Immediate Reaction: Deportivo 2 - 6 Real Madrid

Real Madrid comfortably cruise in Galicia today against a disorganized Deportivo side. The final score was 2-6 (Andone, Joselu; Morata, James x2, Vazquez, Isco, Casemiro). Here’s our reaction, which will be followed by more post-game coverage shortly.

It’s that time of month again. It’s the time where Real Madrid travel to a mid-to-bottom dweller in Spain, and they do it with a bus full of hungry bench mobsters who have already decided they’re going to blitz their opponents.

And blitz they did. It turns out that this game wasn’t entirely different to the away trip to Leganes, Eibar, and at home to Sevilla in the Copa del Rey. Zidane’s men ran the score up with a ‘second-string’ XI, and they did it with a lot of flair. En route to tonight’s win, similarly to a short window in Leganes where they fell apart defensively, they looked dysfunctional and unhinged behind the ball — a common trait when both Modric and Kroos sit. And like the match in Leganes, they conceded, but ultimately, the result was never in doubt.

Those miscues were masked by some really good recovery work from Mateo Kovacic who covered a lot of ground. To boot, the team just rode out a gentle wave which Deportivo threw at them in the first half. On the flipside, the hexagon of Kovacic, Isco, Asensio, Lucas Vazquez, James, and Morata was very dynamic, and out-worked Deportivo. They ran with endless motors — constantly cutting without the ball, making dizzying runs, and playing the ball decisively. Deportivo’s backline had no answers, and looked dazed. Furthermore, they also looked inept, giving Real Madrid’s gunslingers an infinite amount of time to crack shots from outside the area without closing them down, and as the game cut deep into the second half, they stopped defending altogether — turning this game into the ugliest Timpik-esque pick-up game you can encounter.

But don’t take credit away from Real Madrid’s really fun offense tonight. There were some tremendous aesthetic sequences from 1-90, and there is something really promising about watching the Asensio-Isco-James trio dangle the ball around while carving their opponents.

This was a good response, today, which is something that I had stressed beforehand. Again, it’s nothing new, but it’s really important that Real Madrid can cruise in these games while resting key players in the apex of the season.

Still to come: Player ratings, post-game podcast, and tactical review.

Half-time show