Real Madrid 2 – 0 Espanyol (Militao, Mbappe). Here’s our quick reaction at the final whistle. Still to player: post-game quotes, player ratings, visual analysis, post-game podcast, and much more.
Xabi Alonso put out a surprise line-up today, even for his unpredictable standards. Rotation was expected, as this is Real Madrid’s easiest game on paper during a heavy schedule, but, still, it was interesting to see Alonso put out a very attacking line-up, consisting of all four of Vinicius Jr, Kylian Mbappe,
Gonzalo Garcia, and Franco Mastantuono.
Despite a very offensive line-up on paper, Real Madrid were, again, very solid defensively. Alonso’s men defended high up the pitch, and anytime possession was lost, it was right back at their feet through good pressing actions. The biggest challenge was not so much protecting Thibaut Courtois’s goal, but rather carving out clear-cut chances as the attackers weren’t able to get into the box enough, and there were no crosses coming in to Gonzalo — all adding to the fact that Espanyol sat very deep to protect their area.
The deadlock was broken through an outrageous long-distance goal from Eder Militao:
Real Madrid closed out the half with a great chance but couldn’t capitalize:
Real Madrid didn’t carve out more clear-cut chances than that in the first half, but they also nullified Espanyol’s attacks, and in the second half, the amount of transition opportunities increased as Espanyol tried to chase the game.
Real Madrid capitalized on one of those early in the second frame:
It should be noted that there were several bright spots in this game. Alvaro Carreras was perfect defensively, and both Raul Asencio and Eder Militao stood their ground over and over again defending the box.
A crowd favourite this evening was Franco Mastantuono, who was virtually unplayable at times.
This was a very solid performance from Real Madrid overall on a very ‘feel-good’ evening, where both Jude Bellingham and Eduardo Camavinga returned from their respective injuries:
Tonight’s post-game podcast from the Bernabeu will go up about two hours after the game. You can follow on Spotify, Apple, or YouTube.
