Real Madrid News Archives

With Real Madrid already crowned champions, attention turned to the battle for European places and the fight to avoid relegation. The big news this week is that Atletico Madrid guaranteed themselves a shot at the Champions League next season, though like Barcelona they will have to get through a qualifying round in August. The last time Atletico played Champions League football was in March 1997 when they lost a quarter final tie to Ajax.

Atletico’s success this season has been based on their excellent attacking duo of Kun Agüero and Diego Forlan. Agüero has scored 18 league goals while the Uruguayan grabbed his 15th of the season in yesterday’s 1-0 victory over Deportivo. It was not an easy victory as Depor defended well, but just before half time Agüero sent Maxi Rodriguez down the left and his cross was met by Forlan with a side foot volley which crept under the body of Depor’s keeper Aouate and into the net.

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Real Madrid celebrated their 31st Liga in style by thumping rivals Barcelona 4-1 at the Santiago Bernabeu. This will have to go down as the most one-sided clasico since Ronaldinho destroyed Madrid’s defence in November 2005. How times have changed since then. Ronaldinho is only in the news now for his off the field antics, while Madrid have formed a solid compact unit that has won La Liga at a canter.

The Barcelona players suffered the shame of having to applaud their rivals onto the pitch, but by the end of the night this humiliation was nothing compared to what they experienced over 90 minutes. from the beginning Diarra, Sneijder and Gago ruled the midfield and even Leo Messi was kept completely out of the game as Barça’s midfield players struggled to connect with the forwards.

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Today’s transfer roundup starts with transfer-related news, but not a big rumor. Instead, I give two thumbs-up to Real Madrid’s Wesley Sneijder for looking out for his brother’s best interests, as he stepped in to prevent Real from making an offer to former club Ajax for his brother Rodney, a promising youth team player.

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So, what’s going on in the world of transfer rumors today? As always, chime in and chip in with opinions - and with rumors!

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Guess who’s back? That’s right, me and the transfer roundup.

The season’s winding down and the rumors are heating up, so you’ll be seeing me in this space regularly.

Anyway, on to the good stuff!

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Congratulations to Real Madrid for winning their 31st Spanish league title. It’s been a funny old season in Spain so perhaps it was appropriate that Madrid should come from behind and score twice in the last five minutes when they were down to ten men to win 1-2 at Osasuna. Villarreal are looking good for second place after a 2-0 victory over Getafe, while Barcelona who seem to be in a serious crisis surprised everyone by walloping Valencia 6-0. Some might be more surprised by the fact that Thierry Henry played well and scored twice!

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According to Forbes.com Manchester United have been valued at $1.8 billion, ahead of the club traditionally known as the richest club in football (Real Madrid, $1.285 billion) and their chief domestic rivals Arsenal ($1.2 billion), Liverpool ($1.05 billion) and Chelsea ($764 million).

Have fun sorting the lists according to different criteria. Here are some highlights:

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Real Madrid need just two points from their remaining four matches to seal their 31st La Liga title after comfortably beating Athletic Bilbao 3-0 at the Bernabeu on Sunday evening. Barcelona are in big danger of losing out on second place to Villarreal. The Catalans obviously had their minds on Tuesday’s return match with Manchester United and were easily beaten by Deportivo, while Villarreal won at Betis to move four points above Barça. At the bottom of the table Levante became the first team to be mathematically relegated after losing to Recreativo.

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If there was any doubt that Real Madrid are going to win their 31st La Liga title, it was dispelled after their 0-2 victory over Racing Santander. With a ten point advantage over closest rivals Villarreal, Madrid now need just five points from their remaining five games and they will now be hoping to clinch the title before the home game against arch enemies Barcelona on May 7 which will mean the Catalans will face the embarrassment of having to applaud their rivals onto the pitch.

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Apparently, these clubs have (or have had) players with the most Champions League semifinal appearances.

