Real Madrid: 5 takeaways from the 2020/21 season so far
The 2020/21 season has been a strange one for Real Madrid. There have been a lot of highs and lows in the season. The players and the manager wouldn’t be very happy considering the way this season has gone, and they can’t deny the fact that the team has been very inconsistent this season, which hurt them a lot. There have been a lot of talking points, let’s have a look at 5 takeaways from this season so far.
1.Zinedine Zidane finds it difficult to win the league in successive seasons
Zinedine Zidane’s first full season as the manager of Real Madrid was in 2016/17. He won LaLiga that season, and teams found it challenging to counter Zidane’s tactics. But in 2017/18, the same teams were able to get the better of Zidane’s men in a handful of games, as Real Madrid ended the league with 76 points and sat at the third position in the league, 17 points behind the winners Barcelona.
Fast-forward to 2019. Zidane’s first full season in his second tenure as Real Madrid’s manager was in 2019/20. Real Madrid won the league again, finishing with 87 points. They weren’t convincing, but they did what was enough to win the league. And in the next season after winning the league, Zidane’s Real Madrid are struggling in the league again. They can be 11 points behind league leaders Atletico Madrid, who have 2 additional games in hand. They are 3 points ahead of a struggling Barcelona team, who have a game in hand.
This isn’t simply a coincidence. It shows how Zidane’s preference to stick with the same tactics and gameplan is backfiring in the league season after a successful season. Those tactics worked a miracle and won us 2 league titles and 3 UCL titles, but there will come a time when rivals will understand these tactics, and devise a method to counter those. And that time is now.
Zidane isn’t the only one to be blamed, and many other factors like injuries to key players, individual errors from players, and a case of players unable to repay his faith can be blamed. But Zidane’s stubbornness to stick with the same gameplan that’s proving to be ineffective after each game cost the team on quite a few occasions.
Zidane’s team started winning games in 2017/18 after he ditched Isco and the 4-4-2 diamond, to use a 4-4-2 flat and a 4-3-3 regularly. This season he has used a 4-3-3 in many games, but that didn’t work a lot of times. His 4-2-3-1 failed as well, but his latest 3-4-1-2 looked promising. Gotta see if Zidane is gonna trust the 3 man defence again, and we need to see if a change in formation can bring a change in fortune.