Real Madrid vs Real Sociedad

halamadrid2 wrote:We have more of a chance winning something with RM (these set of players) led by ZZ than any other manager. If we hadn't gotten him we would probably be out of the race by now. It's taken a while but we are finally assuring as a unit. It's easy to dismiss it as "it was inevitable" but last season and the one beforr too actually didn't stop us from playing consistently crap for a whole season not improving at all

To be fair, it’s also conveniently easy to boil absolutely everything down to «must be the work of the manager», which is vintage Goallegacy.

I never wanted to talk about this, so as not to jump the gun, but so far the kid valverde has impressed . My hope is that he keeps it up and stays consistent, which is the tough part. I was worried about this game, so far I've always felt we have to score early to take control. But good game, we are approaching crunch time in the season

Btw who was it on here that had been hyping valverde? I recall two people going back and forth regarding valverde vs another player on here. Anyway touche to whoever that was. But as I said, the tough part now is maintaining that consistency

TMO and Valk, they've been absolutely loyal to the man.

Anyone seen the banner:

Rodrygo-Vini-Lucas-Bale

In that order

halamadrid2 wrote:Anyone seen the banner:

Rodrygo-Vini-Lucas-Bale

In that order

"It was inevitable"...  That's what you're going with

Anyway good team win still too many crosses, needs more link up and through passes would give more unpredictability to the attack, it will improve hopefully as long as the team can keep scoring, bale played well needs more minutes should be ahead of rodrygo still.

Madrid fans need to stop acting like they care what bale did, so easily manipulated by the media on how to think and feel damn sheep's.

Jovic needs more minutes ahead of isco, if the team is gonna win anything their needs to be another consistent scorer, bale is one and jovic is the other, the other can chip in but those 2 are a must, at least 25+ from bale and 15-20+ for jovic, zz must realized this already one player scoring all the goals won't win anything.

sportsczy wrote:"It was inevitable"...  That's what you're going with

I assume you’re referring to me. The simple answer to your question is yes, I always believed we would get out of our slump eventually. As long as the total sum of our team is more talented than that of other teams, I see no reason why we would stay in a slump until a «genius coach» comes along. I won’t confidently claim that Zidane bears the sole responsibility for getting us out of that slump, hell, we’ve only just started performing well.  As usual, Zidane deserves all credit for the things he does well, but this is just another classic kneejerk.

If anything was ever inevitable, it’s that this section of the forum would be dancing and singing at the first, barely tangible sign of consistency. Am I really the only one who thinks it’s silly how we have a decade long tradition of pinning all blame and/or credit on the coach? I even think Ernesto Valverde deserves some slack. Shortcomings aside, he’s being painted as the scapegoat for Barca’s failure to secure the right players - which in my opinion has far more impact on their ability to perform, than any management choices made by Valverde. The poor guy even bent to the pressure and gave Dembele a chance, only to see the criticism pile up even further. Football is about more than just the manager.

Someone has to get the blame. The manager is the most dispensable of the lot, at least he gets a nice pay package when he gets fired. Also, I'm gonna wait till I see us win something before I decide to be all loving and affectionate. Or a Clasico win. Either or.

Also, Bale might as well go play golf in Wales about now. Already seeing Rodrygo as our starting RW tbh.

Yeah, I’ve said this before. The manager is not only dispensible, but also a lot easier to give credit for positive results than to analyze and locate what truly seperates a team from their opponent teams. Not that it matters on here since almost everyone seems to have a favorite individual they want to promote, regardless of what everyone else on the team does.

Doc wrote:TMO and Valk, they've been absolutely loyal to the man.

may I say I told ya ?

Great game which took me back to our 16/17 form. step by step we’re reaching a very high level of play just in time for the European spring.

Hazard looks lighter and quicker, he’s so so talented
Benz is young again and our entire old guard looks rejuvenated

as for the kids, i’m not convinced by RG27 who from my pov is not as good as our best RW option Brahim Diaz. Valverde is a future captain and the ultimate B2B mid in football, can do it all

for me our best youngsters are Fede, Brahim and Militao (+Jovic but he is a more seasoned player who deserves more chances)

Around this time of the season last year and the previous we were already eliminated from la liga contention with our only hope for success was the UCL and the copa. The good thing is that we are still in contention and hitting form. The upcoming match against PSG will certainly test how the current squad will fare against the best of Europe.

