Imanol Alguacil remains calm … despite the coronavirus. After the alarm that the news of the outbreak that emerged in Zubieta sowed last Tuesday with ten players infected with COVID-19 in the first team, and another seven in the subsidiary team, things have been returning to their being little by little in the training facilities of the Real Sociedad. There was a lot of nervousness and confusion at the beginning, because the realistic squad was very decimated, and it was difficult to know for sure which players the Oriotarra coach could count on when visiting Mendizorroza to play against Alavés.
But with the passing of the hours everything has calmed down. The first step was to take extreme precautions in Zubieta to avoid more cases that they would have put Real in a truly compromising situation, and the second step is knowing which players could really be counted on for this Sunday. And from there work with what is available. No regrets. It doesn’t go with Imanol, who is never used to making excuses. And now it can be said that everything is controlled and that moderate optimism reigns in Zubieta for being able to count on a guaranteed team to visit Alavés. In fact, Imanol believes that he will be able to do a good eleven with the players that he has at his disposal these days in Zubieta training as they are not affected by the coronavirus.
The Royal Society keeps the identities of the infected players secret. To the point that he has suspended interviews and events to prevent people from knowing who they are. Also when broadcasting images of Rafinha’s first training session, he was very careful not to give any clues. And the rest of the days it does not give information about who is training, and it does not send images of the sessions. as he used to do. The only way to know who is training these days in Zubieta is to wait at the door and see the players who come out of training. It has emerged that vital players such as Zaldua, Zubeldia, Merino, Silva, Le Normand, Januzaj, Ryan and Sorloth would be at Imanol’s disposal. But he is going to recover more players, more than half of the positives that were known on Tuesday come out of their confinement in time to reach the game against Alavés, and they are following an exhaustive individualized preparation plan. Isak would be among them. It must be remembered that of the players who train these days in Zubieta, Oyarzabal will not be able to play due to sanction, and neither will Rafinha because he cannot be registered until January 3, because in LaLiga they are on vacation these days. Monreal and Carlos Fernández will also be out due to injury. So the coronavirus may have decimated the forces of the Royal, but it has not killed them at all.