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Real Madrid's manager Carlo Ancelotti delivered a brief 7-minute press conference following the match and chose to look for positive takeaways from today's fierce match:
"A point is a point. It was a difficult match. We tried to play but it wasn't easy because Atlético played a very rough game. In the end it was very good, and when we started to play we had a lot of chances. They tried to impose a violent game. We don't play like that. We tried to play and in the end we did it."
Despite his satisfaction with the result, the boss criticized his side's sloppy care of the ball:
"After Benzema's goal we lost the ball very easily, we didn't have possession of the ball and Atlético turned the match around."
Ancelotti subbed off both starting fullbacks, Alvaro Arbeloa and Fabio Coentrão, for replacements Dani Carvajal and Marcelo in the second half. Asked whether these substitutions provided his team with more width, Carletto gave a more general response:
"Atletico found it harder to defend (in the second half) because we changed our game on the left and right and played with patience. In the first half we weren't capable or patient. We tried playing up the wings but the pathways were closed. In the end, Atleti were a bit tired and didn't press as much as they did in the first half."
Carlo Ancelotti eventually explained his reasoning for starting both Arbeloa and Coentrão and defended his line-up:
"Some people might think I got it wrong. The match was very difficult and the response from the players in the second half was very good. The response we have to give when a team comes at us like that is to play our game. In the second half we did well...Coentrão and Arbeloa were fresh because they hadn't played on Wednesday. Then, when we needed to apply more pressure up front, I made the changes."
