Real Madrid’s invincibility will have lasted 3 days in La Liga. The 4th match was fatal for the Merengues on the pitch of a surly and determined Betis. Casa Blanca had a bad evening yesterday during their 1-0 defeat. However, the opportunities were numerous. Kylian Mbappé even saw Valles push back his penalty at the end of added time, and a few minutes earlier, joker Espi thought he had equalized, before being flagged offside. Vinicius Junior ended up falling back into his ways, and some players like Arda Güler and Dean Huijsen even clashed with each other.
Nervousness overtook the Madrilenians in this hostile environment of La Cartuja. Brilliant at home against Real Sociedad (4-1) and Malaga (4-0), Real is much less brilliant away. His sluggish success on the Espanyol pitch had already shown certain limits. “ Congratulations to Betis, who played to draw and were lucky », railed Mourinho from the outset at a press conference. “ If the match ends in a draw, we are frustrated, because we deserved better, so imagine our frustration in the face of a defeat. »
Mourinho: “ Real Madrid players are pure and naive »
The Portuguese looked like bad days. He was angry both with his players for having been naive in wanting to respond to opposing provocations, but also with the Betis players for their attitude. “ This guy who was lying there, in front of my bench… I thought the ambulance was coming “. There is also the change of Arda Güler at the hour mark in place of Diomande, while the Turk put in a good performance. “ It was difficult to take Arda out. Betis players are smart, smarter than Real Madrid players. Real Madrid players are pure and naive. Real Madrid players get up after a mistake, and Betis players are smarter about it. »
And then, there is of course this unconverted penalty by Kylian Mbappé (which should have been withdrawn), the culmination of an evening where he achieved nothing. Aligned at the forefront, the Frenchman benefited from 4 big chances without converting a single one. The fault lies with a heroic Andalusian defense too, but more generally, the attacker missed his match by losing a lot of balls (18) and duels (8/13). Mourinho refused to overwhelm him. “I am very happy with my players. All. Absolutely all of them. Collectively, I really enjoyed it, and individually, I can’t fault them. As for the missed penalty, when someone is about to take one, we are all together.» Be careful though because Inter is already showing up next Tuesday.
