Grading Real Madrid Castilla’s loanees to this point in the season
By Ben Sundock
Real Madrid has 12 players out on loan at the moment all across Europe. Ranging from Castilla personnel to big names from Achraf Hakimi and Dani Ceballos, there is plenty to cover in this loanee round-up.
Getting youngsters experience has been Zinedine Zidane‘s mantra since he took over as Real Madrid boss for the first time just over five years ago. Navigating the waters of signing some of the world’s best while maintaining the famous ‘Fabrica’ youth academy makes the Real job just that much more difficult.
As far as Zizou is concerned, he has done a stunning job managing his personnel. Without the guarantee of regular first-team football, Zidane has loaned out some very talented players so they can earn valuable experience and give his coaching staff a larger sample size to analyze.
Who have been the standouts from the Castilla team thus far this year? Who has underperformed? Let’s dive in.
Real Madrid currently has five Castilla regulars on loan in Spain. Midfielders Alberto Soro and Oscar Rodriguez are with Real Zaragoza and Leganés, respectively, while striker Hugo Vallejo is with Deportivo La Coruña.
Lucas Zidane has been receiving a lot of playing time with Racing Santander in the Segunda Division and Javi Sanchez is with Real Valladolid but has not featured since moving over the summer.
The standout of the group has been Oscar Rodriguez. Featuring regularly and playing with a La Liga team has greatly helped the midfielder showoff his ability and wow has it been special.
Appearing in 26 matches in the league and Copa del Rey, Rodriguez has racked up five goals and two assists while averaging a 6.7 match rating.
Since Martin Braithwaite was purchased by FC Barcelona as an emergency player earlier this month, the Real Madrid loanee is now the leading scorer on the team! His two assists are equal to the mark held by Braithwaite before his departure and Youssef En-Nesyri before he was sold to Sevilla, so, it is not unreasonable to call Oscar Rodriguez the most productive player Leganés currently have.
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Oscar has been included on the last few Real Madrid preseason tours and is developing into a solid attacking midfielder who enjoys dribbling past defenders and creating for himself. If he can close out the season with a bang, he could be a depth midfielder for Los Blancos come the fall.
On the other hand, both Alberto Soro and Hugo Vallejo have done very little while away from the Spanish capital. Soro has made 23 appearances and has managed just four goals while Vallejo has played just 50 minutes in three appearances for La Coruña and has yet to score.
Soro ranks third on the Zaragoza team for goals in league play thus far and it is encouraging to see he has scored twice in the last month, but it isn’t enough to woo Zinedine Zidane.
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Zidane is the regular in goal for Santander making 28 starts since moving but has registered just three wins and kept just six clean sheets. Lucas has allowed 36 goals in those 28 matches, but his team struggles to score having tallied just 29 through 30 league matches.
Saving 72 percent of shots faced is a bit worrisome, but it is worth noting he has stopped two of five penalty attempts. Luca needs to close out the season strongly since he could throw his name into the consideration to be the back up to Thibaut Courtois.