Before you go through the list, try guessing who’d be on this list. Several Italians, of course, which is where Juve / Milan come in, and then there is the Madrid - Chelsea connection (bonus points if you can think of the 2nd player before peeking at the list), and there’s a record-breaking Champions League winner and a couple of underachieving continental strikers to round off the list.

Here’s the list:

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Here’s a list of the top scorers in this year’s Champions League (so far), plus their career stats for the Champions League:

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Real Madrid moved another step closer to their 31st La Liga title with an uninspiring 1-0 victory over relegation bound Murcia. Barcelona have more or less said adios to their title hopes after only drawing at Recreativo, but the big news this week is the almost certain sale of Ronaldinho to AC Milan. The Brazilian will reportedly be on a meagre €150,000 a week for his new club. Villarreal slipped back down to third place after losing 1-0 at Almeria.

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This can be a difficult time of the season for strong recommendations as title hopes evaporate; teams get lost in mid-table mediocrity with little to play for and those resigned to their fate fail to perform to expectation.

But there are some interesting clashes this weekend as in Serie A six of the top seven take each other on. In the Premier League, Arsenal’s season will finish early unless they can win at Old Trafford. There’s much to be decided at the bottom of the Bundesliga as any three from five could still be relegated and two of them meet this weekend. Ligue 1 is even less defined as only six points separates 12th from 19th and four of the bottom five have the same number of points. Only in Spain could nearly everything top and bottom of the table be resolved this weekend.

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The 2008 Emirates Cup kicks of on 2nd August this year in preparation for the 2008/2009 season.

The tournament will mark Ranieri’s return to London as Juventus take on hosts Arsenal along with Hamburg and Real Madrid. The competition is played in a Group format with three points for a win, one for a draw and an additional point for each goal scored.

Inter Milan were amongst the entrants in the 2007 edition, but the Nerazzurri finished at the bottom of the pack after defeats against Valencia and winners Arsenal.

Emirates Cup schedule:

August 2:
Real Madrid v Hamburg – 2pm
Arsenal v Juventus – 4.15pm

August 3:
Juventus v Hamburg – 2pm
Arsenal v Real Madrid – 4.15pm

It’s a good sign for Arsenal and for English football (not to mention the capital of world football) that such illustrious sides with rich traditions will play part in a friendly tournament at the Emirates.

The top three all failed to win this week but Real Madrid who played badly will be the happiest with their 1-1 draw at Mallorca which leaves them seven points clear with seven games to go. Barcelona played better than in recent weeks but will be most disappointed with their 0-0 draw at home to Getafe, especially after hitting the post three times. Villarreal stay in second place on head-to-head goal difference despite losing 2-0 at Sevilla.

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Stuttgart have slapped a 50m euros price tag on Mario Gomez, in a manner reminiscent of Lyon’s incessant posturing that comes every year before they sell their star player in the summer (usually to Madrid or Chelsea, or Barcelona have been the beneficiaries as well).

Mario Gomez is in demand right now and if he goes with (and stars for) Germany in Euro 2008, his value will go even higher. Once Gomez decides to leave for greener pastures, it’s going to be very difficult for Suttgart to keep him from going to Spain (Madrid, Barcelona) or England (Manchester United and Chelsea).

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As a rule, I don’t believe anything that comes out of Real Madrid. But the following statement made by current Real Madrid manager Bernd Schuster about Manchester United winger Cristiano Ronaldo is a bit interesting:

“He’s the star at Manchester United and until they win the Champions League and another league title or two then they aren’t going to let him go. So in the short term I don’t think it will be possible to sign him.

But in a couple of years, yes, I believe he could be wearing the white shirt at the Bernabeu.”

This is interesting because it’s the classic template for pissing the hell out of others.

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In the most expensive transfer in the history of professional sports, Real Madrid have committed to paying 100m for Manchester United’s Cristiano Ronaldo.

