Ancelotti demands more pick and shovel in defense

Courtois stops Sergio León's great header, on Friday in Valladolid. CESAR MANSO (AFP)

At midnight on Friday, in the intestines of José Zorrilla, Hazard consulted his cell phone leaning against a wall, Asensio asked the members of the expedition when they were leaving, everyone asked Vinicius for photos and, while the managers left the stadium , Carlo Ancelotti was chatting with Ronaldo Nazario, the owner of Valladolid.

A few minutes ago, the Italian coach, despite the hasty victory (0-2), had once again lamented the cracks in Madrid's defensive system.

"The team has not been compact," he warned in his brief appearance.

Before and after the World Cup, with the initial streak of 16 games unbeaten and after the first results curves, the white coach has not stopped warning about the problems with the team's protection shield.

Almost always, on his own initiative, without the need for anyone to push him and using very similar arguments.

“The key to the success of last season was the defense.

In recent times, we have lost some duels and the team is not always compact, ”he warned in October, when he had not yet lost.

"We lacked the forcefulness of the rival and concentration in individual duels," he complained to the scolding of Vallecas (3-2), in the days before 13 of his players left for Qatar.

“We have scored many goals and we have defended less well than the previous season.

In the second part [of the course] you have to do better”,

Carletto claimed in his first post-Doha press conference, before traveling to Pucela.

A day later, with the victory assured, he insisted on hitting.

"Balance" has always been one of his key words to explain his vision of football, the balance that Xavi's first Barça lacked -according to his analysis- and that he tried to punish, and the balance that he now demands from his dressing room after a first stretch of some mismatches.

Beyond recovering the best performance from Benzema and one more point from Courtois, decisive in Valladolid, the pitfall of all in defense is the margin for improvement of a team that has struggled to offer a finished performance, from start to finish.

In that task backwards, he no longer has the corrective factor of Casemiro and sometimes he also misses more withdrawal from the men above.

The balance of goals for and against in the first 22 games (52-20) does not present major changes compared to last year at this point (51-18).

However, the thermometer of clean sheets does offer a mismatch: 39% last season (in 22 of 56 games) compared to 27% of the current one (only six have not conceded).

In the League, the percentage is even worse: 20%.

Carletto's first concern

The move to Valladolid was one of the only three matches in the tournament that Madrid ended with the door closed (Getafe and Elche out, the others), and it was not precisely due to the good general functioning, as Ancelotti warned, but to the stretches of the best Courtois.

Perhaps the most decisive of this campaign.

The numbers and feelings of the Belgian goalkeeper when he went to the World Cup were not the best.

His save percentage (68.4%) was 13th in the championship, far behind Ter Stegen (84.4%), Rulli (82%) and his version last season in the League (75.2% until raised the title).

Punished in October for the sciatic nerve, Zorrilla's was his first match in the tournament without receiving.

The defensive system was already Ancelotti's first concern on his return to the Bernabéu in the summer of 2021. During the first two months of competition, he did not stop demanding a better display.

In those beginnings, he tried to raise the line of defenders to press up, however, the problem was solved the other way around: with the so-called low block to adapt to the conditions of a midfield that no longer moved (Casemiro, Kroos and Modric ).

Until that adjustment took place, the percentage of clean sheets was 30%;

later, 41%.

Now the solutions cannot be identical because Madrid changed a positional pivot (Casemiro) for a more mobile one (Tchouameni), and the World Cup condition has forced them and will force them to make more rotations, at least in these first two months of 2023, with a very condensed calendar and players in different states of physical shape.

An unprecedented scenario, as Ancelotti has warned several times, in which the Italian will seek to readjust the defensive shield.

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