Last night was one to forget for Real Madrid as they were thrashed 0-4 by arch-rivals FC Barcelona at the Santiago Bernabeu, dealing an early blow to the defence of their La Liga title.
A failure to break Barça’s offside trap combined with poor finishing and a complete defensive collapse in the second half led to Carlo Ancelotti’s men being condemned to a humiliating defeat on home turf.
The result sees Real Madrid fall six points behind Barça in the La Liga standings after 11 matchweeks.
The 0-4 defeat meant that Los Blancos saw their unbeaten streak in La Liga come to an end after 42 matches – just one shy of Barça’s all-time league record of 43.
As mentioned earlier, Real Madrid were repeatedly caught in the offside trap that Barça worked so effectively on the night.
Indeed, in the first period alone, Real Madrid were caught offside eight times – equalling their highest number of offsides in the first half of a La Liga match since at least the 2003/04 season, as against Celta Vigo in March 2013.
In the end, the game finished with a total of 12 offside calls against Real Madrid on Saturday night.
Meanwhile, Kylian Mbappe, making his El Clasico debut, had a career-high eight offsides against Barcelona in what was a frustrating outing for the Frenchman.
Real Madrid captain Luka Modric came on in the 62nd minute to try and turn things around but was unable to.
However, the veteran became the oldest player to play in El Clasico history when he came on at the Bernabeu last night, at 39 years and 47 days, surpassing the record of Dani Alves (38 years and 318 days).
Ancelotti will once again come under scrutiny after last night’s performance, with his record in La Liga against their main rivals – Barcelona and Atletico Madrid – far from favourable.
Indeed, under the Italian, Real Madrid have now lost 11 league games against Barcelona and Atletico Madrid (W7, D4), compared to just three defeats under Zinedine Zidane (W7, D8).