Vinicius & Rodrygo: Rise, Fall & Real Madrid Form

Five months have elapsed since Real Madrid and Salzburg see their faces for the first time in an official match-they had previously done so in a friendly played in August 2019 that was resolved with the victory of the whites thanks to a lonely goal by Eden Hazard-, but it seems to have passed an eternity according to the changes operated in the set of chamartín, which will cross again with the Austrian painting in the Austrian box Around Thursday to Friday (3:00 hours / Dazn) with the passport to the round of 16 of the Club World Cup at stake. Carlo Ancelotti is no longer on the bench of the fifteen times king of Europe but Xabi Alonso, Dean Huijsen and Trent Alexander-Arnold have arrived to sew a defense made, while other members of the squad that will repeat duel with the ‘red bulls’ have changed their fate with respect to that lawsuit held on January 22 in the Santiago Bernabéu.

Rodrygo and Vinicius were then the great protagonists of the win with which Real Madrid cleared the black clouds that censed on Chamartín in the League phase of the new Champions League. A Rodrygo double in the first part on track the victory of the White, which was certified in the second half with a goal of Mbappé and a new double, this time of Vinicius. The Ancelotti squad, which had reached the seventh day of its favorite competition in a delicate situation after having added only nine points in the first six dates, dodged the cliff lying to the block directed by Thomas Letsch on a night in which the Bernabéu danced to the rhythm of Samba.

However, the brilliant performance of the two Brazilian extremes of Real Madrid that Wednesday has given way to the darkness in which both are currently mired and that is subject to concern for Xabi Alonso before a meeting in which whites could be enough to even be enough for a draw with goals to seal the pass to eighth as first of the group.

Vinicius, who started in the two previous days of the Club World Cup, has only scored four goals and has distributed six assists in the 27 games he has played with Real Madrid since that win to Salzburg in the Champions League. The last one arrived on April 16, in the quarter -final return of the maximum continental competition against Arsenal. Since then he has not returned to see door with his team, although he did on June 11 in the victory of Brazil against Paraguay that sealed the passport of the ‘Canarinha’ for the World Cup of 2026. Despite that disturbing drought, the ‘7’ keeps its status intact and was the main offensive reference in the two initial appointments of the new era with Xabi Alonso at the control of combat Mbappé.

Caught in the tunnel

Rodrygo’s case is even more worrying. The ’11’ has barely registered three goals and five assists from the review European litigation with Salzburg and remains caught in a tunnel that calls on its continuity in Real Madrid. A week after scoring his double against the Austrian painting, he also doubled the Brest and wet against Atlético in the round of 16 of the Champions League. But since that distant March 4, he has collected a disappointment after another. He played background in the final of the Copa del Rey and did not dress again until the match against the Hilal. Xabi Alonso gave him ownership in his first function as Real Madrid coach, threatened with a shot from the front of the area that came out licking the crossbar and delivered the pass with which Gonzalo García advanced to the whites. It looked a ray of light for Osasco’s ray. Or a mirage, because four days later he remained unpublished to Pachuca. He did not even warm up in a commitment in which Xabi threw Brahim and even the quarry Víctor Muñoz before the Paulista.

Thus, the match against Salzburg that will host the Financial Field Lumen of Philadelphia can shed more light with respect to the future of the former Santos, which has several Premier League teams very attentive to the clues that Xabi Alonso offers. Leaving him out of the equation could be equivalent to showing the exit door, although if Real Madrid chooses to sell him to pay part of the investment in signings that he is undertaking, he should take advantage of the tournament as a showcase so that he does not continue to depreciate a footballer whose current market value is around 90 million euros.