(Photo by Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images)
It's too early to predict what the future holds for Manuel Pellegrini and his team, but it is confirmed after three matches that the football played by Real Madrid will be beautiful.
Real Madrid has adopted a football style much like Arsenal—quick short passes and fluid movement, the style is so hauntingly similar that Real Madrid found it very hard to break packed defenses for two and a half games.
Real Madrid's football is good but it is not flawless, they still have some positions in the field to be sorted out, which I will be pointing to in my analysis.
Defense
Players Used: Michel Salgado, Miguel Torres, Gabriel Heinze, Marcelo, Royston Drenthe, Cristoph Metzelder, Pepe, and Ezequil Garay
The defense looked quite solid in all the matches, the center backs-Pepe, Metzelder, and Garay were exceptional, so were the right-backs.
Michel Salgado did not look like he was 33 years old and Metzelder looks hungry for a place in the squad and has put up three amazing performances. Pepe has been world-class, no mistakes from him, pretty solid at the back. Miguel Torres and Garay were decent, too.
The only problem in defense was the left-back position, which was constantly being attacked in every match and Marcelo and Drenthe weren't looking exactly at ease while defending, letting the teams create their attacks.
The possible remedy for the left-back problem is Alvaro Arbeloa, who would be confirmed as a Real Madrid player today, although Arbeloa is a right-back, he will be deployed as left-back—the position where he has played some matches for Liverpool.
Midfield
Players Used: Esteban Granero, Fernando Gago, Lassana Diarra, Cristiano Ronaldo, Arjen Robben, Tebar, Wesley Sneijder, Rafael Van der Vaart, Guti, Dani Parejo
The center of midfield is a quite worrisome place for Real Madrid, the pairing of Gago and Lass is truly annoying to watch, as neither Gago or Lass can deliver exceptional defense-splitting passes.
Gago may be called as the next Redondo, but surely he isn't, he shows his brilliance in patches, otherwise he is as dull as anything. Lass has been brilliant but he has been guilty of stupid passing and dribbling unnecessarily. But the ball recovery from Gago and Lass has been good and even Pellegrini pointed that out.
Passing from Guti was off too, he was nowhere near his best. But he was working really hard.
Cristiano Ronaldo came to his "running all over the defense" self the previous game only, and will get into his rhythm after a game or two more. Arjen Robben was okay, not great.
Esteban Granero, whatever praise given to him will fall short of describing his quality, possibly the brightest spark in the Real Madrid midfield at the moment. He even got the most amazing welcome against Al-Itihad, the crowd was chanting his name although he played just 20 minutes in his Bernabeu debut.
Granero scored one and assisted one against Liga de Quito. It was nice to see his pirate celebration—he covers one of his eye with his hand as if his hand was an eye-patch. Surely Granero would be better than Gago, he should be starting ahead of Gago.
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