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Real Madrid have not recorded a single win over the last four games they’ve played. Furthermore, they have not scored a single goal in that span, which means that they’ve spent the last 6 hours and 49 minutes they’ve been on the pitch without converting a chance. The Spanish coach was Florentino Perez’s choice to replace Zinedine Zidane when the Frenchman shockingly announced his departure this summer, and it seems easy to assume that Lopetegui had the blessing of team captain Sergio Ramos, who was also his captain in the Spanish national team.
For the moment, Los Blancos can call themselves lucky considering that they would be at least 4 or 5 points behind Barcelona had the Catalans started their season as well as they did the previous year.
Should Lopetegui’s spot as Real Madrid’s coach be in risk? Is he the one to blame for the team’s struggles? While Madrid have completed some mediocre performances this season, the lack of quality signings to replace Cristiano Ronaldo was not Lopetegui’s decision. The board somehow believed that Gareth Bale, Karim Benzema, Marco Asensio or Vinicius were going to step up and turn into reliable and consistent scorers. Needless to say, they proved that they can’t be trusted in that regard.
Bale has not been able to finish the last few games where Madrid has struggled, Benzema started the season in good form but he is not even finishing chances and Asensio clearly isn’t ready to take the reins. Is that really Lopetegui’s fault? Keep in mind that the coach was the one who insisted about signing Mariano to improve the depth in the offensive line when the board thought that the roster was good enough with Mayoral.
Still, it’s fairly obvious that this won’t be taken into account when making the decision. The media is reporting that Lopetegui is safe “for now” but we’ve been here before and we know that a loss in the upcoming El Clasico against Barcelona in the Camp Nou could put the nail in Lopetegui’s coffin, no matter whether he was actually given the tools to succeed or not.