Zinedine Zidane’s Real Madrid: The Undisputed Kings Of Europe
foreign consecutive UEFA Champions League this Real Madrid team are unstoppable in the Champions League winning one champions league is tough winning two is even harder three in a row relax buddy countless clubs have stood witness to the most iconic Anthem in the history of organized football countless teams have given absolutely everything to reach Euphoria by the time it’s all over and countless teams have failed to even come close but there is one team that absolutely cannot relate to what I just said a team that wins
this competition so often that it’s a wonder that they haven’t named the trophy after them yet Real Madrid are so good in Europe that it really makes you wonder how they keep it up regardless of personnel this team manages to regularly find ways to exceed our expectations at 14 wins in total Los Blancos have won double the amount of trophies that the team with the second most has Milan with seven and you can pretty much bet they’ll be adding to that tally in the future as of 2022 this team has won five titles in a nine year period which is
wild however there are three titles between 2016 and 2018 in particular that we’re going to be looking back on today a z Zoo master class that cemented his legacy as Untouchable both on and off the pitch a CR7 demolition that cemented him as the greatest Champions League player ever and a team effort that is hard to imagine will be replicated anytime soon today we look back at how Zinedine zidan Made Real Madrid the most Royal of them all foreign welcome back to the channel this is a story of The Pinnacle of greatness it’s
also one that I think I’m gonna look back on every so often and just think I was really alive to watch this all happen huh we’ve got a lot to cover today but before we get ahead of ourselves we gotta talk about The Hangover of La Decima we must start again from zero Carlo ancelotti said this after a poorest Dodge to the 1415 season the sales of Angel Di Maria and chabi Alonso two key Figures were singled out as major contributors to this quote and the bad starts after over a decade of failing to advance past the semis Real Madrid
finally managed to win their 10th Champions League in 2014. laudesima was a momentous occasion truly one for the ages naturally it was assumed that this win would kick-start world domination it did not at least not right away which even as I was typing this sounds like absolute rubbish yes Madrid had a poor start but they finished with 92 points in the league only two behind first place Bossa they were narrowly knocked out of the UCL in the semis and Cristiano Ronaldo had his best scoring season ever with 61 in all competitions
apart from that between 13 September 2014 and 4 December 2015 they played 22 games and won every single one all the same what you have to understand about a team like Real Madrid is that they have impossibly high standards they are impatient and quite frankly often fickle Cristiano Ronaldo Zinedine Zidane Alfredo di Stefano even they’ve all been booed by supporters that expect nothing else but Perfection of course Barcelona winning the treble that year didn’t help the situation to a lot of people this season was a complete failure if you
need further proof Carlo ancelotti was sacked straight after Rapha Benitez who replaced angelotti wasn’t exactly the replacement Madrid were after while he did top his UCL group and boasted an 11-4-3 record his Madrid was set in third in the league by the time his time was up also he played Dennis Cherry Chef in the Copa del Rey even though he was ineligible due to card accumulation and got Madrid disqualified honestly this probably wasn’t even his fault but it’s still a funny story change was needed luckily for Madrid they didn’t have to
look too far as a player Zinedine Zidane was a legend as we all already know to this day he is regarded by many as not only the greatest European player ever but he’s in the running for the goat to some when it comes to Real Madrid the term Legend is apt spending 20 euros in Madrid has been the most beautiful thing that’s happened to me in my life a quote from zidane from 2021 I think the feeling is mutual as is the case for several former Players management called out to him and he answered in 2010 he returned to Los
Blancos to begin this journey and his first assignment was as a special advisor to Florentino Perez and Jose Mourinho and guys I’m going to level with you uh not entirely sure what that is there is a lot of tactical jogging mumbo jumbo online about what his role actually was here but very little in terms of an actual description regardless he must have done pretty well in that role because a year later he was named as Real Madrid’s sporting director this was after a former director Jorge valdano was sacked when it was rumored that him
and Jose Mourinho had fallen out never changed Jose never changed two years after that he became an assistant coach to Carlo ancelotti he was in The Dugout as the team won La Decima his progression into this new world saw him then move on to managing Real Madrid’s B-side all well and good but at the same time there was it was a rather large issue the man didn’t have his coaching badges which from what I’ve heard are quite important in this line of work this even led to him being banned from coaching for a few months as Madrid were
hoping to pull a sneaky on everyone he did receive the full qualification in 2015 though which makes what he would go on to achieve as a manager all the more impressive which brings us to 2016 the big job when zidane took over at the 1516 Midway Point many were confused a man that had just earned his coaching Badges and had zero experience at the top level let alone at the biggest club in the world how could Paris think this was a good idea it may sound funny but for some reason there is still a widespread belief that this decision was
not a calculated and smart one by Paris and the higher-ups that they hadn’t taken into consideration that zidane had been impressing with the B-side attending pep guardiola’s training sessions with Bayern Munich seminars with Marcelo bielsa and Marseille being right by Carlo evangelotti’s side as he won the Champions League or working hard towards his training badges to this very day for some unknown reason there is still a widespread belief that Zinedine zidane’s entire coaching career boils down to one thing and one thing only
