Staff Roundtable – Grading Real Madrid’s summer transfer window
By Alex McVey
That’s it! Silly season is finally over. #DeadlineDay is past, and the transfer window has slammed shut. We here at The Real Champs decided to take a look back and evaluate Real Madrid’s summer transfer business. How did Real Madrid do?
Aakanksha Sharma – Staff Writer:
B-
Astute investment in young talent like last year by buying Hernandez and Ceballos. Bringing back players on loan after they get first team experience elsewhere – Mayoral and Llorente. Selling players who don’t fit in the system anymore – James and Danilo.
Small complaint – should have gotten De Gea this season, no possible logic to delay the move. Massive complaint – gaping hole in strikers. Short-sighted decision to let Morata go, should have given him the nod over Benzema. If he was hell bent on leaving, should have replaced him with a quality striker (not Mbappe at 180 though). That’s the big negative for me and that’s the reason why they won’t win the treble in my view.
Kristofer McCormack – Staff Writer
B
It would have taken a really special form of sabotage to come out of this transfer window worse than last year. Llorente and Vallejo guaranteed quality depth, Ceballos and Hernandez are fantastic bonuses. Only reason I didn’t give an A is because we sold Morata.
Ahmed Genina – Staff Writer
B
Had it not been for me realizing that Benzema has become priceless for Florentino Perez and Zinedine Zidane, I would’ve given this transfer window a C. Selling Morata and James wasn’t a transfers management fault. Rather, it was Zidane being unable to integrate one of the lads (James) into the starting 11, while the other (Morata) wanted more playing time than the coach offered.
Perez has successfully managed to compensate for the departure of James with the arrival of Dani Ceballos. The ex Real Betis player is young, Spanish, very promising, and above all he suits Zidane’s tactics more than James.
On the other hand, Morata wasn’t properly compensated. Mayoral is a good investment for the future. However for the time being, he is a downgrade from Morata last season.
The defense didn’t go as well as the midfield though. What disappointed me is letting go of Pepe. I’ve always thought that having three world class centre backs is very beneficial. It’s almost mandatory for any team aiming to win every trophy available. In other words, Vallejo is definitely another commendable addition from Perez and Zidane, especially when considering the future. Nonetheless he is definitely a downgrade from Pepe.
Ben Sundock – Editor.
B
It was a very quiet summer in Real Madrid terms, only purchasing two players in Theo Hernandez and Dani Ceballos. I expected President Perez to have a relatively slow summer, however, so it didn’t come as much of a surprise that he only signed two players.
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I think bringing in promising talent for cheap before they hit their prime is a great change in approach from the past few years when the club would shell out the big bucks to bring in a “Galactico” player like James Rodriguez or Toni Kroos. Ceballos and Theo will work into the squad some this year, but are long-term projects which I’m a fan of.
On the selling side this summer, the departures of James, Pepe, and Danilo were not surprising to me or a big deal (thank God Danilo is gone. No more headaches or own goals!). However, I don’t understand selling both Alvaro Morata to Chelsea and Mariano Diaz to Lyon.
Why sell away all the striker depth and bring in nothing to replace them? It’s a real head scratcher.
Bringing Marcos Llorente and Jesus Vallejo back from loan is a very smart move and they will provide great depth to the squad. I would give Real Madrid a solid B for this summer’s transfers. Not great, not horrible. Pretty average.
Alex McVey – Editor.
C
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think Real Madrid did poorly in the transfer market. I just think they missed some key opportunities that they might later regret.
Real Madrid missed out on the chance of signing two world-class youngsters, in Gianluigi Donnarumma and Kylian Mbappé.
Bringing in Donnarumma would have allowed Madrid to have two world-class keepers vying for the first spot and would have meant a smaller drop-off in quality of Keylor Navas were injured this season.
Yes, Theo, Ceballos, Llorente and Mayoral are all excellent young squad players whose inclusion will help the squad depth and will allow Zidane to continue his rotation scheme.
But in Alvaro Morata, Real Madrid had their second most prolific striker last year. And James Rodriguez was banging in assists left and right, despite scant playing time. As I discussed on the last Real Champs’ Podcast, together James and Morata accounted for 39 of Real Madrid’s La Liga and Champions League goals.
Kylian Mbappe would have provided Zidane another option for massive goal creation numbers. As soon as Morata left, I said we should go all-in for Mbappé. We didn’t, and I still think it was a big mistake.
Real Madrid are making a huge gamble that Bale can stay healthy, Ronaldo’s age doesn’t start catching up with him this season, and that Asensio fully lives up to the promise he has shown. All of those things could very easily happen, and this grade could end up looking really harsh. But if one or all of those gambles fall through, Madrid’s chances at silverware could be seriously threatened.
Real Madrid have already had one match (Valencia) where a lack of depth at center-back forced Zidane to play Casemiro out of position. Real Madrid could have kept even more depth available by keeping Pepe on board.
Let’s hope I’m over-reacting to Madrid’s relatively quiet transfer market.
Next: Real Madrid received nearly two dozen offers for Marcos Llorente