Zidane: “I don’t understand all these injuries”

Zinedine Zidane spoke about Real Madrid’s injury crisis before Sunday’s 2-0 win over Valencia and went into even more detail on his concerns after Dani Carvajal suffered an injury relapse just 25 minutes into the game.

On the plague of injuries, Zidane said: “The worst thing for a coach is having injuries. I hope what Carvajal has suffered isn’t serious. I feel for him. He played well for the first 25 minutes and I’m annoyed that he is injured again because he is an important player for us. But, I don’t understand all these injuries. We’re suffering a lot of them and I’m concerned. I can’t explain it.”

Speaking about the positive aspects of the result, Zidane was asked about the defence after yet another game in which Thibaut Courtois hardly had to break a sweat. The coach said: “There has been an improvement and the players believe in what they’re doing. There are still many points to be played for. There’s 45 remaining, so we’ll see what happens. We’re just going to focus on what we can control and won’t worry about everything else.”

Finally, Zidane was asked about Ferland Mendy and the way in which he is becoming more involved in attack, even having a goal in this Valencia game that was ruled out for offside. Zidane said: “I’m really happy for Mendy. He can contribute in attack and scored a great goal the other day and a great goal today, even if it was ruled out for the width of a foot. He’s doing well. He’s a player who can run up and down the wing all game.”