Real Madrid Stock Watch: Thibaut Courtois leads the way

Falling: Zinedine Zidane

An age-old question when evaluating a struggling team is this: Are the struggles on the manager or on the players failing to perform?

In Real Madrid’s case, the key players are all performing at a high level. Karim Benzema has six goals in La Liga, Casemiro has been neck and neck with Idrissa Gueye as the season’s best defensive midfielder, Sergio Ramos is as good as ever, Toni Kroos has answered the critics, James Rodriguez looks rejuvenated, Gareth Bale has been effective when healthy, and the list goes on and on.

But it’s interesting to note that the players struggling are the newcomers in attack. Eden Hazard has been “good” but not “great”, which is a problem. Luka Jovic? He’s been invisible when on the pitch. In fact, with the exception of Eder Militao, many of the players on the bench have been poor whenever Zinedine Zidane rotates them in as starters, which may speak to either Real’s reliance on veteran stars or Zidane’s inability to tactically manage a team without them.

For all his faults, Zidane is a good manager who has plenty of past success to tout, whether or not you want to chalk his trophies up to Cristiano Ronaldo and the players. But Zidane’s stock is falling simply because the tactical prowess has not been there.

Why did Zidane play a two-striker system against Mallorca and in the later stages of the Galatasaray game with Luka Jovic in the deeper role? Why did he start Isco as a midfield pivot next to Casemiro in the loss to Mallorca instead of starting Fede Valverde? It’s not like Isco was 100-percent healthy and ready to play an unideal role…

These were massive tactical errors from Zidane among other more minor ones, and he’ll need to be accountable to himself to make these changes.