After three successive victories in La Liga, Real Madrid were defeated 2-1 by Athletic Club on Wednesday. It is a result that sees the defending champions lose out in the title race after Barcelona won convincingly at Mallorca 24 hours prior.
It was costly errors that meant that Real Madrid fell to defeat at San Mames. Federico Valverde gifted the winner to Gorka Guruzeta, while Kylian Mbappe missed his second consecutive penalty when the score was at 1-0. As per Diario AS, Carlo Ancelotti issued a strong defence of the latter after more criticism came his way.
“I haven’t spoken to Mbappe. It was a complicated match – even, hard-fought and competitive. When we equalised you could think of having control and small details cost us tonight. We missed the penalty… I don’t have to evaluate a player’s game because of a penalty that is sometimes scored and sometimes missed. Obviously he is sad, disappointed, but we have to continue.
“He is not at his best, but you have to give him time to adapt. He has scored 10 goals and is working to do better.”
Ancelotti also clarified the penalty taker situation at Real Madrid on the back of the incident.
“Vinicius has usually taken a lot of penalties and all of them are good. The ones who take penalties are three: Mbappe, Bellingham and Vinicius.”