Here’s why Luka Jovic deserves another chance at Real Madrid
Luka Jovic wasn’t utilized properly in his first spell at Real Madrid
In January 2021, when Luka Jovic was about to leave on loan, people labeled him as a flop and saw him as a player who couldn’t do well at Real Madrid. There was a claim that Jovic didn’t get the minutes he wanted at Madrid, but people immediately pointed to the fact that he got 32 appearances at Real Madrid.
But context is highly important in this case because it is 32 appearances, not 32 starts. He got a combined total of 1014 minutes at Real Madrid from 2019 to 2021 and got just 208 minutes in the 2020/21 season. 1014 minutes in one and a half seasons isn’t a great number for a player who was signed for 60 million euros.
With Karim Benzema as the first-choice in his position, Jovic wouldn’t have got many chances and at Real Madrid, chances aren’t guaranteed at all. Even Zidane was under high pressure due to a string of bad results, and the pressure of results didn’t give the Frenchman a scope to experiment as the season progressed.
But still, Zidane could’ve trusted Jovic more by ensuring he had continuity in playing time, at least as a substitute or by rotating Benzema. Jovic was only 21 when he was signed by Madrid, and he needed game time to develop. This was something Zidane couldn’t give Jovic because of his won reasons and observations.
Jovic did get some starts under Zidane, but the continuity wasn’t there and he wasn’t used to his strengths. Jovic is great as a second striker, and he could’ve worked a wonder if he was used alongside Benzema, but sadly he couldn’t get many chances to be in the starting XI. He was often used as a lone striker, a role in which he isn’t that comfortable.
He was used as a lone striker for three continuous games in January 2020, but he was heavily isolated in a 4-5-1 system where he didn’t have any support from wings and the presence of five midfielders didn’t work out for him. In spite of that, he assisted Luka Modric is one of those games. He also assisted Casemiro for his first goal against Sevilla with a neat backheel flick. Two of his goals for Real Madrid did come as a lone striker, but they were in games where he was used as a substitute.
He loves to play off a striker, and create danger with some quick combinational play and movement. In the limited chances he got as a second striker alongside Benzema, he was impressive against Villarreal in September 2019 where he created Gareth Bale’s goal with a beautiful backheel flick and was impressive in the games against Real Betis and Real Valladolid at the beginning of the 2020/21 season. But disappointingly, he couldn’t get minutes on a regular basis, and a spell on the bench followed a spell where he could show some signs of improvement.
One can also blame his bad luck at Real Madrid. He has hit the woodwork countless times in the limited game time he got at Real Madrid while seeing narrow offside calls deny him a goal four times. Just when he picked up form in the international break for November 2020 after scoring 3 goals and assisting 2, he got infected with COVID-19 and missed out on some important games when Benzema was unavailable as well.
It would be silly to blame his bad luck as the root cause of his failure at Madrid, but he couldn’t get many chances at Real Madrid. It would be too harsh to judge a player on the basis of just 1000 inconsistently distributed minutes, and Jovic definitely deserves a proper chance to prove himself.