luck we’re gonna spend the rest of the video talking about why that is and why you should be ashamed of yourself if you think that took over from Benitez the team wasn’t in the best of shape they were trailing both Atletico and Barcelona in the league and although the new look management were showing encouraging signs the Gap in the league grew larger by the day by February there were 12 points off the top and the league looked to be wrapped up that was until Madrid went on a 12-game win streak closing the
Gap to one point by the time the season was over doesn’t get much closer than that a remarkable turnaround yes a fluke no there are several things that made Sudan work as a manager of course there was the fact that he’s one of the greatest ever that alone will earn you the Instant Respect and admiration of every professional footballer while zidane was often the best on the pitch he was known to get the best out of his teammates around him as a player recognizing what each player did best and doing whatever was possible to
ensure that those qualities were allowed to be on full display is something that he’d been doing his whole life by this point as a playmaker vision is something that has to come naturally to you so despite the fact that he was already inheriting a Champions League Winning Side what he did for the team ensured that the success continued the first tenants came from Fitness being equated to confidence not once did you ever see as he done Madrid player gas out even an extra time and they went to extra time a lot Madrid were somewhat of a hybrid of
a possession-based side spliced with a counter-attacking team so when they lost the ball it was important that the opposition were overwhelmed regardless of the form of transition for the most part this was achieved in a 4-3-3 early nzdan’s tenure starting from defense both Danny Carvajal and Marcelo were players with extremely high attacking work rates in marcelo’s case it’s a wonder why he was even put in the back line on paper guys spent as much time on the opposition’s half as the opposition’s Defenders these two were
extremely good at knowing when to overlap underlap hang back play the early ball or drive to the byline and they honestly needed to be as their wide partners and Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth sale were really unpredictable in their movements in the final third it’s tough to call having these two in their Prime in the same team Fair because it wasn’t on one hand you have Ronaldo who practically had no weaknesses in attack and was able to finish get past Defenders and deliver a final ball in every possible way then on the other
hand you have Gareth Bale who had Olympic level Pace was more of a traditional white man but could still do just about everything I just said Ronaldo could albeit with a less versatile weaker foot as Bale was constantly injured and also because the team needed some unpredictability Isco would play just about everywhere in the attacking line often in place of bail he also played because he was phenomenal back then not as quick as the others but still with a lot to offer we’ll talk more on him a bit later Benzema gets his
praise now but back then he was the often misunderstood clue that held everything together people forget that this man was tipped to be the best striker in the world when he moved from Lyon it took a little longer than expected but this ultimately came true instead at the start of his Madrid career he took a reserved role dropping deep and vacating spaces to allow his wide men to shine with no Benzema there is no record-breaker Ronaldo when he would drop deep it was mostly to add numbers to the Midfield alongside Tony
Cruz Luca Modric and casemiro the title of greatest Midfield of the 2010s is usually given to Chavi Iniesta and busquets and I’m not here to debate it but this Madrid 3 have just as much of a claim in my eyes with casimiro the furthest back no one was getting past him Modric was box to box Cruz would hold and often drop deep to form a pivot with casemira all were defensively and defensively Adept Sergio Ramos and pepe were the central defensive pairing both of them strong and crazy so good luck getting past them Ramos in particular is
maybe the best ball playing center-back as well as the best ball carrying center-back of his generation probably the best goal scoring center-back too he allowed the team to push forward without having to worry about any unexpected turnovers and even though he likely drives automatic I have its own good authority that his clutch control is superb Kayla Navas was the long-term successor to Ike Cassius in goals however while the latter is a legend nabus might be one of the most underrated goalkeepers in history this
man was not a superstar by any means but he was always reliable in goals had the reflexes of a cat and rarely made egregious errors looking back at this team today it’s safe to say that greatness was pretty much inevitable thanks to the poor showing at the beginning of the season the 15-16 Champions League was not expected to be a Victorious one at all for Madrid and by the time the quarterfinals came around it was more or less expected that they were on course or an exit they breezed through the stages prior but a
two no loss in the quarterfinals first leg against Wolfsburg put everything at risk insteps Cristiano Ronaldo second leg Bernabeu Patrick the man was really an Unstoppable force not too long ago so much so that he scored 16 goals in that year’s competition an amounts that while crazy would be even more crazy if he hadn’t scored 17 in the 13-14 Edition the highest goal tally of any singular Champions League campaign in fact Ronaldo holds the top three spots for most goals in a single UCL campaign did uh did I hear anyone say Mr Champions
League after man city did a uh a man city it was atletic Madrid that were yet again standing in rail’s way in the final a repeat of the 2014 final Atletico unfortunately just could not handle the pressure and rail did them over yet again on penalties this time in zidane’s first season as a first team manager he took a team that a lot of people had completely lost faith in to the promised land it was unbelievable and he was far from finished in his first fourth season in charge in 1617.
