It wasn't a weekend worthy of remembering for the European Champions, as they helplessly watched their la liga title hopes slowly drifting away. Real Madrid have toiled all season and at some point were Beginning to pull applause worthy stunts, however, their rather disappointing 1-2 defeat to a team like Girona have left them in shambles.

The European Champions have been on a seven game unbeaten run until Girona came knocking at the Bernabeu on Sunday. Los Blancos were lost in all angles as Girona made them pat for their abysmal performance in front of their home fans. Will they ever be able to placate their fans this season? Maybe if they win the Champions League, lol.

Trust me, it has been a hectic and challenging season for Madrid. Just when we thought we thought they have finally put the departure of Ronaldo to Juventus behind them and moved on, they get speared again, this time around by Girona. No one really saw that coming, I would lost my bet if I had staked. Football never ceases to surprise me and that's the awesomeness embedded in the game.


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Recent weeks have seen Madrid gather momentum that seemed lost few months ago, raising hopes and firing from all cylinders as they remained resilient and refused to throw in the towel in the league. Despite all these efforts, it took just a second half ignominious display to quash weeks of hopes. Don't really know who to blame, but I think Solari's selection didn't do him any good this time around.

Though Madrid wasn't having a good gameplay on Sunday, but neither was their visitors Girona, in fact the 15th placed Girona were not better. However, with a 1-0 lead at first half, one would have thought the European Champions were still gonna have their way at the blast of the final whistle. But it dawned on me when I saw the scoreline 1-2 at the end. I saw the despair on Solari's face, but even more disappointment could be seen covering the faces of the Bernabeu fans.

To be frank, I don't think there is any way one wouldn't trace a blame to Sergio Ramos and the Brazilian Marcelo. I mean, these two guys have been the driving forces in Madrid's back line for a long time now, however, if I was allowed to call out any player for criticism, I will not exclude these two. Sure, they are awesome players no doubt, but their Sunday performance against Girona was nothing to write home about.

Since the departure of Christiano Ronaldo to Juventus, Marcelo have become a total shadow of himself. Little wonder Santiago Solari have always preferred Sergio Reguilion in the first team line ups. It was a shambolic performance by the left back on Sunday, which left his flank to be explored by a never giving up Girona side. Even after being one goal down at half time, the visitors had gone into the dressing room to summon courage and march into the remaining 45 minutes with all their strength.


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Despite Girona having been a victim of six defeats in succession from all competitions and have not been able to get a win after thirteen games, they knew Madrid wasn't invincible and they got rewarded for trusting their instincts at the Bernabeu. Maybe it was their bad run of form that tempted Solari to rotate his team, as some of his regulars were seen on the bench. The team Saw Marcelo in the Line up and Marco Asensio who was also deployed on the left flank in place of the vibrant Vinicius.

Also, in the heart of the midfield was Dani Ceballos who replaced the Croatian captain Luka Modric, and all these culminated in upsetting Madrid's usual playing rhythm. Even after Madrid was put on the lead by Casemiro's first half header, it was obvious that all weren't well. Sometimes I wonder if same would have happened to Barcelona on Saturday, as the league Champions also got a narrow 1-0 win against Real Valladolid.

Girona's coach Eusebio Sacristan took advantage of the halftime break to talk some morale into his team, and it payed off. He had noticed a crack on Marcelo's flank and so he switched his winger Portu over to their right, and as the case may be, the results started showing. With Sergio Ramos committing a somewhat intentional handball in the box, The visitors levelled at the 65th minute through the resultant penalty.

Stuani made mistake in converting the penalty as he netted his 13th goal of the season. With Eusebio having introduced Aleix Garcia and Lozano in the second half, Girona gained momentum and started hunting Madrid. The visitors will later get their winning goal to kill off the game as Ramos got sent off few minutes to the end. It was the 20th red card of his career, making him the most sent off in the history of La liga. Madrid are now sitting on third place with 45 points and are now nine points behind league leaders Barcelona.