I just realised we lost home and away to LaReal last season

The PSG game is very important. We have likely alreadt qualified but winning that game would give us so much confidence going forward. I hope thet dont take the game lightly

Valkyrja wrote:

Doc wrote:TMO and Valk, they've been absolutely loyal to the man.

may I say I told ya ?

You may, I'm willing to eat my humble pie for the cause.

halamadrid2 wrote:I just realised we lost home and away to LaReal last season

The PSG game is very important. We have likely alreadt qualified but winning that game would give us so much confidence going forward. I hope thet dont take the game lightly

Agreed, a win vs PSG (and hopefully a comfortable one too) would really send the moral of the side sky high especially with Clasico coming up. I really wanna see us humiliate Barca in their grounds at least once in my life ffs.

A win will do for me. A win against both PSG and Barca will have the Bernabeu rocking in every home game. I really miss the times we had wonderful nights at the Bernabeu. With a Clasico win who know, we might go on to win the treble na Hala you being to premature, settle down. A man can dream

The only reason, we are not already out of la liga, is both Barca and Atleti have been just as bad or worse than we have been!

Will I end up regretful that I sold my tickets for this season? Maybe, but it’s way to soon to say. We’ll have a better idea after next couple of weeks.

I admit that Zidane does deserve some credit and team does look good, but they haven’t played any strong team in this pleasant surprise run.

And to MTO, you’re right Valverde has surprised me. What happened to your dramatic exit? Did you get the help you needed?

Bill... you know what our record was last season after the same number of games?  We had 20 points.  This season, we have 28 points.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018%E2%80%9319_Real_Madrid_CF_season

Barca at the same time last season?  They had 25 points...  this season they have 28 points.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018%E2%80%9319_FC_Barcelona_season

So Barca has started this season slightly better in terms of points after 13 days while we're MUCH better.

Sports, you more than anyone else know that we have to be patient and not get carried away with expectations! The last month is encouraging and grounds for being hopeful. But it’s way to early, particularly keeping in mind who we have played in past month to start with bold predictions.

The starting lineup seems to be fixed in terms of Courtois, Ramos, Varane, Carvajal, Valverde, Casemiro, Hazard and Benz. There is an open battle of Marcelo / Mendy; Kroos / Modric; Rodrygo / Bale for the other positions. All good, but we still haven’t seen what Militao, Jovic can offer plus we don’t have Isco, Vinicius, James offering much. So although so far so good, there is still room for improvement and contributions from rest of squad.

13 days is 1/3 of the La Liga campaign.  It's not too early.  This is typically the time that, barring injuries, you know what you have as a team.

Even if Barca beat us, I think our squad is better than theirs in terms of balance now.  Although face-to-face clashes are very sexy...  La Liga is really won by not losing points against the other teams.  Going forward, i think we're better set up for the marathon.

As far as PSG...  they're more talented than us.  And for the first time this season, they have everyone (almost) healthy.  

Midfield of Gueye - Marquinhos - Verratti.  Attack of Neymar - Mbappe - Icardi.  

I don't think we beat them.

There is a big difference with how players buy into what message Zidane preaches week to week. His "I have 25 starters" is very good. If he benches you well it's because other guys got to play. Man management skills are still excellent. With time players performances are also coming around and he is finally doing something I thought he would do sooner in terms of pushing his old starters.

I had my doubts we would get here but I still feel like we are on the edge, like one loss away or one moment in a game away for things to look much different...

Anyway Pogba 2020

Pogba can stay where he is por favor. We can get VDB for half as much for our bench

PSG are not better than us, not by a long shot. After 1 win suddenly they are better, do me a favour. They have Keylord to thank for even winning their last few games. Can't wait to silence them with a convincing win on Tuesday

Btw ADM is 100% starting, he has been their best attacker this season. If he plays in the forward line then either MBappe who's been average or Neymar who's been out injured will take that last spot. Either way we are winning this game and PSG will be back to being prerenders

Mbappe has been average....

Anyhow, if Di Maria starts... and he might... it would be because they play a 4231 and take out a CM. Since the game is in Madrid, I think they go with a 433 with 2 holding mids and Di Maria sits.

Tuchel is not a moron. You can't bench Neymar or Mbappe. The only other option is Icardi... which is possible if you move Mbappe to CF.

PSG's defensive issues are at fullback. Bernat, Kurzawa and Meunier all play worse defense than Marcelo lol.

BUT, with Gueye and Marquinhos covering, the defense has been a rock. Marquinhos was trying to do the job alone last season and he couldn't cover enough ground.