Real Madrid vs Atlético Madrid

Guys, if you're not busy and happen to have a few minutes to spare, please feel free to create a new topic for Real Madrid's upcoming game, especially when it's the day of the game and there still hasn't been one created yet.

I understand that we're already out of the title race and most of us are no longer interested in the league, let alone having the urge to create a topic for it. But we have to take care of our section on GL, and most importantly, we have to believe in our team even when there's still no light at the end of the tunnel.

Me personally, for the time being, I'm only interested in having our tactical problems fixed, the like of which Z has been seemingly indifferent and oblivious to. I honestly would rather lose with those problems gone than win with them still hovering over our heads.

We've lost the league, and rightly so. We didn't have enough hunger, thirst or drive to keep going. Let's just hope that now we learn from our mistakes and channel every fiber of our being into the last competition we're still in.

First things first, Simeone's men are knocking on our door. Let's open it to them and make sure they never come out of it.

Hala Madrid!

we are so shit these days that i even forgot that we have such a big game today

i see no reason why we shouldn't beat them....i hope we beat them; for sure they'll put pressure on our midfield, but i think we can take them at home. we could have got three points at the calderon had rafa not switched tactics to hold unto the lead, and then arbeloa did his thing and messed things up....funny enough, i hope arbeloa plays in place of the injured marcelo....its like he's Jekyll and Hyde on the left and right flanks respectively

Just to put things into perspective, sure we have problems, lots of them, BUT i believe we are still the 2nd best team in Spain (today's game will either prove or disprove that) and easily in top 10, perhaps 5 in Europe.

This isn't a terrible team, just one that has problems to overcome before we can take home any trophies. As someone said previously, let's hope they can recognize those problems and resolve them this summer. I wouldn't be so hard on Zidane. He's not the established coach that Sports makes him out to be, but he does have potential and is a work in progress. Let's hold off the evaluations until May!

Very even game.

Atleti, as always, pack the middle and dare you to beat them going wide since they're good in the air.  Well...  James, Danilo and Carvajal can't really cross.  It's a dilemna.  We're not going to create a ton of chances until Atleti tire out a bit and leave some space.  Impossible to attack the middle as a result. Everything needs to happen outside in even if it's on the ground.

It would be nice for one of the midfielders to attack the box once someone has a chance to cross.  Kroos, Modric and Isco NEVER make a run into the box to help the strikers.  With Ronaldo or Benz dezoning, the other striker is all alone against 2-3 defenders.  That's a wing and a prayer right there.  The opposite fullback needs to make some back post runs in too.

I've been noticing over past month that James cannot retrieve the ball. His first touch is pathetic! Has he always been like this? It's such a basic skill that I find it hard to accept an 80M player doesn't have this skill that is developed and trained into 10 -12 year olds.

sportsczy wrote:Very even game.

Atleti, as always, pack the middle and dare you to beat them going wide since they're good in the air.  Well...  James, Danilo and Carvajal can't really cross.  It's a dilemna.  We're not going to create a ton of chances until Atleti tire out a bit and leave some space.  Impossible to attack the middle as a result.  Everything needs to happen outside in even if it's on the ground.

It would be nice for one of the midfielders to attack the box once someone has a chance to cross.  Kroos, Modric and Isco NEVER make a run into the box to help the strikers.  With Ronaldo or Benz dezoning, the other striker is all alone against 2-3 defenders.  That's a wing and a prayer right there.  The opposite fullback needs to make some back post runs in too.

good post as usual I agree

Danilo other that very poor pass back to Navas has played well. Just made a good cross that Sports said he couldn't make.

These cantera kids are looking good, Majoral, Lucas and Jese.

We're so shit lmfao

we need infusion of quality in the summer. 3 players. CF, LW, DM.

futbol_bill wrote:Danilo other that very poor pass back to Navas has played well. Just made a good cross that Sports said he couldn't make.

Well he also said James can't really cross which I found amusing. James crosses are usually on point as well as his corners nearly always on the money.

But I think he referring to this game in particular not in general. However Danilo's crosses have been shit since he got here.

halamadrid2 wrote:I hope Perez is happy now he got rid of ADM for that pathetic excuse of a footballer called James. When the kids from Castilla look better than multimillion signings you know its time to rethink your transfer strategies

Danilo was excellent, the rest were average or bad. Atleti didnt even deserve to dtaw let alone win. Clos Gomez as usual robbing us. Never seen a worse referee in my life

Feck the Pogbas, the Hazards of this world. Pesteros the lot of them. We need to fill this team with homegrown players. Lucas, Jese and Mayotal looked really good when they came on particularly Mayoral.

Kroos was horrendous today, losing the ball, giving up on chases and generally really useless

Your hate on James is hilarious. He didn't start against Malaga , it was Kovacic + Isco and both had absolutely terrible games. James is playing shit and it's very apparent so no argument there.

But your hype on Jese, who essentially runs to the wings to over dribble to nowhere, lose the ball, or try to force himself through impossible gaps and lose possession. Last 10 minutes of today's game he must have done that about 5 - 6 times.

Lucas on the other hand I've been impressed with since this season and was favored over Jese (rightfully so).

Never thought I would say this but my god was Danilo good! At LB he played better defensively than Marcelo and better offensively than RB-Danilo. I need to see more of him at LB.

Ronaldo is improving performance-wise. He's now dribbling past players, opening lanes for his teammates and his speed was quite remarkable against Atlético. I hope he keeps on improving. In my book, this is better than scoring a goal and doing nothing for the team. Having said that, his defensive game is still pathetic and he shouldn't have missed that header.

