Carlo Ancelotti Talks About Isco and James Rodriguez

As we wrote about, Isco has reportedly expressed interest in leaving Real Madrid this winter in search of more playing time. Though, it should be noted that there is nothing concrete about this report, and Isco and his camp have stated several times they don’t want to leave the club, and that Isco will fight for his place in the team. It should also be stated then, that these rumours are coming out after some outlets reported that Carlo Ancelotti is interested in signing Isco at Everton, and reuniting the Isco - James Rodriguez pair that took Europe by storm in the 2014 - 2015 season for large stretches.

Of course, that’s something fun to speculate, even for Real Madrid fans, who are happy for any and all of these three entities to be doing well. Ancelotti has already gotten great football out of James, perhaps he can do the same with Isco.

But Carlo also squashed that idea in an interview with Directv Sports.

“It’s not true that I’m after Isco,” Ancelotti said. “We haven’t started thinking about the team for the January window. So, those rumours are, as they say here, ‘bulls**t’.”

Ancelotti also spoke about James’s time at Real Madrid, stating that the best way for him to get fit would’ve just been to simply ‘play’.

“He gets his fitness by playing and that’s why he didn’t play much at Real Madrid,” Ancelotti said. “Changing a winning team is much more difficult.”

“There are no doubts over the quality of the player. No one has disputed [his quality] at Real Madrid or Bayern Munich. I think he’s found it more difficult at these two clubs because there’s more competition in the team and, sometimes, you might not be playing.

“I think, for him, playing is more important than training. In my opinion, he can be at a good level physically because, on the contrary, it’s not the coach who is going to kill him in training.”