it was expected that this Madrid side would be even stronger for most people expectations create pressure that is insurmountable not for these guys and for the record looking back this is the season that showed that it really wasn’t just dumb luck while the core of the team remained fit and ready to go on several injuries and niggling grievances caused enough disruptions to make sidan have to really think things through the most significant change came due to zidane’s increased distrust in Gareth Bale’s Fitness that’s along with his
Reliance on the outputs of Ronaldo and Benzema both players that were we’re racking up minutes and also getting up there in age meant that rotations were necessary and that they needed to be done right the so-called B Team consisting of players such as Lucas Vasquez Alvaro Morata James Rodriguez Marco ascencio Mateo kovacic and more all stepped up when needed because the squad was able to stay fresh all year the league title was theirs for the important matches especially the ones in Europe the main guys were always fit and
ready and again while the team was Stellar on all fronts it was the Ronaldo show Once More 10 goals in The Knockout stages of the competition 10. in a winning UCL run you only play seven knockout matches and these matches were played against Napoli Bayern Munich Atletico Madrid and Juventus of all teams with hat tricks and braces in each game he scored I will admit VAR would have likely been put to good use in some of these matches especially against Bayern but hey what can we do now the 2017 UCL final and how things were set
up here is perhaps one of the main indicators of zidane’s prowess as a tactician Madrid’s starting lineup was identical to their setup from the previous year with the exception of Isco coming in for bail and Varan coming in for Pepe never change a winning team zidane and most other people who have winning teams at their disposal instead of lung bursting Wild play this girl would drift in and add to the Midfield Benzema would then do so less often Isco would actually drift across the entire pitch leaving Carvajal to provide the
bulk of the width on the right side therefore most of the attack went down the left in the final itself Juventus had Madrid’s number for large portions of the game blocking all their wide play forcing them Central the first half ended 1-1 and it wasn’t the greatest half by Los Blancos noticing the issue zidane had his team pack the Midfield in possession in a 3-4-3 of sorts the result was a destabilized Juventus and three goals in 29 minutes to make tickets for what Madrid with three for two season number three by this point no
other manager in the history of the competition had won the modern champions league three times in a row mostly because what the that’s ridiculous and to that point the 1718 campaign was by far the toughest run out of any of the runs that we’ve spoken about so far in terms of quality of opposition at the very least you would think that the team was well on its way to falling off after such a long stretch of dominance after all there was a drop off in the league as they finished third 17 points off of
Champions Barcelona yet in Europe they phased off against PSG the champions of France Juventus the champions of Italy Bayern Munich the champions of Germany and Liverpool who were building up to being something truly special even going on to win the whole thing in the following year Real Madrid rolled through all of them it was a campaign filled with comebacks going down and overturning deficits against PSG she and Bayern Munich they almost had their 3-0 lead Stripped Away by Juventus in the second leg of that tie if not for a 97th
minute Ronaldo pen in that match Juventus would have completed a miraculous Redemption coincidentally it was a campaign that had two of the greatest overhead kicks in champions league history Ronaldo had the entire Juventus crowd at the Allianz giving him a standing ovation for his just look at how high his foot is this is not normal Bale came off the bench and had the entire world in shock due to how insane his was and it was in the final of all matches can anyone else remind me why neither of these goals won the puskas
it’s been almost five years and I’m still upset once again the exact same starting lineup from the year before was used here the only difference was that East Coast Central free roam role was made more official as per the team Sheet the philosophy remained the same high pressure quick interplay through the flanks and back inside deadly counters and then there was that Magic fact that simply can’t be coached three in a row now that is a headline like I said earlier on a lot of people were initially expecting this Madrid
side to crash and burn under the dot and then when the opposite happened they expected the high to be short-lived neither of those things happened all the same we all knew that this was going to have to come to an end at some point and funnily enough it happened mere minutes after Madrid’s name was etched onto the trophy Cristiano Ronaldo’s post-match interview was riddled with hints that he was leaving he’s on record saying it’s because he felt Madrid didn’t value him as he thought they should there are other rumors but you can make of those
but you will subsequently every other post-match interview involved asking his teammates what they knew Gareth Bale who felt that he should have started that match and also many of the others before that let that be known and also hinted at leaving Perez was dismissive of any and all Ronaldo leaving talk he has been happy is currently happy and will continue to be happy he’s under contract I’m not here to speak about individual players all of a sudden the fact that they won a European Cup was a secondary even tertiary headline contrary to what
Perez had to say Ronaldo did leave shortly after but more significantly days after the big win zidane announced his resignation as manager guy literally showed up won everything refused to elaborate further and left I mean he did say that Madrid required change but that could mean anything right also I guess change wasn’t actually what was required as he was back only 10 months later but that’s a whole other kind of worms going back to this incredible three-year run this team was remarkable they had everything hard work luck the right
personnel and that right there probably best sums up this era and what ultimately made this team the greatest team in modern European Cup history a club hierarchy that knew how to Market their players while keeping the quality of Ballers at its absolute Peak Stellar footballing ability from phenomenal mentally strong players a highly intelligent manager who clearly did not give a about being underestimated while wiping the floor with an entire continent I guess there really is no argument against the fact that Real
Madrid are the Undisputed Kings of Europe and there we have it let me know what you guys think about this insane Madrid team feel free to follow all the socials that’s all for me today hope you guys enjoyed hope you’re having a great day cheers and I will catch you in the next one foreign