In a move that David Gill described as ‘the textbook definition of too-good-to-refuse’, Manchester United will net £100m upfront and take off around £6m / year from their bloated wage bill. If there was ever a profit to be made, the American owners have made it here.

This is all part of Manchester United’s plan to pay off their debt by 21 December 2012, and along with selling Ronaldo to Real Madrid they are also poised to sell several other players to leading European clubs.

Ronaldo will move to Real Madrid in July after the Euro 2008 championship in the summer, signing a mind-boggling deal that:

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After weeks of inconsistency Real Madrid found their form again to defeat Sevilla this weekend and take a big step towards their 31st La Liga title. Barcelona, however, threw away a two-goal lead at Betis which sees them slip back to seven points behind Madrid and allowed Villarreal to move above them into second place after a fine 3-0 victory over Atletico Madrid.

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Anyone who thought La Liga was over has been proved wrong again. Every week it gets more and more crazy as Real Madrid and Barcelona try to outdo each other to see who can waste most chances. This week Barça did not play well but 17-year-old Bojan Krkic scored twice as they beat Valladolid 4-1, while Madrid played well going forward but paid the price for defensive mistakes, losing 2-3 at home to Ronald Koeman’s Valencia.

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When last season the Spanish title race was pulled down to the wire with three teams in contention for the trophy going into the ultimate round of matches, there was a whisper of hope rippling across the nation and especially among the Spanish football commentators that the duopoly could be broken at last.

Real Madrid might have won their 30th La Liga trophy in history and FC Barcelona might have finished second level on points but Sevilla FC had finished third 5 points off the pace and Valencia CF had been in the title chase until the last weeks of the season in what had been one of the most exciting Spanish championship campaign in years.

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Hugo has an interesting article up today on back-up goalkeepers - and one of the points he makes is how first-choice keepers, when demoted to the bench, become easily frustrated and move off to greener pastures.

Hugo:

…it is in this light that we can see the desertion of a trio of excellent goalies from a Liverpool side that seems to have delighted in stockpiling exciting guardians: we are talking, of course, about Scott Carson, Chris Kirkland and Jerzy Dudek, although the latter rather insanely opted to join Real Madrid, where he is kept out of the side by a goalkeeper in Iker Casillas who is a good deal better than the man who had blocked his path at Liverpool!

Both Casillas and Reina are top-quality keepers. Both are young (Casillas turns 27 in May, Reina 26 in August), in their prime and have been on top form for quite some time now. Both are considered indispensable to their clubs (Casillas is Real Madrid for life and a club icon, and one suspects that Reina may reach the same status if he stays on at Liverpool). Along with Gigi Buffon, Petr Cech and Edwin van der Sar, these two are considered among the best goalkeepers in the world (Reina is easily one of the best keepers in the Premier League - and stats-wise, perhaps even better in the last two seasons).

So the question is - who is better - Casillas or Reina? More importantly, does the defence in front of the keeper matter (Liverpool have a better defensive record than Real Madrid), and what criteria should we use to find out which keeper is better?

I write a lot about the English Championship and in that league the top four, Stoke City, Bristol City, Watford and West Brom, are all doing their level best not to get automatic promotion. Only Stoke have won in their last two games, and that is one in five for them. The rest of the teams can’t buy a win. Despite that, the chasing pack are making no inroads because they can’t win either.

I thought this was because it was a tough league and there were no outstanding teams in it. However, a glance around the top leagues in Europe will show that teams at the top everywhere are trying not to win their leagues.

What is going on? Worldwide corruption? Teams unable to handle the pressure?

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It seems as if neither of Spain’s big two really want to win La Liga this season. Real Madrid’s defeat at Deportivo was their eighth defeat in 2008 and thet have now lost four of their last seven league games. Barcelona have consistantly blown their chances of capitalizing on their rivals mistakes: this weekend they twice surrendered the lead and had to settle for a 2-2 draw at Almeria which leaves them seven points behind Madrid with ten games remaining.

