more

Tito, who are you referred to when you keep mentioning Someone from Osasuna?

I get that some of the backups are not performing, but not all.

I’ll begin with The two promotions, Mayoral and Achraf. Both of these were decisions made by Zidane and neither belong on this team. Actually what it really comes down to is our lack of any scoring forwards, BBC, Mayoral and Lucas. While I won’t call Lucas a scrub, he is limited, a squad player at best, but he only goes once you have replaced the forward line and have competent backups in place.

When I look at defense, I agree re Achraf and Theo as well. Theo came without 1st division experience, probably would have been better to get someone more experienced. But he didn’t come from Osasuna. Casilla is the backup portero, a former Castilla product and had been a competent GK in liga for several years. although he is not WC, he isn’t bad for a backup. Nacho, a Castilla product has had some moments both bad and good, but overall for a 3rd, not bad. Most if us would have preferred Pepe to remain, but.....
Then we have Vallejo, who also does not come from Osasuna, has looked better every time he has played, although that number is very low. But most will agree he’s not a scrub, but definitely needs some time.

So that brings me to midfield ( trying to find your man from Osasuna). Backups are Kovacic, llorente, Ceballos and Asensio. None of them by the way have played for Osasuna. Kovacic is not a scrub, ceballos has been impressive although not used by Zidane for reasons unknown. Asensio is a disapointment this season, but hardly can be called a scrub. So that leaves us with Llorente and yes I agree he has been disappointing.

I know you have never liked Isco, but he also has never been to Osasuna?

So I’m stumped as to who you keep referring to?

Tito is obviously referring to Theo and Llorente's time at Alaves and impressing there. Also a bit with Ceballos' time at Betis who also impressed a bit. From all his posts, he was never a fan of signing young talent that may or may not make it at Madrid since this is not a club for such things. He has a legit point be it harshly written most of the time.

In any case, only Hakimi looks like he really doesn't belong at Madrid. Llorente could get the nod as well but he rarely features and whenever it is, it was in the CDR and that is barely anything to judge a player by.

He did have a shit match though.

It's not even that our bench is terrible, come on now. The first team sucks too, honestly, we're 4th in the league. Not too great.

Even hakimi has had some good games, he's just a kid, he's clearly not ready for top flight football. You think carvajal could've played at 18/19 at Madrid with this shitty team and never made any games.

The real problems we've had, in my opinion are;

1. Cristiano and Benz not scoring. They are probably the two worst strikers I've ever seen in my life. Ronaldo is our version of Rooney with a model body. Benzema has been garbage this season, well I'm sorry, That's an insult to garbage to compare Karim to it.

2. Why isn't Isco getting more criticism? As I've said before, his best position is LW in a 4-5-1 or 4-3-3, or as a F9. He is a horrible CAM, his off the ball and decision making is absolutely shocking for someone as talented as him. He is the biggest ball hog i have ever seen and we have zero creativity with him on the field, forcing us to go wide and cross again and again. He needs to be benched and go back to the basics, I'm a big fan of his and I love his natural ability but he tries way too much.

3. Marcelo went on vacation or something this season. Seriously. You guys talk about Theo and Hakimi being bad defensively, let me tell you something, Marcelo is possibly the worst left back in the world when it comes to defense, and this season hasn't done him any favors

4. Zidane keeps trusting the same players and keeps playing that shitty 4-4-2 diamond. When we play 4-3-3 we throttle teams. Coincidence?

@doc, exactly my point. i just picked on osasuna as a metaphor, i see these guys play as most of us do, the pressure to perform week in and week out in smaller la liga teams is totally different from madrid, that's even if you get the chance to play. a lot of those players i watched at their previous clubs and found them alright, our best policy is to loan them to mid to top table foreign clubs, let them get some experience with regards starting, playing under pressure from media and fans and then bring them back. remember that kid from racing? i forget his name now, we signed in mou's first year, how'd that work out? or pedro leon lol

unless they are absolutely special and are doing special things with the smaller teams they're on e.g. pushing well above mid table or putting up numbers, let them grow elsewhere; loan them out and bring them back.....unless the manager knows how to use them, they serve no purpose rotting on the bench and wetting the bed on the rare occasion they come on

btw i also agree with the bulk of fennec's post. i'm just a little tired of talking about marcelo's defensive woes which have followed him all his career.....but he's supposed to be better than ....ah forget

and he plays 4 4 2 when his front three arent available, cos if he had to leave it at 4 3 3 it would mean having to play mayoral who he doesn't trust even though he approved the move to have him as benzema's understudy, so nobody could disturb benzema starting....i love madrid honestly, some decisions we make just have to make you laugh, it comes with the territory

The Demon of Carthage wrote:Best result ever.

If he had won the cup, and even though it's a meaningless trophy, Florentino would've kept him.

But with this CDR exit, it has become patently obvious he'll end up trophyless. In other words, his head will roll  at the end of the current season at the most.

what the hell is wrong with you proud fan of the biggest and most prestigious club in the world ? i guess you're proud only when winning

Valkyrja wrote:

The Demon of Carthage wrote:Best result ever.

If he had won the cup, and even though it's a meaningless trophy, Florentino would've kept him.

But with this CDR exit, it has become patently obvious he'll end up trophyless. In other words, his head will roll  at the end of the current season at the most.

what the hell is wrong with you proud fan of the biggest and most prestigious club in the world ? i guess you're proud only when winning

People are allowed to be disappointed in the team and say comments like his.
It's no different than us winning trophies then claiming Ronaldo is better than Messi.

