After his side’s 2-1 defeat to Getafe, Mourinho hammered his team with heavy criticism, stating that Madrid deserved to lose.
In their first three games, Real Madrid have lost 2 and drawn 1, resulting in the Portuguese manager’s worst league start in his 12 years of football management. To make matters worse Real Madrid are now 5 points behind arch rivals, Barcelona.
“It was an unacceptable game, in this match for me it is not a frustrating defeat. We totally deserved to lose,” said Mourinho to reporters after his match.
Although he is notorious for starting off a season at his own pace, the Portuguese has never fallen so low at the beginning of a season, whether it was with Chelsea, Porto, Inter Milan, or up until recently, Madrid.
The worst start he had before now was during his 3rd tenure with Chelsea, where his side lost two of their first three matches.
Madrid seemed to be dominating in the first half of the game, with a goal from Gonzalo Higuain. However, with an open defense, Juan Valera and Abdelaziz Barrada squeezed two goals in, which resulted in the five-point gap between Real and Barcelona.
Looking at the game, it seemed evident that Real Madrid’s strikers were just not fit enough. They weren’t moving fast enough, they were lacking in confidence, they were imbalanced and as a result, they suffered the consequences.
The season may just have started, but that is all the more reason to get a good lead in the game.
With Alonso and Diarra in midfield, Real still couldn’t keep track of Valera, and hopefully, with Modric now joining Madrid for €42 million, he will be welcomed.
Other squad members’ mistakes should also be pointed out.
With Casillas ran way off his line in the first half, and narrowly skipped embarrassment when a Getafe free-kick flew right over the crossbar, where Casillas was nowhere near to be found.
“We have practiced and practiced and practiced set-pieces. There is no time to practice anymore. When there is an individual error there is nothing I can do about it” said the Portuguese manager, who seemed to be commenting about Alonso’s and Ramos’ inability
to keep track of Valera.
However, despite his disgust in his own team’s performance, Mourinho did have a few words to say about the referee, mainly with the fact that the second goal seemed to be through the aid of a handball.
With Ronaldo, Higuain and Benzema on the pitch till the 90th minute, it seemed that Real Madrid could still snatch back a couple of points, however, they did not seem to connect well, and could not do enough to save Mourinho’s pride.
So it seems that either Mourinho has not trained the team hard enough during the summer, or the team is just not reacting well enough to his methods, but it’s his third season, and he’s given them a good two seasons already.
However, he has to react quickly before the 5-point gap becomes larger.
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