Mayoral really impressed me. I don't understand why they've opted not to promote him to first team next season just like they did with Mariano. With first team action, he can hone his skills and blossom into an elite CF.

Atlético were really pathetic, but we were even more pathetic than them. This shows that neither of us will go that far in Europe. We'll both be eliminated from the CL the second we meet Bayern or Barça.

The same problems are still vividly present. And I can safely say that I have seen enough of Z to be convinced that he's not a Pep. Not even close. But I don't blame him. He's doing the best he can. He's just not good enough, and so are several of our players.

Now that we're officially out of the league title, I hope Z does some experimenting.

halamadrid2 wrote:I dont expect anything from Kovacic from this season. Its his first season in a proper tough league. I expect to see progress next season.

Isco has been neither here nor there but he has never been so bad I'd want to punch a TV. He is more anonymous than anything else. I assure you Jese is more useful to a team than James. Much more actually.

James is just WTF. His snail-like pace makes him look even worse. He was supposedly going to come in for "inconsistent" ADM and make us a better. Instead we are about to go 2 seasons in a row without any trophies. He was able to hide his patheticness last season when he spent the majority of the time injured and came back against some minnow to score a golazo and return to the treatment table when we were facing tough oppositions. This season his "quality" has been laid bare for everyone to see. I dont blindly criticise. I dont particularly rate Danilo either, nor Bale but i am able to recognise when they play good

it took di maria 3 and half season to actually perform. james is good. just needs to be played in his best position.

halamadrid2 wrote:

What is James's best position? Cuz i cant tell

Bench

Well... when Benz went down and without Bale and Marcelo... i was hoping for a scoreless draw. No way we were going to get past one of the best defenses in Europe with Mayoral and Ronaldo up front and crap James/Isco to go along with another cantera. When we went down 1-0, it was over because Atleti were going to completely pack it in then.

We don't have a single player that can pierce lines or bring it physically... everything is very easy for a defense.

And yeah... I was talking about this game and on current form about James. He's a shell of what he was at Monaco. His passing and crossing were inch perfect there with great ball control. Now, he looks like a DM in terms of technique. Not sure what happened. Isco isn't much better btw.

Everyone else did what they could... even Kroos. But as Hala said, we don't have a creative player that can make magic and pierce lines like Di Maria in his last season or Ozil when he was on form. We're a team made of positional players who don't really fit together. Result? You can have 70% possession like we did... but can't do anything due to injuries and squad makeup.

That said, if Benz, Bale and Marcelo are healthy, we win today imo. Despite that, Atleti did not deserve the win. They just parked the bus and countered.

i strongly disagree that it took di maria 3 and a half seasons; strongly disagree. are you saying di maria was playing as bad as james? the only players who one could say were playing as good or better than di maria in his first couple of seasons were alonso, cristiano and ozil. which is why he always started. i'm sorry but if di maria was playing like james, he'd have been gone even before ancelotti had the chance to play him in midfield. he had lapses and could be awkward, but we haven't had a better rw since he switched positions (bale hasn't been better for the record). benzema, higuain, cristiano scored loads of goals from his assists as well as ozil

this team today, done. lack of ideas. i said it a million times, i never understood why fans supported this isco, james, kroos, modric combo. even last season there were holes in it. they'll hold the ball, they'll pass, keep possession but when things are tight- nothing. even cristiano's misses, people getting excited, i just had that feeling after the first half that nothing would go in. the team has run its course....a pathetic course at that; 1 liga and 1 ucl in what, 7 years? hey whether anyone likes it or not, this team is done, and people should start looking to move on

honestly, the way this team is, i once again don't think if everyone was healthy they'd do squat. the team has checked out mentally, when teams see they've held us even for so long, they begin to realize "hey these guys are terrible, we can beat them". and being healthy isn't an excuse- the rivals played in the world club cup, and most of them have managed to stay healthy. injuries at this point isn't an excuse- if bale can't stay fit, cash in on him....hell, we don't even know when he'll return, and i bet he'll get injured again after that

There's too many tito and to all our truly irreplaceable guys...  Marcelo, Benz and Bale have nobody that can do a half decent job covering for them.  The dropoff is pretty extreme when one of them are out let alone all 3 at the same time.  Modric is another one of those guys.  

We looked pretty good in the first half.  It was an even game and it should be because Atleti are a damn fine team.  But once Benz went out, Atleti got more aggressive with their line and pushed up as they didn't worry about our CF... that led to us losing the ball in a really dangerous position.  In the first half, that turnover happens 10 meters higher.

When Atleti parked it after going up, it was over. Ronaldo, Jese, Vasquez and Mayoral were never going to worry a defensive team like that.

sports, are you really going to say, you were confident when as time went on it stayed at nil nil? cos we've all been watching this team this season. its like a song, as it goes on, we know the next lines, or verse. when the game isn't looking like a small team massacre, with the opponents making mistakes, we all know we're not going to get 3 points (except maybe the roma psg games). we knew atleti would press, and then park the bus. we all knew this, there's no way in hell they'll open up, they're much smarter than that, and don't have the players to do so.

this is my point, we have depth (excluding the cf position where for some reason we knowingly went in without buying a co-cf), but its been used poorly. nobody has any incentive to play, lol. they all know they'll start, there's no competition among each other, and they lack ideas; its a boring side, cos when we can't counter, we can't do anything else.....this is an embarrassment. messi was out for close to two months, and we still did rubbish....hell, we got battered without him in clasico.....that speaks volumes. and now we've become atleti's whooping boys as well

watch us beast against levante. i've seen levante play, they may be low on the table, but if they're smart, they'll get a point off us. they can be very aggressive too, so the players shouldn't think it will be another malmo just like that