In the midst of the formidable crisis in which Real Madrid finds itself, and with Xabi Alonso very much in the spotlight, Aurélien Tchouameni redirected the attention towards the footballers this Tuesday: “For example in the Celta match, I am sure that the coach had a good game plan, but in the end it is us, the players, who play on the pitch. And if we play at our level, we have more chances of winning this type of match. If we lose 2-0 means that there was a problem on our part on the pitch, like the intensity, the technical errors… It’s not the coach’s fault, the fact is that we have to improve and we are going to do it,” he said ahead of this Wednesday’s match against Manchester City at the Bernabéu (9:00 p.m., Movistar). “We have to do better to win games and we hope we improve and win more games because what is happening now is not possible.”
The big hole is once again the one that Carlo Ancelotti had already highlighted several times last season, the intensity, particularly in forward pressing. “We have to improve in this aspect of the game. When we start the match we want to put pressure on the opponent. The fact is that sometimes we do it well and sometimes very badly. We have to improve in this area to win more balls and score goals,” he said. “If we don’t play with maximum intensity, it will be very difficult to win matches. We have to understand that to win this type of match we have to give everything, and we didn’t do it against Celta, and we have to do it tomorrow against City in the Champions League.”
Xabi Alonso, who failed to get his players to execute their plan consistently, is also looking forward to the European Cup commitment: “I’m looking forward to everything that’s coming, and everything that’s coming starts tomorrow,” he said. “In our heads, there is only City. It’s the Champions League, and that can change quickly. Fortunately, in football, for better or worse, the perspective can change quickly, and we are in that moment.”
Names of possible replacements for him on the bench are also currently being circulated, but Xabi has once again avoided this subject as he has done in recent days: “When you coach Madrid, you have to be ready to face all these situations”, he replied. “We are ready to face everything that awaits us and this is the moment we have. The team is united, everyone is convinced that we can win tomorrow. I think no one has any doubts, but for that we have to play a good match, we have to play with good rhythm with good intensity, to compete,” he said, returning to the central point on which Tchouameni intoned a resounding mea culpa.
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