By: OderahReal Madrid may have beaten Barcelona in the most recent el Clasico but that can only go a long way in helping their la liga ambition which frankly at this point in the season should be to finish second.
The Clasico was an eye opener to the kind of manager Zidane could be. He got all the Real players pitching in in defence including Cristiano Ronaldo!, he also showed us all he is a smart man by learning from his predecessors’ mistake and including Casemiro in the team from the start.
Let us take nothing away from Barcelona though, Saturday’s el Clasico performance is by far Real’s best performance in the fixture since before the Mourinho era and that is including the 2014 copa del rey final. Real looked like they actually had a plan this time, they were not moved by Barcelona’s early dominance and half chances.
The first scare for Madrid was when Ramos appeared to have brought messi down in the box but on closer examination we see that the foul was indeed just outside the box and yes it was a foul but beyond that point the first half seemed to go by more or less smoothly for the galacticos.
Real did not create much in terms of chances in the first half, there was a half chance for Gareth Bale to shoot and instead he decided to try to find Ronaldo and the chance was gone and one for Karim Benzema which he skied.
At the start of the second half real seemed to have relaxed a little, even though the tie seemed to still be in the balance and then Barcelona made an awful mistake, they scored!
The goal seemed to spark life into the Real players and from a deflected Toni Kroos shot Karim Benzema scored a wonderful overhead kick to level matters again, and then came involvement of Arda Turan which implied the end of the game for the hard working Ivan Rakitic leaving Sergio Busquets all alone in the midfield all Real needed to do was bide their time and counter when the opportunity came and boy how they grabbed the it when it came, even though they had perfectly legitimate Gareth Bale goal disallowed for reasons only the referee can explain led by the very attack minded Marcelo who fed Jese, who in turn fed Bale and with his weaker right foot delivered a sumptuous cross which Ronaldo controlled perfectly on his chest and expertly slipped between Claudio Bravo’s legs. Real held on to win the game despite being down to ten men as Sergio Ramos picked up his fourth Clasico red card.
On the night Real’s eleven or ten played better than Barcelona’s and they fully deserved their victory. Modric and Kroos never looked better, Iniesta and the MSN on the other hand were missing.[post_ad]
