MADRID, 4 Mar. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The coach of Real Sociedad, Imanol Alguacil, has assured that if there is a team “capable” of winning at the Santiago Bernabéu, it is his, as they have shown in recent years, but he has warned that this Saturday they cannot be “courageous” all the time” against Real Madrid, and has ensured that at times they will have to “get together”.
“You have to do everything; you can’t be brave all the time, there are times when you have to get together. The same thing happens to them. 96 minutes go a long way. Tiredness will be there, being fresh will not be simple. The team has to know how to adapt,” he declared at a press conference, where he stated that they must score “minimum two” goals.
Despite the “complication” of playing in Chamartín, the Basque coach stated that they have “shown” that they are “capable of overcoming them”. “If there is a team capable of winning there, it is ours, especially if it is capable of playing with personality, if it has a good day and they do not have it”, he stressed, and called not to trust the team’s good progress .
“We can’t get overwhelmed by having a winning streak like the one at the beginning or a bad one like the one in the last phase. We try to improve, grow, being ambitious and always thinking that we can win the next game. Now we have the leader, a team that they have not lost at home, they have only given away four draws at their stadium. If there is an opponent who knows what it is to win there, it is us; there will be few players who can say that they have won there three times, and I have many who do They have done two,” he recalled.
In another order of things, he pointed out that the defensive level of the Madrid team “is very good”, and that “the offensive level is always there”. “They don’t give away much. You won’t have many chances at the Bernabéu and you have to hit them. Not long ago, we were able to score four goals, and that means we were effective. This year we are not being as effective, although the team , in many parties, has had options”, aimed, and valued the options donostiarras to go to Europe. “Twelve left, we’re in the fight and there’s a lot left,” he said.
On how the white team will approach the match and with which players, Alguacil joked about some words pronounced by Carlo Ancelotti. “He himself has said that there are many times that his players do things that he has not asked them to do, imagine you, as a rival coach, knowing what they are going to do! The individual talent is brutal, they have quality in all their lines and personality and ambitious character, it is global,” he said.
In this sense, he downplayed the absences of Toni Kroos and Fede Valverde. “If I don’t look for excuses when there are important casualties, imagine Ancelotti… Due to the level of the squad, those who are going to replace them are just as good. Real Madrid is always a powerful and powerful rival”, he indicated.
He also doesn’t think they’ll be affected by the fact that they have the ‘Champions’ round of 16 second leg match against PSG in a few days. “Knowing the coach and the club’s philosophy, you have no doubt that they will be very involved in the game. They know that Real Sociedad plays very well and that if they don’t come out as they have to, they can beat them. Tomorrow they will have everyone the senses in the game,” he said.