Ahead of his Clasico coaching debut, Zinedine Zidane is confident superstar strike trio Gareth Bale, Karim Benzema and Cristiano Ronaldo can break their duck against Barcelona.
Los Blancos are trailing La Liga leaders Barcelona by 10 points heading into tonight’s match at the Nou Camp, and are also desperate to restore pride after suffering a 4-0 mauling when the teams last met at the Bernabeu in November.
And in the inevitable battle between the two teams’ respective forward lines, Zidane’s ‘BBC’ are eager to taste victory over their eternal rivals for the first time as a trio.
Although Madrid have twice beaten Barca since Bale moved to Spain in the summer of 2013, Ronaldo missed the first of those triumphs – the Copa del Rey two years ago – through injury, while Bale was absent from last season’s home win in La Liga.
However, the front three all played well and scored in the 4-0 thumping of Sevilla before the international break, and Zidane believes they are ready to fire Los Blancos to victory on Saturday night.
“The forwards are playing well and this is a game for them to shine,” he said. “They can change that [never winning together against Barca] and that’s what we’ll try to do.”
Zidane also insists revenge is not on Madrid’s mind following the humiliating loss four months ago.
“I’ve watched the game again because I always analyse teams, but I have not shown it again to the players,” he said. “We don’t talk about revenge. We know what happened, but this is another game. Every game is different.”
Zidane has nearly a full strength squad to choose from. Raphael Varane has been ruled out with an injury sustained on international duty with France but he was unlikely to start. Zidane is expected to maintain the same 4-3-3 formation he has recently employed, with Brazilian holding midfielder Casemiro providing a touch of steel alongside Toni Kroos and Luka Modric.
That would mean no room in the starting XI for Isco or Colombian James Rodriguez, who expressed his frustration with his current lack of playing time with Madrid while on international duty.
Zidane claimed he had no problem with the playmaker’s show of dissent, adding: “Neither James nor anyone else accepts being on the bench, but he knows he is important for this team. He is happy here, but when you think you’re not going to play it is difficult and normal to be upset.
“He said things when he was away but here he is good and committed. I have to make the decisions and I will always take them thinking about the good of the team.”
