The Merengues managed to win despite the absence of Thibaut Courtois, Federico Valverde and Kylian Mbappé, which testifies to the quality and depth available to Carlo Ancelotti.
Ancelotti said he was satisfied with the result, according to Diario As. “” Today, we have rotated, but we stayed solid. We were compact and made a very good defensively match, with solidarity. We are doing well, despite the rotations. Endrick brought a lot, in the sense that he scored a goal. Arda worked very well in this position, helping a lot on the defensive level … We must be satisfied. It was an intense match, against an opponent who gave everything and we got a good result for the return match. ”
Ancelotti also mentioned incidents involving two of his players. Vinicius Junior was the victim of racist insults, while Raúl Asencio was the victim of Cris de “Asencio, Meurs” during the first half, which finally led to his replacement at halftime.
“Vinicius acted well”
“I think the referee acted well. Vinicius spoke to the referee, arrested the game and activated the protocol. He did well. This is what he must do. I removed Asencio for two reasons: he was assigned (by the songs) and he had a yellow card. Nobody likes to be shouted “Meurs”. He was therefore affected. I preferred to remove it because his feelings could affect him. »»
Ancelotti was also asked about Dani Ceballos' injury in the last minutes, the first information suggesting that the Real Madrid midfielder could be absent up to a month.
“We'll see … he had a muscle problem at the end and he will take exams tomorrow. It's a shame, we can't do anything. »»
