Real Madrid Annihilate Malmo to Set Themselves Both a Template and a Challenge

Only 15 minutes remained and the substitute board went into the air, prompting the Bernabeu's PA system into action. 

If you haven't experienced it before, the Bernabeu's PA system can often feel like it's assaulting your ears. Thanks to the very liberal use of the volume knob and one of football's more excitable announcers, it can roar even when the football doesn't. So when the scoreboard reads 8-0...

"Mateooooooo Kovaciiiiiiiiiic," it blared on Tuesday with Real Madrid leading Malmo by that scoreline. The Croatian received a warm applause as he left the pitch following his best performance since joining the club. As he did, a figure wearing a No. 21 shirt emerged from the dugout. It was Denis Cheryshev. The same Denis Cheryshev who'd been at the centre of "Cadizazo." The same Denis Cheryshev whose name had been whistled when announced at the Bernabeu three days earlier—not for what he'd done personally, but for what he symbolised. 

But this time the mood was different. Amid a gentle applause for the Russian, only a handful of whistles could be heard; of all moments, this was the one in which to bring him on. "It's much easier for a delighted public to accept an apology," said AS rather neatly.

And in a sense, that's what Tuesday night served as: an apology.

Following a wretched week that brought more unwanted attention and heightened the sense that this is a club botching almost everything it touches in 2015, Real Madrid needed to give those connected to the club something to smile about, reasons for optimism. A 4-1 victory over Getafe on Saturday hadn't quite done it; something more was needed, and they knew it.

Winning 8-0 counts as something more. 

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In a furious blitz at the Bernabeu on Tuesday, goals one, two and three came in a hurry; after half-time, four, five and six came even faster, and as they did, double figures looked not only possible but likely.

On his own, Cristiano Ronaldo got four, Karim Benzema bagged three and, by the end, it was almost surprising that the collective tally was only eight, which feels absurd to type and probably sounds even more ridiculous to read. 

Yet, in the immediate aftermath, you wondered where this performance had come from given what had gone before it. You wondered what it was. Was it a new beginning? A sort of culmination? An outlier?

It was hard to know, but what it should become was obvious: a template. 

Too often this Real Madrid outfit is guilty of playing only halves of games. After goals, the team regularly stops; in general play, they rarely look interested in sustaining intensity on both sides of the ball.

Indeed, 45-minute performances have seemed to satisfy them, and this is a team that typically doesn't recover the ball quickly. Or press with any intent. Or chase. Or harass. Or tackle. Whereas some sides refuse to let their opposition have the ball, Real Madrid sometimes appear as though they're content to wait until it's given back to them.

And that's why Tuesday night's performance was notable. 

PIERRE-PHILIPPE MARCOU/Getty Images

Even as the scoreboard grew more and more lopsided, Real Madrid had a relentless edge to them that's rarely evident. After three goals had gone in, they kept running. After six had gone in, they kept running. After eight had gone in, they kept running. But it was more than that, too.

Over and over, Madrid forced turnovers and mistakes from Malmo in their own half, swarming the visitors in a manner that was ferocious even if it wasn't exactly methodical or systematic. On his own, Danilo had eight tackles, Casemiro had four and Mateo Kovacic also four, per WhoScored.com. A host of others laid two or three, the numbers indicative of a go-again mentality that was, well, new. 

The proof? In a game in which they dominated possession, dominated the shot count and utterly annihilated their opponents on the scoreboard, Real Madrid did what you theoretically don't do in such circumstances and set a season-high for tackles with 27.

For comparison, against Sevilla that number was eight; against Barcelona it was 14. Their season average hadn't been much more.  

Thus, what we saw at the Bernabeu on Tuesday was a vastly inferior Malmo side have its deficiencies brutally exposed by a Real Madrid team that finally coupled talent with work rate. The nonchalance shelved, the casualness that borders on arrogance put aside, Madrid for the first time in a long time looked like a unit and not just a collection of players. 

That's a template. 

Now the challenge is to do it again. And again. And again.

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