Madrid Derby 2015: Real Madrid Humiliation to Open the Door for Barcelona

The look on Iker Casillas' face was a picture of despair as La Liga champions Atletico Madrid burned their illustrious rivals at the Vicente Calderon.

Diego Simeone's men won the day 4-0, proving that a Real Madrid team with Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale in it are not indestructible.

Los Blancos did have injuries for the derby match, but they fielded a side that should have been able to compete with Atleti, despite the ruthless finishing of the home side.

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Carlo Ancelotti's team managed just one shot on target on the night, per WhoScored, and the questions will now be asked of where his side goes from here.

Barcelona will sit just one point behind Real if they take care of Athletic Bilbao on Sunday, blowing the title race wide open.

Matters at the Camp Nou have been challenging this term, as Luis Enrique's regime change has left a few flummoxed.

But the Blaugrana are very much in this title race, and their best football is still to come.

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As usual, Barca fans will look towards Lionel Messi—but it is the form of Neymar that will have Ancelotti looking over his shoulder.

The Brazilian has now truly arrived in a Barcelona shirt, and his contribution to the cause has been undeniable this season.

Neymar has hit a stunning 15 goals in 14 La Liga starts this year, per WhoScored, and the wonderkid has officially grown from a boy to a man.

And Barca will now be able to smell blood in a title race, in theory, they should not be involved in, considering their upheavals and the gossip surrounding the club.

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For Madrid, the job now is to quickly dust themselves off and get back on the horse as soon as possible.

Ronaldo returned to Madrid's team after his recent suspension, but the mercurial attacker looked rusty and frustrated, as Los Blancos' stars went missing.

After the game, Ancelotti was damning in his assessments of his team and highlighted the lack of fight in his side's performance, per Dermot Corrigan of ESPN FC:

"

It is very simple to read this game. Atletico deserved to win, they beat us in every respect—in fight, play, organisation, second balls.

Why this happened, we must look at it over the next days. Clearly we are hurting a lot for this defeat, and clearly we must change our attitude, our motivation, above all to avoid a game like this happening again in future.

We all failed, we all arrived second, we lost all the tackles, all the aerial battles. We did not play the game at all. We did not have one player who played a good game.

We did not have good possession, had no chances to counter, we had nothing [in attack] today. They deserved to win this game, they were better in everything. We were worse in everything.

"

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It is interesting Ancelotti speaks about motivation and "fight," two elements team coaches rarely talk about in public, saving it for behind-closed-doors discussions.

But he chose to publicly rip into his team, and it will be fascinating to observe how individuals react to such a public dressing down.

Of course, the scoreline justifies Ancelotti's criticisms of his players, but this team features Galacticos—they are not your common local team.

There is a balance that needs to be redressed at Madrid, despite their largely strong performances this season. Bleacher Report's Guillem Balague acknowledges this, saying the derby result was no accident, with CR7 "missing" from the sharp end of the action:

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And Balague is correct. Los Blancos rarely have a plan B, and eventually all sides—especially ones who are overtly attacking—get found out by clever, tactical opponents.

Man-for-man, Atletico are not "better" than Real, but Simeone has a dedication from his team that Ancelotti seems envious of.

The success of La Decima is now a part of history and has no impact on this season's incarnation of Madrid.

And Ancelotti has seen all of this before as Chelsea boss, capturing a league and cup double to only be shown the door the following year after a slight slip in standards.

History could repeat for the Italian coach, and he will know he must act now, or Barca will attack with the predatory knowledge of a wild animal.

The real winners on Saturday night were the Catalan giants, and the Liga crown is now there for them to take.