Real Madrid and Zidane do not win to disappointment in the 2020-21 season, a soccer and emotional roller coaster that is now going through a new stage of plummeting, which returns the Marseille coach to the edge of the precipice. A situation that is not new for him and from which he has already escaped several times in the past; At the club, however, each new misstep takes a toll on the confidence in Marseille. The mark of defeat this Tuesday, eliminated from the Cup at the first exchange for a Second B like Alcoyano, it hurts especially and raises the tension around the figure of Zizou, who is back in the air.
Zidane has already avoided similar situations in the past. We say similar and not the same, because in truth it never happened that his Madrid hit it against a lower category team, let alone two below. In the Cup, Celta, Leganés and Real Sociedad were his previous executioners, all of them First; in Champions, only the City of Guardiola knew how to throw him; and in the Super Cup, the stick a few days ago was hit by an Athletic who would end up taking the title against Barcelona.
During his first stage, despite slight momentary disappointments and moments of the team's league drift, Zidane managed to keep the ship straight, especially in Europe with three Champions in a row. But the second stage of Marseille is marked by irregularity. Last season, Mourinho's name jumped several times during the first half of the season, after the defeats against PSG and Mallorca. This campaign his place has heated up much more with Madrid's dizzy gait in the Champions League, to the extent that his dismissal was considered if he did not put the team in the second round of Champions (which could happen until the last day; Zidane, faithful to lucky man tradition, he won on D-day and entered the next phase as group winners).
That triumph against Borussia, preceded by a thunderous victory at Sevilla's home, anticipated Madrid's best moment of the season: six consecutive victories against Sevilla, Borussia, Atleti, Athletic, Eibar and Granada, showing off a more than decent game and a lot of defensive solvency. But with the last game of 2020 the course was twisted: the draw in Elche was followed by a no-frills victory against Celta, another draw in Pamplona (with Zidane complaining about a grass that was not at all like to suspend the game) and now two consecutive defeats, against Athletic and Alcoyano. Only one win in the last five games exceeds the qualification of pothole and gets fully into the crisis. One more.
Zidane does not change the speech, despite the fact that in the past another cup similar to this one (the elimination at the hands of Leganés in 2017-18) already led to his resignation after lifting the third Champions League in a row. “When you lose there are always things that are talked about … I take responsibility and whatever happens will happen, I'm calm. We have to assume it, I assume it and we will see what happens in these days ”, he answered enigmatically to a question about whether he saw his position in danger. Without a Cup, there are only two trunks left in the river of 2020-21 that Madrid can hold on to to arrive with air in their lungs at the end of the course: a League in which Atleti takes four points (with two games less than the whites) and a Champions League in which the general opinion predicts that the white team does not give to compete beyond the quarters.
Zidane and Militao, Jovic, Odegaard …
The club's anger with Zidane regarding the results is equivalent to that of the fans: circumstantial. When he wins, he is a phenomenon; when he loses, not so much. However, in Madrid they contemplate with amazement the management of the staff that the coach is doing, especially around some names for which a huge investment was made and that hardly count for Marseille. Militao, for example, 50 million central for just 344 minutes this course; Jovic, so far away that he went to Eintracht and in 30 minutes scored two goals in his redebut with the German team; or Odegaard, the last case, who started counting a lot and went on to do nothing, to the extent that he has run out of waiting and has asked to leave, with Real Sociedad and Arsenal on the list of suitors. They are assets of the club that Zidane does not exploit and devalues, which widens the distance between the French and the board, with Florentino at the head.
The cup-bearer in Alcoi at least released the white calendar, helps Zidane and his men recharge their batteries to try the comeback in the League and to focus attention on the Champions League. Starting on Saturday, when Madrid travels to Vitoria to face Alavés, who not so long ago already assaulted Di Stéfano (1-2) and that he has a fighting record in his stadium against the whites in recent seasons. Another defeat in Mendizorroza would increase the toxicity that surrounds the air that Zidane breathes in this unfortunate 2021.