Real Madrid suffered a second consecutive surprise defeat at the hands of Espanyol in La Liga. The Barcelona club defeated their visitors 2-1 after opening the scoring 17 minutes into the game.
Raul de Tomas hammered in a strike from close range following a cross from the right hand side. Real Madrid were then pressed to find an equaliser, but could not do so in the first half.
Fifteen minutes into the second period, Espanyol doubled their lead against Los Blancos with Alex Vidal scoring at the hour mark. The second goal was a result of some very good planning and execution from the home team, who did well to deceive the defenders following a free kick situation.
Madrid could have conceded a third goal against Espanyol, but were saved by some poor finishing. The only silver lining of the game for Real Madrid was that Karim Benzema scored once again, having received a ball from Luka Jovic and firing it into the bottom right corner.
Carlo Ancelotti himself said that the result was deserved and that the team played worse than their defeat against Sheriff Tiraspol in the Champions League.
“It wasn’t an accident today and we deserved to lose. The reaction came too late. We played bad. We started with one defensive and offensive idea, but we couldn’t keep a sense of calm or maintain that idea after conceding.
“There was confusion on the pitch and we weren’t well-positioned, with or without the ball. Being honest, that’s our worst match of the season. Now, we have the international break, but sometimes you want to play again straight away. We have to see what happened, how the team changed its attitude in one week.”
Madrid will return from the international break to face Athletic Bilbao on the 17th of October.
