2. Eder Militao struggles to adjust without David Alaba
It was a heart in mouth moment for Mardridistas to see David Alaba not included in Ancelotti’s starting XI for the match. If that wasn’t bad enough the immediate realisation that the Austrian wasn’t even on the bench made that feeling even worse. We later learned that a last-minute muscular problem kept the Austrian sidelined for this game and possibly the weekend’s final, although he’s not completely ruled out.
It was evident that Real Madrid’s defense was affected without Alaba. Although his replacement, Nacho Fernandez dropped a reliable shift, his partner in central defense, Eder Militao seemed way off his game. He was losing aerial duels against Luuk de Jong and was partly at fault for Barcelona’s first goal. And, he reacted way too late with Ansu Fati’s equalizer in the second half. This was an uncharacteristically poor outing for the Brazilian who recovered well after his loss of concentration against Getafe at the beginning of the year.
Although Alaba lets Militao be the star defender too often when these two are playing together, I think Alaba’s influence, leadership, etc. play a huge part in how the Brazilian performs. Alaba makes Militao a better defender and yesterday, we saw Real Madrid’s defense switching off completely at times.
This is a major issue before we head to the round of 16 of the Champions League. PSG especially isn’t the sort of opponent who would leave Madrid unpunished for their mistakes. If there are at all any injury concerns that show up and Madrid is anywhere below their full-strength XI, we could suffer. Carlo Ancelotti needs to let all these rotational pieces of the squad develop understanding within themselves. As we head to the business end of the season, it’d be hard to predict absentees and resulting changes in partnerships.