Ancelotti shuts down Camavinga to Arsenal rumours: “Eduardo is untouchable”

At Real Madrid’s manager’s press conference on Saturday, Carlo Ancelotti spoke to the media ahead of the team’s next game, away at Athletic Club on Sunday night. The Italian confirmed that Eden Hazard has suffered a new injury, and therefore joins the injury list that also contains Lucas Vázquez, Dani Carvajal, David Alaba and Aurélien Tchouaméni.

Ancelotti on Ernesto Valverde

Asked about his counterpart at Athletic Club, Ernesto Valverde, Ancelotti said: “He is a good friend and we have a good relationship. His teams always play with clear ideas and they’re well-organised. I respect him a lot.”

Ancelotti on correcting mistakes

The coach also reflected on Thursday’s Villarreal game and on how he remains concerned by what he saw in the first half. He stated: “We committed many big mistakes in the first half, so we’ve evaluated that over the past couple of days. We had some poor positioning, we’ve tried to press when it wasn’t the right time, the line isn’t compact, there are some bad individual decisions. I’m telling our defenders that our penalty area should be our friend, not our enemy. We have to first of all control our own home. We haven’t had time to train on it, so we’ve just focused on recovering and watching videos to learn from our mistakes.”

Ancelotti on Tchouaméni going to Paris

During the Villarreal game, the injured Tchouaméni was in Paris watching an NBA game. The young midfielder later apologised for attending the event while his teammates were playing and Ancelotti was asked about this controversy. The Italian stated: “He already published an apology. I think he made a mistake, but he is young and he made one mistake. That issue is in the past. He is working on recovering from his injury and we hope to have him back next week.”

Ancelotti on the Camavinga to Arsenal rumours

There have been reports in the past couple of days claiming that Arsenal want to sign Eduardo Camavinga on loan for the rest of the season. But, Ancelotti shut that down, stating: “Eduardo is untouchable.”

Ancelotti on Modrić and Kroos’ roles

He discussed Luka Modrić and Toni Kroos in this press conference and the issue of whether they should be dropped for younger players like Dani Ceballos. To that, he replied: “Modrić and Kroos are undroppable, but that doesn’t mean they’ll be play every game. They made history for this club and they’ll keep making history. Ceballos and Asensio showed that they could make a difference the other night. Now, I need to decide if they can do the same as starters or if they should be coming off the bench.”

Ancelotti on Sergio Arribas

Asked what Sergio Arribas needs to do to have an opportunity of his own, the coach said: “He just needs to keep working, like all the other young players. We have good players coming out of the academy, with Raúl working well with them. We’re evaluating them and they could have an opportunity.”

Ancelotti on the Copa del Rey draw

Finally, he was asked for his first thoughts on being paired with Atlético Madrid in the Copa del Rey quarter-finals, which were: “I don’t think it’s an easy draw for us, because Atlético Madrid are a top team. It’ll be a good game because it’s a derby, and these duels are always fun.”