FalcaoPunch wrote:

Valkyrja wrote:

The Demon of Carthage wrote:Best result ever.

If he had won the cup, and even though it's a meaningless trophy, Florentino would've kept him.

But with this CDR exit, it has become patently obvious he'll end up trophyless. In other words, his head will roll  at the end of the current season at the most.

what the hell is wrong with you proud fan of the biggest and most prestigious club in the world ? i guess you're proud only when winning

People are allowed to be disappointed in the team and say comments like his.
It's no different than us winning trophies then claiming Ronaldo is better than Messi.

we just failed to qualify for the next round, a trophy we had a relative chance at, and this guy calls this shitty fixture the best result ever ? just gtfo

Valkyrja wrote:

FalcaoPunch wrote:

Valkyrja wrote:


what the hell is wrong with you proud fan of the biggest and most prestigious club in the world ? i guess you're proud only when winning

People are allowed to be disappointed in the team and say comments like his.
It's no different than us winning trophies then claiming Ronaldo is better than Messi.

we just failed to qualify for the next round, a trophy we had a relative chance at, and this guy calls this shitty fixture the best result ever ? just gtfo

Have you seen how the team has been since August? We failed to qualify to the next round while playing at home.

He's essentially saying this season is a waste and believes had we qualified and won - Flo would think that was enough to keep Zidane on board.

Doc wrote:Tito is obviously referring to Theo and Llorente's time at Alaves and impressing there. Also a bit with Ceballos' time at Betis who also impressed a bit. From all his posts, he was never a fan of signing young talent that may or may not make it at Madrid since this is not a club for such things. He has a legit point be it harshly written most of the time.

In any case, only Hakimi looks like he really doesn't belong at Madrid. Llorente could get the nod as well but he rarely features and whenever it is, it was in the CDR and that is barely anything to judge a player by.

He did have a shit match though.

Thanks Doc. Ok Tito, I now get your point, perhaps use somewhere next time that has had a player that we at one point might have had an interest!

In any event, I agree with you a fair amount. I believe we are into this search of Spanish players primarily because the academy talent level is at an all time low. We used to stack the academy not only international kids, (that route has pretty well been cut off), but with kids from all over Spain. Not sure, what’s gone wrong with that approach, but ever since the gang of Nacho, Jese, Morata, Denis, Carvajal, Sarabia etc, the well has run dry. The other factor is Spain has regularly been producing amble futbol players particularly at the U21 and U23 level and have been consistently near top of world. That’s been Flo’s recruiting grounds.

But bringing in 6 at once, particularly after a season in which 3 came, was a mistake, as we have discussed here before. I used to be frustrated that we never left room in our squad depth to accomodate potential players, when Barca regularly were adding 2 or 3 each season. That would have been a better choice.

I do believe Ceballos showed enough with U23 and with Betis and in his few opportunities here, but we would have been better off with buying experienced laterals and keeping Pepe on another year. Llorente would have been better off another year at Alaves especially with how well Casemiro has developed plus the fact that Zidane covers for that role when necessary with Kroos or Kovacic. Said here many times there were alternatives on squad for Benzema and if they let them go, then for god sake sign someone who can score not Mayoral.

But we are not where we are because of the kids, our problems IMO, are primarily the coach and lack of scorers. I don’t buy this BS that the squad has been assembled without Zidane’s involvement and he no doubt had a lot to say in who made the squad. His not playing these kids is a matter of his desperation in going with the veterans thinking that will resolve the problems.

The road to recovery begins with Zidane being out of the picture, Benz for sure dumped. Ronaldo is saying he leaving because of wages. Good thing. Bale also needs to go, but we really need at least 4 scorers added, allowing for backup strength. They need to do something about Marcelo and they need to take a good hard analysis of what’s right for the club and players with regards to these kids.

Ceballos looked incredible with the U21, never saw him at Betis, his talent is there for sure. Maybe he has a hard time adapting to the big leagues.

Rincon, he just hasn't been given the opportunities. He is playing behind Modric, Asensio, Isco, Kovacic!!! He has the talent, but Zidane is so inflexible in his starters other than Copa games.

We lose to Mighty Leganes and our players are not good enough... You guys need to check yourselves in

Mr Nick09 wrote:We lose to Mighty Leganes and our players are not good enough... You guys need to check yourselves in

This.
I'm looking forward to our game against Valencia lol

Valkyrja wrote:

The Demon of Carthage wrote:Best result ever.

If he had won the cup, and even though it's a meaningless trophy, Florentino would've kept him.

But with this CDR exit, it has become patently obvious he'll end up trophyless. In other words, his head will roll  at the end of the current season at the most.

what the hell is wrong with you proud fan of the biggest and most prestigious club in the world ? i guess you're proud only when winning

https://www.thefreedictionary.com/sarcasm

Barca playing Messi and Suarez in Copa vs Espanyol but we rest our stars' because of course we must la Liga...oh wait...

Leganes is a mid table La Liga team, for those not familiar.  13th place (just behind Bilbao and ahead of Espanyol).  They'r 4th in the league in GA, behind Atleti, Barca and Real Madrid...  19 GA in 19 La Liga games and they've played everyone including Barca etc.

So scoring only 1 against them is actually on par.

The issue is we conceded two... courtesy of clownish play by Ashraf and Nacho followed by Ramos being Ramos.

They played their top team and we played our B team too.

Just to keep perspective.

And who in his infinite intelligence, in hope to help us secure a trophy when la Liga is already lost, fielded a second team against a side even you say is quality?

Zidane, the caretaker. If we needed another example of what he is when Ramos isn't scoring last minutes headers for him