The resounding first half of Real Madrid against Shakhtar Once again, the powerful influence of Sergio Ramos at Real Madrid is clear. In Europe, without him, Madrid disintegrates. Far is the magical triennium from the Eleventh to the Thirteenth. Since then, when Ramos has to be absent due to a penalty or injury, the team breaks down. It happened in the last Champions League game of last season, the 2-1 in Manchester with a horrible Varane, and it happened now in the first of this season, with Militao joining the defensive grotesque. Both, Varane for lack of leadership and Militao for lack of attitude, are in the eye of the hurricane …
The precedents are what they are. In 2017-18 Madrid without the camero was overwhelmed and almost eliminated in that 1-3 against Juventus In rooms; later would come 1-4 against Ajax at the Bernabéu In the season that Lopetegui started, Solari followed and Zidane finished. Without Ramos, Madrid he screwed up in both games against CSKA also from that year (1-0 and 0-3). Last season, already with Zidane, the Varane-Militao duo fell off the Eiffel Tower: a 3-0 at the Parc des Princes that revealed a weak Madrid in Europe. And more without its great leader.
The defensive nonsense of Real Madrid in Shakhtar's 0-3, with bad pressure from Militao, Varane lost and Marcelo having to try to close as the last player …
Ramos was absent against Shakhtar due to the blow to the knee that he suffered against Cádiz and Madrid in the 13th minute against a Ukrainian rival severely depleted by the coronavirus He conceded his first heads-up against Courtois. A sign that things were not going to go well. Three Ukrainian goals at halftime confirmed White's nonsense, with Militao recovering the walking position on the play of the third. “I don't know what happens to the central Madrid, but my God …”Mijatovic lamented in Sports Carousel.
For carousel, the one of Ukrainian occasions that allowed first Casemiro and then Varane, Militao and Marcelo, with Mendy as the only salvageable of burning. Dentinhó forgave the 1-4 in the 55th minute and Teté the 2-4 in a heads up against Courtois in the 68th minute. The outside of Teté annulled Marlos's 2-4 in the 80th minute. Unfit for a serious contender for the Champions League, as Courtois and Zidane claimed in the previous one.
Militao, Varane and Casemiro failed against Shakhtar time and time again.
JESUS ALVAREZ ORIHUELA
The worst thing for Zidane is that he can leave psychological sequelae. Varane said after his two errors in the Etihad that cost him the elimination of Madrid in August that it had been difficult for him to assimilate that. “It was hard to digest,” he admitted this summer. The Shakhtar thing, with an own goal, is to put salt in that wound. Ramos ends his contract in 2021, let no one forget it.