Real Madrid: Isco responds to critics in style at Osasuna

Isco put in an impressive performance for Real Madrid against Osasuna in La Liga, scoring a goal and putting in a Man of the Match performance.

Real Madrid came back from behind to win 4-1 at Pamplona against Osasuna. Los Blancos started slowly and struggled early on in the game but slowly gained a foothold in the game, thanks to Isco’s performance. He scored the first goal for Real with a brilliant finish, allowing Madrid to tie the score. Even without the goal, his performance today was top-notch.

Even when the Whites were slow to get off their starting blocks, Isco was the only one who seemed to have started the game at full intensity. Real Madrid would have scored much sooner if Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema had done better with the two beautiful passes that Isco had provided, which broke the Osasuna defense completely.

According to whoscored.com, Isco had two shots on target, completed three of his four attempted dribbles and an 86% pass success rate. But stats don’t really show how great he was on the pitch today. He helped Luka Modric control the game, got the ball out of tight spaces, acted as a ball carrier in transition a few times and pressed tirelessly throughout his time on the pitch.

In recent times, there have been a lot of doubts about Isco’s ability to put in a great performance at tough away stadiums. There have also been talks of him not contributing as much as he can from both the fans and the media and questions about his place in this team. But this performance provides the perfect response to all those doubts and shows everyone exactly what Isco, at top form is capable of.

This performance summed up why Zinedine Zidane trusts the player so much and why he’s so important to this team. Now he only needs to work on putting in such displays consistently.