Zinedine Zidane does it again as Real Madrid pulls back from the sidelines Real Madrid

ONE Shortly after eleven on Saturday night, Zinedine Zidane was at the bench where he began his coaching career against Getafe B, ahead of three European Cups and the league title, before stepping out again and winning another title, best of his last Derby win against Atlético Madrid.

At one end, two men with a ladder took off the net where Dani Carvajal had scored the second goal shortly before – a great shot that hit off the post and Jan Oblak – but it wasn’t. It was not Casemiro’s start either. And it wasn’t Thibaut Courtois’ salvation to concede a goal. Instead there was a shrug, a smile and then Zidane said, “Everything.”

“There were three very important points, but it’s a little bit of everything. It was a complete performance, the win and the way we did it: Against a team that we know are very good and have played 26 games without defeat. And I am happy. “

He had left and done it again. Atlético were leaders, “favorites,” said Zidane. Six points ahead of Madrid with a game in hand, they faced perhaps the best chance of winning the league, even better than then. This was their strongest and deepest squad and they dominated the games and not only decided them. They had won seven times in a row, never lost a game, and never failed. They had cashed twice in ten games. But now Madrid had left so many behind in one night and suffered a first division defeat since February – the last time they faced each other.

But that wasn’t all Zidane had done again. He survived. It’s a bit absurd to describe the most successful manager the European Cup has had as a survivor, but it’s also true. Overcoming another ultimatum, he was still standing, still smiling. Beat by Cádiz, Alavés and Valencia, beaten twice by Shakhtar Donetsk, the team that left five and none behind, this could have been the week Real Madrid’s season ended. Instead, this week has finally started.

Within seven days, Madrid met Sevilla, Borussia Mönchengladbach and Atlético Madrid. At the end of that run, they could have left Atlético 12 points behind after playing one more game and being eliminated from the Champions League for the first time in the group stage. Do that and Zidane would be out too. But they didn’t, at least in part because Zidane would be out. Instead, Madrid won 1-0 at Sánchez Pizjuán, defeating Gladbach to win the group before beating Atalanta in the last 16, and then beating Atlético.

Atlético’s win would have given them a bigger lead over their rivals than either side would have overturned to win the title – but the gap is now three points, with AS leading in “Madrid promotion aboard the league”. Marca decided: “Madrid revive the league”. As Zidane said, it wasn’t just that they had won, it was the way they had won, and they affirmed a superiority that was so evident that you felt like you could be champions again will. “Madrid turned things like a sock,” said a report – which doesn’t say much about their hygiene and which somehow you always knew they would do.

Thomas Lemar missed an absolute sitter who could have reached Atlético. The two goals that Madrid scored were a header from a corner and an own goal, that’s true too. But it is just as true that when Thibaut Courtois rescued from Saúl Ñíguez late, the only stop he made was. “They were better than us, more intense,” said Atlético captain Koke. “In the first half we weren’t ourselves.”

The cynic might suspect that was the case: On Saturday, Atlético’s most recent change in style was abandoned, as was always likely, and another evolutionary process remained incomplete. When it came to that, Atlético didn’t believe in their new selves and that Madrid still had a strange influence on them.

Diego Simeone has spoken about how Luis Suárez has conditioned the way Atletico play, forcing them to move closer to the opposition’s goal: there is no point in playing against him for a long time and leaving him out behind the defense. That, in turn, benefited João Félix, perhaps the most outstanding player of the season. However, on Saturday, Suarez had 10 goals before being withdrawn after 70 minutes and replaced by a defensive midfielder. João Félix had left 10 minutes earlier and stepped angrily in his place. Atlético’s three-man central defense didn’t work, the broad men – Kieran Trippier and Yannick Carrasco – were more like full-backs than strikers and couldn’t escape from the depths. And they saw Madrid pass 150 more passports, this new identity was reversed.

“The manager got it wrong,” said Simeone, underscored by his decision to move the formation and make three changes during the break, with both strikers removed soon after – a decision partly motivated by a desire to limit the damage. “As a leader, it is about the points you have, but also a state of mind,” Orfeo Suárez wrote in El Mundo. Atlético lacked that, he argued, and he was not alone. “They have withdrawn into their Middle Ages”, AS complained, “in order to prototypeCholismo.In Marca, Roberto Palomar insisted: “It is the syndrome of regression; It’s okay to lose to Madrid, but not like the old days. “

It was a game, however, the formation was well known – just as it has been in the past, more successful weeks – it would be a leap to point out that they had resigned on purpose and the intention to keep playing showed in how they did for Madrid’s first Chance were caught and the opening target. Also, there was another reason Atlético Madrid wasn’t doing very well: Real Madrid.

They were what they should be. The club’s institutional director, Emilio Butragueño, was asked to explain Madrid’s performance and said: “Well, we have very good players.” When asked about Toni Kroos and Luka Modric, Zidane replied: “Pffff, well … they are damn great. But all what? Kroos and Modric are extraordinary, that’s true. Benzema: What should I say? Lucas Vázquez, our captain [Sergio Ramos]Rafa [Varane], everyone, everyone … “

It was classic Zidane, always about her, not him, and there’s something in there. In the best case, there is still no midfield trio like Modric, Kroos and Casemiro. Against Atlético, Kroos completed 87 of 90 passes; Against Gladbach, Modric rolled back the years and any opponent who was stupid enough to get too close. Karim Benzema was great again: “If you like football, you like Karim,” said Zidane. And there is no big game player like Ramos, maybe anywhere else: a man with a sense of occasion and a taste for the epic, a feel for the moments that really matter. “When they’re on, they’re on,” Zidane said last week. This week they had to be.

There is something about immediate goals that drives them that may be only human in nature. There are priorities in life, moments when everything else is left behind, when everyday life gives way to something bigger or more important, moments when the danger of losing brings a realization of what you have, a renewed seriousness. Madrid have won three European Cups in a row but Zidane always insisted that the league made him happier knowing how elusive constancy can be. This is the team that viewed the 2019-20 La Liga season as a post-pandemic sprint more than just a slog of the season. This season it won in Barcelona and Seville, beat the Internazionale twice and now defeated them – the team could not have anyone else.

In seven crucial days, Real Madrid stepped back from the abyss, just as you always knew. Not least because they needed it and because Zidane needed them – as he did before the Clásico and in Istanbul last season. As a tightrope walker, as one columnist called him, he had made it back to the other side.

Make no mistake, it wasn’t an outside conversation that marginalized Zidane; it was a conversation from within. Much is made of his relationship with key locker room characters, especially the veterans he turned to. It’s often, at best, a backhand compliment that deliberately overlooks tactical ideas – Modric and Kroos, for example, play far on Saturdays to overload the wings – and make it sound easy or dismiss it as insignificant when sometimes it’s all. Madrid’s reaction was to feel “not touching our Zidane” which would result in a brilliant Machiavellian representation of leaks from above – a reaction that has been sought and secured. The question they and others are asking is why Madrid isn’t always like this. “It’s hard to know, but it’s an unusual season,” said Carvajal.

“Everyone is talking about it,” said Casemiro. “But many teams have ups and downs, that’s normal. It is as it is; There are tons of games, no time. It’s not an excuse, but we’re not machines. It’s not just about intensity, it’s about playing well. We also need to talk about football. It’s easy to talk about Toni and Luka. You can see them playing on the field and you can see the manager’s hand too.

“It’s not just the players; It is also the coaching team that studies things. And it’s not about who comes out stronger: Real Madrid come out stronger. You can see that we trust the manager, but it’s not just for him: it’s our pride, the badge, the club. You can see we’re in it together. “