Ancelotti: "This team never defends with five"

The three-center-back defense has not come to stay at Real Madrid. This is the takeaway from the press conference Carlo Ancelotti gave on Monday ahead of the match against Borussia Dortmund, corresponding to the third round of the Champions League. "This team never defends with five. You might end up with five defenders, but the idea is always four," said the Italian coach, emphasizing that the setup in Vigo featured three center-backs with the ball, but without it, it should have been a line of four defenders. "As we have always done and will always do," he added.

Ancelotti continues to ponder Real Madrid's formation, seeking the right formula to improve the team's performance. One thing is clear to the Italian: the team needs to strengthen its defense. "We are focused on defending better, which is the key this season. We need to defend better as we did last year. Now the team is less solid, and we are working on giving the team more solidity," Carletto remarked in a press conference where he again showed his preference for a fast-paced game over a slow one. "A back-and-forth game suits us. We have more difficulty in a controlled game because we don't have players with the characteristics to play in tight spaces," he noted.

"We are not at one hundred percent. We have achieved good results, but we need to improve our offensive and defensive play. We will do it gradually," Ancelotti explained before Real Madrid faces Dortmund, "a demanding opponent" that played the Champions League final against them less than five months ago and "maintains the same football idea" with Nuri Sahin at the helm as they did with Edin Terzic. Carletto knows the secrets of the German team inside out without needing to place spies in their training sessions, as Sahin feared, which is why Dortmund preferred to hold their last training session before Tuesday's match in Germany and not at the Santiago Bernabéu, as is usually the case. "Football has changed. You know everything about the opposing team because you can watch all the matches they play. I have enough data to evaluate the opponent with the matches they have played recently," the Italian pointed out.

What really worries Ancelotti is his team, once again lackluster on Saturday against Celta. "We need to work a bit more compactly as a team. Sometimes you have the idea of pressing higher, we do it well when they play out from the goalkeeper, but we lack a bit of solidity when we have the mid-block," acknowledged the Real Madrid coach, who repeatedly emphasized the need for his team to gain consistency because they have enough quality up front to win matches.

In this quest for Real Madrid to be stronger in all areas of the field, Jude Bellingham must play a prominent role, whom Ancelotti praises despite the Englishman not yet scoring this season. "We are very satisfied with his work. He is always present on the field, competes, fights, and sacrifices himself. He hasn't scored the goals he did last year, but that's not the surprise; the surprise was last year. The problem is not that we lack Bellingham's goals. We have always scored goals and will continue to do so because of the talent we have up front," defended the Reggiolo coach, who continues with his idea that the Stourbridge midfielder strengthens the right flank in the offensive phase since the left side is more occupied this year with Vinicius and Mbappé. "We think that with Bellingham and Rodrygo on that side, we can be more effective, as we are on the left wing," he remarked.

The Italian prefers Mbappé "to score goals rather than press," the same he asked of Benzema when the Lyon player performed a similar role to what the Bondy star now does. Finally, he praised Modric, who was key against Celta with the pass to Vinicius that resolved the match corresponding to the tenth round of the League. "Modric is a unique player in football and in our squad. He has spectacular experience and continues to have unique quality in his ball handling and game timing. He is helping us a lot in the matches, and hopefully, he can help us tomorrow as well, whether he starts or not," he concluded.