Open Thread: February 21, 2021

The Open Thread/Daily Merengue is a place where you can discuss anything and everything related to football. Feel free to discuss the topics presented here, or start your very own discussions! The Open thread will be posted every day by one of the mods: Valyrian Steel, Felipejack, YoSnail, Ezek lx or NeRObutBlanco.

Los Blancos grind out the win at Valladolid.

The 2019/2020 season vibes are slowly creeping back in after injury hit Real Madrid found a way to win away to Valladolid courtesy of a towering Casemiro header and some Cuortois heroics. More importantly they’ve cut Atletico’s lead down to 3 points even though the Rojiblancos have a game in hand. The game was covered extensively in the immediate reaction, player ratings, and 3 answers and 3 questions articles.

All eyes now turn to Atalanta and Benzema’s status.

Have secured the result at Valladolid, Los Blancos will now turn their attention to a much tougher task in their Champions League round of 16 clash against Atalanta at the Gewiss Stadium. We will find out whether Benzema will be available for the game after more tests are done today. Zidane was cautious when probed indicating that Real were not going to take chances with the attacker’s injury. “If he’s not fine he won’t play” the coach stated.

Zidane will also have to figure out his front three for the game having substituted all of them in the game against Valladolid.

Other results from Spain and Europe.

As mentioned previously Atletico once again dropped points to Levante, this time at home and this time being all 3 points. Is the title race back on? Barcelona play Cadiz later today also hoping to capitalize on Atletico’s loss.

In the Bundesliga, Bayern slumped to a 2-1 defeat at Frankfurt. Luka Jovic started the game and played fairly well before suffering a head injury that caused him to be substituted on 68 minutes. Erling Haaland scored a brace in a 4-0 thrashing of Schalke, with one of them being an outstanding goal.

In the English Premier League Everton won at Anfield after 22 years with James Rodriguez providing a sumptuous through ball for the opening goal. Klopps's team are now in danger of missing out on a top 4 finish and we'll behind league leaders Manchester City who take on Arsenal today. It will be interesting to see if Ødegaard starts in such a massive clash for the gunners.

ICYMI: Who was Enrique “Pachín” Perez?

Kristofer McCormack takes up back in time to reminisce the period when Pachin graced the Bernabeu. Do give it a read.