Real Madrid will look to get back to winning ways in La Liga after their shock midweek loss when they host Getafe at the Santiago Bernabeu on Saturday.
Real Madrid’s poor domestic campaign continued in the midweek as they slumped to a 1-0 loss at Espanyol, putting talks of a resurgence to bed. But, on Saturday, Los Blancos will be aiming to cut the gap on the league leaders when they welcome Getafe to the Bernabeu.
Real Madrid are currently third on the table with 51 points to their name, 10 points behind second placed Atletico Madrid and only a point ahead of Valencia. Athletic Bilbao did Real a massive favour by holding Valencia to a draw in their last game, allowing the reigning champions to hold onto third place, and there are some more positives for Zinedine Zidane.
In their last training session, the Real Madrid manager welcomed Marcelo and Jesus Vallejo back to training. Luka Modric (thigh) and Toni Kroos (knee) continue to miss out though, as they are still recovering from their respective injuries. But, there is no shortage of midfielders for Zidane to choose from.
When asked about the injured players the Frenchman said in his pre-match press conference, “The important thing is that Marcelo is available tomorrow and we’ll see about the others. The way the players feel is the most important thing and I want the players to be 100%.”
There will likely be a few changes to the squad that started in Tuesday’s 1-0 loss to Espanyol at the RCDE Stadium. Dani Carvajal and Marcelo will likely come back into the starting XI at right and left-back, while Sergio Ramos and Raphael Varane are expected to retain their place in the starting XI.
Casemiro is expected to come into central midfield ahead of Marcos Llorente and join Mateo Kovacic in the middle. Dani Ceballos is also available, but Zidane will most likely prefer to use his strongest available midfield pairing with a win paramount.
Marco Asensio is expected to make way for Gareth Bale to move back to the left wing and Isco is also expected to be benched. Crisitiano Ronaldo and Karim Benzema are almost certainly going to be brought back to lead the line for Los Blancos.
