A couple more reasons to love this team (¿cómo no te voy a querer?), as we head into tonight’s derbi madrileño! Plus, go Getafe, especially all the madridistas there!
At yesterday’s training session, Marcelo Sunshine was left behind, sitting on the field, as the rest of his teammates walked away. But that was all part of his cunning plan to get his little hands on Ángel di María, as we can see, although ultimately he wasn’t successful, due to Ángel’s trademark speed and evasion techniques.
Later on that day, as the team arrived at the Bernabéu to begin the concentración, Sergio wore a sweater with a big, thick, red vertical stripe. My eyes just travel down that stripe and stop at the end of it. It’s almost as if it were an arrow directing our attention to a specific part of Sergio’s body… Meanwhile, Cristiano and Fábio arrived together, having carpooled. I’m going to imagine that Fábio had just gone to Cris’ house to steal get vegetables, and then Cris offered to drive Fábio to the stadium.
When I first saw Iker turn up like this, I thought madre mía. The shirt is too busy, the scarf is too short, the blazer is too tight… but then I saw Hamit Altintop, and I gave thanks that Iker hadn’t gotten his hands on that plaid shirt, which is two times worse than a normal plaid shirt, because it’s a marriage between two plaid shirts and one that will obviously end in divorce. Hopefully Hamit changed out of it before Iker saw it and got any ideas.
This morning, Iker posted on his Facebook that he had started the day by drinking Cola Cao (it’s nice to see he’s a traditionalist and a fan of the original version, not the turbo version). He wrote, “many things stay the same, despite the passing of the years. I remember when I was small, my mother would give me a big glass (of Cola Cao) to help me replenish my energy after playing or training. What she didn’t know was that I would have liked to have one before training or playing as well!” Shortly after that, he posted, “Marcelo came to have a Cola Cao with me. He brought along a friend of his, but I don’t know who he is, although his face looks familiar…” Watch some people take this as a sign that things (still) aren’t well between Iker and Cristiano… I love the lighting in that photo, because Iker really does look like a saint! Jajaja!!!!
And looking ahead to the game, here are some facts and statistics from Mister Chip via AS.
The breakdown: Real Madrid and Atleti have faced each other in 243 official games (148 in the Liga, 37 in the Copa, four in the Copa de la Liga, three in the Copa de Europa, and 51 in the regional championship) with the following balance: 129 wins for Madrid, 59 for Atleti and 55 ties. Madrid has scored 428 goals and Atleti 315. The first derbi was played on Nov. 16, 1913 and Madrid won 2-0.
In the Liga: of the 148 derbis madrileños in the Liga, Madrid has won 81 and Atleti 35, with 32 ties. Madrid has scored 265 goals, while Atleti has found the net on 199 occasions.
Player records: Paco Gento has played 29 derbies, the most out of any player. Santillana (13) and Di Stéfano (13) are the top goal scorers for Madrid and overall. Raúl has won 17 derbies, the most out of any player.
An objective for Sergio: our second captain has played 10 Liga derbies and has not lost one (eight wins and two ties). If Madrid does not lose today, he will become the only player to have played more than 10 derbies without losing a single one.
Winning streak: Madrid has an unbeaten derby streak of 19 games, the longest unbeaten streak of any derby between clubs in the first division. The last one that Madrid lost was on Oct. 30, 1999 in the Bernabéu (1-3). A total of 4,410 days have passed since then until today.
Early goals: in 16 of the last 18 Liga derbies, a goal has been scored in the first 15 minutes and on nine occasions, a goal was scored before the six-minute mark.