April is normally the month where Real Madrid move up through the gears ahead of success and more trophies in May. Time and again, football’s most successful club bewilder opponents and leave them dazed.
As the reigning Spanish, European and world champions, there was little reason to suspect they wouldn’t do the same this season as they homed in on a treble. But April has started awfully for Carlo Ancelotti’s side. The signs were there when Real Sociedad held them to a 4-4 draw at the Bernabeu in the Copa del Rey semi-final last week before Madrid narrowly advanced on aggregate in extra time.
Saturday saw a Valencia side who have been fighting relegation all season win 2-1 at the Bernabeu with a 95th-minute winner. That defeat left Real Madrid four points behind Barcelona at the top of La Liga with eight league games to play.
Tuesday night saw what could be the biggest blow of all, a 3-0 reverse at Arsenal in the Uefa Champions League quarter-final first leg. Spain was stunned.
“Arsenal burns Madrid,” was the headline in El Pais, who said that “Arteta’s team dominates a timid and disorientated Madrid, who except for Mbappe’s runs was subdued. Madrid collapsed with two amazing free kicks from Declan Rice and a goal from Merino.”
It was one of the greatest results in Arsenal's history and they are clear favourites to reach only a fourth semi-final in European football’s top competition. But as the front page of Wednesday’s Marca states: “Humiliated … but for Madrid nothing is impossible.” The second leg is next Wednesday at the Bernabeu, time for the shock of the Arsenal game to sink in and get a reaction.
“Nothing in the Champions League has been more extreme than Real Madrid’s way of winning, a tightrope walker of impossible nights, a team that has walked along the sharpest edges without their heart rates rising, disconcerting rivals who fell under the weight of something they considered absurd. And that it was,” wrote El Pais. “Their falls are also extreme. The giants, as giants, collapse with a crash. Ancelotti’s team sank disappointed in Manchester under the hammer of City [4-0] and melted two years later in London burned by the meticulous conviction of Arsenal and the aim of Declan Rice, who made two astonishing free kicks. Mikel Merino’s feet made it more difficult for Real Madrid to pass to the semi-final.”
Ancelotti, usually a celebrant for his outstanding side, turned critic.
“The last 30 minutes were very bad,” said the Italian. “In the first half we did quite well, the team was organised. But with the two goals from set pieces we fell a little physically and mentally. We had no reaction, something we usually have. We were not able to make a joint reaction, a united one. We made individual plays and they penalised us. We lost order.”
Madrid have not been as imperious in Europe as usual, losing three of their eight games in the group phase. It barely seems to matter though as they almost always do enough to progress and win the competition, yet the defeat at Arsenal could have been worse.
“I know two of their three goals were free kicks, but they could have scored many more," admitted Madrid forward Jude Bellingham. “We weren’t even close. They punished us and that happens in a high-level football. That’s the truth, Arsenal were really good.”
Madrid fans will be determined to make the Bernabeu hell for Arsenal as they attempt their latest astonishing comeback. But there was praise for the English club in Spain.
“Declan Rice, settled into that stage of life we all dream of as children and only a select few can enjoy in the same match, in the best competition and against the reigning champion, unleashed two missiles into the top corner so devastating, so impressive, that he beat Courtois after one of the craziest performances – and it’s already difficult – from the Belgian goalkeeper for Madrid,” wrote El Pais. “Two direct free kicks, two impossible goals.”
And while half of those in Spain with affection for Madrid hope for better, the other half were not displeased.
“Humiliated,” is the headline on the Catalan Mundo Deportivo around a picture of one of Rice’s superb curling free kicks around Madrid’s wall, with their brilliant white shirt greyed out to show that they were almost invisible. Rice had never scored from a direct free kick in his professional career that is now in its 10th season. Then he did it twice in 12 second-half minutes. Not for nothing the cover of the Madrid based AS showed Vinicius Junior with his shirt pulled over his face and the Catalan Sport an image of Bellingham wiping his brow, dazed and confused. Arsenal were that good and Madrid weren’t.
