Players On National Duty - Bernabéu Bites, 11.11.2013

• Well, it's Monday and you won't have club football this weekend. Can it get any worse than that? Furthermore, Benzema, Modric, Varane, Cristiano Ronaldo, Coentrao and Pepe will be playing really hard-fought matches in order to qualify for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. Croatia will play against Iceland, France will do it against Ukraine while Cristiano Ronaldo and his Portuguese mates will face Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Sweden.

• Cristiano Ronaldo has started the season in really good shape. He has already scored 16 goals in La Liga and he also has found the back of the net eight times in four European matches. Could the Portuguese astro get the Ballon D'Or? Maybe he should...

• The 'BBC' trio seems to be working just fine! Good news for Real Madrid as Bale, Cristiano Ronaldo and Karim Benzema's chemistry seems to be perfect.

• Messi will be out a couple of months with a muscle injury -biceps femoris, back of the thigh-. Yes, they do have Neymar, but they might drop some points on the road while they recover their best player.

More from Managing Madrid:

• Bernabéu Bites, 11.10.2013: Our Very Own BBC
• Ancelotti on CR7: "He's otherworldly"
• Real Madrid Vs. Real Sociedad, Liga BBVA 2013-2014 Match Recap: Another Hat-Trick for Ronaldo (5-1)