The Falcon picks up Ancelotti’s glove

After successfully stimulating Vinicius, to the point of turning him into one of the most unbalanced and lethal figures on the current football scene, Carlo Ancelotti has stung Fede Valverde with a challenge similar to the one he posed to the Brazilian winger when he began his second spell in the Real Madrid bench: shoot up his goalscoring production. “What surprised me about him is how little he scored, he only scored one goal last season. I told him that he has a stone in his foot, an incredible shot, today he scored with his left foot, and I told him that if he didn’t score at least ten goals he had to tear up my coaching card, “revealed the Reggiolo coach after the victory of Real Madrid against Leipzig on the second day of the Champions League group stage, forged from a goal by the versatile Uruguayan footballer who unblocked his team on a thick night.

It was Valverde’s second consecutive game seeing the door, after unraveling Mallorca last weekend with a spectacular left-footed shot at the end of a prodigious counterattack. The one from Montevideo, who had inaugurated his record of goals this season finishing off Real Madrid’s win over Celta on the second day of the League, adds to that streak the two assists he distributed against Betis, with Rodrygo as the beneficiary of a goal that he certified the whites’ sole leadership, and against Celtic in the king of Europe’s debut in this edition of the Champions League, this time with Vinicius receiving a delivery very similar to the one that validated the Fourteenth at the Stade de France .

In the space of twelve days, Valverde has been directly involved in five of the eleven goals scored in the last four games by a Real Madrid team that subdues opponents with devastating effectiveness in the second half. Chamartín’s team has signed 16 of the 22 goals that he has accumulated so far this season as of the 46th minute of the match and has not conceded a single one after passing through the dugout. Data that contrasts with the 6 he has scored and the 5 he has received in the early stages. A clear exponent of the bipolarity of a squad that overwhelms its rivals with power and physical power when their forces dwindle.

A facet in which Valverde stands out. The former Pajarito mutated into Halcón already last season, when he earned a place in the eleven in the last stretch and was a decisive piece in the Champions League final against Liverpool, which resolved a Vinicius goal after the Uruguayan burst in as a meteor in the ‘red’ rearguard and released a center-shot that the carioca took advantage of to seal the only goal of the match.

Juanito’s mirror

But Ancelotti knows that Peñarol’s ex can raise his performance even more and that’s why he squeezes him. Valverde scored six goals in his first four seasons at Real Madrid: 0 in the 25 games he played in the 2018-19 campaign, 2 in the 44 games he played in in 2019-20, 3 in 33 games in 2020 -21 and 1 in the 46 of the 2021-22. In the eight that constitute Real Madrid’s immaculate journey to date, he has already scored three goals that have made him, along with Vinicius, the whites’ most tuned footballer at the gates of Sunday’s derby at the Metropolitan.

Valverde has picked up the glove that Ancelotti threw at him and has established himself as one of the players preferred by Real Madrid for his edge but, above all, for the passion with which he lives the matches and the drive he gives to his team. Shy away from the playing field, he exudes character on the pitch, to the point that the merengue parish begins to see part of Juanito’s spirit in him. Along with the plasticity of the target that he scored against Leipzig, the rage of his celebration drew attention. “It was my way of showing the pride of Madrid, that we always have to fight”, reeled off the protagonist of the night.

But his ability to form a group and his leadership skills also stood out when he demanded the support of the public for Asensio, after the Balearic Islands player heard whistles on his way out to the pitch after the tantrum against Mallorca. «It will be seen by the cameras that when he entered I raised my hand to be applauded. It’s not nice to be whistled at, but in the end he managed to reverse the situation and it ended in applause. He is a great boy, with a lot of quality and we need him », he said of his partner.