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It really is a crazy time in La Liga. At the end of January Real Madrid had a nine point advantage over rivals Barcelona, two weeks ago that difference was reduced to two points, but Barça’s successive defeats against Atletico Madrid and Villarreal have given Real Madrid the chance to move eight points clear with only eleven games to go. Surely Madrid won’t let it slip again now.

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There are some occasions when a big performance from the referee is needed. Of course it would be more pleasant if referees did their jobs well every match, but that is not possible. That being said you would expect that Europe’s top club competition, where Europe’s top players, top managers, best stadiums and on occasion the best crowds are showcased, would also be home to the best referees. Unfortunately that is hardly the case as we saw last night at the Santiago Bernabeu.

With AS Roma taking a 2-1 lead to Madrid for the second leg, they were looking to hold on to it (we all know…); Real Madrid on the other hand were desperate to avoid another premature exit from the Champions League. This ensured that the game would be scrappy and with dirty tactics employed by both sides. The referee needed to be on top of his game to give Real Madrid a fair chance at qualification or AS Roma a way back into the match in case Los Blancos scored. Here is what happened:

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Well, that was a surprise. No, not Real Madrid losing at home to Roma (bye bye Schuster, hello Jose?), although Roma must be commended for their excellent efforts (for full coverage, read Chris’s live blog / report).

No, the surprise was seeing Liverpool fans searching on Google for information on the 2nd leg game against Inter (easily outstripping the search efforts of Chelsea fans, so there’s one debate settled about which club has more fans) - apparently a large contingent of Reds thought that Liverpool were playing this Wednesday. What, Hicks and Gillett are too busy dragging the club through mud to send you guys a memo?

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It’s a night of magic in Madrid. Magic like the touches of Totti, magic like the saves of Doni and the tackles of Juan, magic like the goals of Taddei and Vucinic, magic like only Roma can be (they’re nicknamed “La Maggica” in the Italian capital). The home factor of the Estadio Santiago Bernabéu did not work this time: what the Spanish call “miedo escénico” (scenic fear) did not even graze the Giallorossi as they stepped into the footballing heart of Madrid. No sir, Francesco Totti & friends travelled to Spain with the firm belief that an exploit was possible, that beating the team with the most UEFA Champions League titles (in their home stadium!) was not a pipe dream.

Tonight’s victory is in large part the merit of Luciano Spalletti, firm believer of his team’s potential, uncompromising in modifying their attacking style, and proving dead wrong those who said that playing in such a way will never get you significant results. It is also the victory of everyone else on the Roma roster, but in particular Juan, Daniele De Rossi, Alberto Aquilani, and Mirko Vucinic, absolutely royal in their performance. Yes, royal, because there was only one king in Spain tonight and it wasn’t Madrid: the Giallorossi traveled to the big monster’s lair, brought the Spanish giant down to its knees, and returned pride to Italian football. Grazie Roma.
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Everything is ready for Real Madrid vs. Roma. Giallorossi supporters have arrived in the Spanish capital, ready to face off against their Merengues opponents in a battle stadium chants. Meanwhile, the two managers Bernd Schuster and Luciano Spalletti have already begun their ‘battle of the mind’: a tactical showdown which will determine who holds the key to this game, whose nerves will fail and whose will prevail, who will be left standing at the end of the second leg. Roma was victorious in the first encounter at Stadio Olimpico, but the away goal scored by Real may prove very costly to the Giallorossi… which of the two clubs will reign supreme?

Meanwhile players, Real Madrid’s and Roma’s alike, have been training hard and are fretting in anticipation of the big match. I am talking about all players of course, but in particular two of them: Francesco Totti and Fabio Cannavaro, will will be the protagonists on a veritable ‘match-within-a-match’ on Wednesday night. Riccardo Pratesi of La Gazzetta dello Sport introduces us to this epic battle.

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