Real Madrid-Betis Fatal skid of Madrid

Because of their losses, because of their disadvantage and because of an endemic lack of goal, Madrid lives on the edge of the impossible, with the feeling that what he has does not give him for the League and the Champions League. There is no forensic who gives him up for dead, less with Zidane on the bench, but each game costs him an immense effort. And after the draw against Betis, he is forced to look straight ahead at the Champions League and already very sideways at the League, where the applicants are a herd. The feeling is that nothing happens if Benzema doesn't think of it and the Frenchman also has the right to lower the volume.

Chelsea arrives and Zidane makes it clear that the conversation changes. In that key you have to interpret the return to 4-3-3, Nacho's mission (umpteenth) as a left back, Marcelo's return to the bench and the presence of Isco against Betis. Also the substitution of Vinicius, who was saved for Tuesday. The hubbub it generates has no replica in the template. The Champions is won with trade and that's where the shots will go, for bringing together most of those who have filled the museum with glasses in the last decade and ordered as then.

Betis' response was as expected. Channels by Fekir, the Villamarín school of fine arts, refreshment for the extremes and Guarded by Guido to double the surveillance in the center of the field. With both sides he played the first minutes well, with a ball bog, a good short game and no stampede from the three ends of Madrid, who found it too difficult to cross the midfield. The impression remained that the white team, better finished than in recent weeks, looked behind the game. That is the charm and, at the same time, the danger of the Champions League.

Benzema, on the attack

So the clash became boring, an example of those who justified the uprising of the Super League until it appeared Benzema, who in his heavenly version, left a break in a brick and a subsequent shot that Bravo rejected. The extended version of the French seems the only offensive solution of Madrid.

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In any case, the cast changed the direction of the wind. Without exaggeration and without too much grace, Zidane's team was taming Betis, which had turned its back on the goal, from the feet of Isco and Modric. But beyond there was little life. Rodrygo is very affected by irregularity, a sin of youth, and Asensio continues without that change of pace that he is suspected of having but does not appear. They swapped their bands frequently with no apparent result. Madrid has been moving at a tropical pace for a long time, taking care not to burst the boiler, and that greatly lengthens the games. Before the break Benzema had the least blurry occasion, but his right, after turning around, went to Barajas. By then, irrigation and rain had left a dangerously slippery road.

Drawing change

Laínez woken up Betis in the second half. But he had no other accompaniment than that of Emerson. Nobody was put to the auction. Nor in Madrid, who warned again, in a tense center shot by Rodrygo that hit the crossbar. It was the last thing he registered in the game, because Zidane understood that the game needed the defibrillating effect of Vinicius. His entry coincided with the best chance for Betis. Guido was cleaning rivals until clearing the horizon to then screw up the shot. And then Borja Iglesias repeated, still in a better position. He was not right either. Betis already countered with intention against a Madrid more neglected by the rush.

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As the team languished, Zidane turned to 3-4-3, with Odriozola and Marcelo. In a minute they caused the first mismatch at Betis. Now the party did have a march, it flew from area to area. There was even reason to whistle one of those neopenaltis by Miranda's hand. And in those came Hazard, who before becoming an anatomy manual, struggled to be the third best footballer in the world. It is not to turn Madrid upside down. Nor is expected. Passed without a trace for a game that, for Zidane's team, could be the beginning of the goodbye to the League.