Real Madrid visited Valencia for the last time at Mestalla in the League and left it in ruins, with part of the public fleeing the stadium minutes before the end and another complaining about some of their own players. Mourinho's team delivered another convincing performance against the penultimate team in the table, which cannot find a point on which to stand. Madrid, driven by the expansive Bellingham and the genius of Güler, achieved its eighth consecutive victory, the first time it has achieved this since the first nine games of the 2022-23 season, still with Ancelotti, just after winning the 14th Champions League in Paris. The team continues to gain strength and returned to the capital tied on points at the top of the standings with Barcelona, who visit Atlético tonight (9:00 p.m., Movistar).
Mourinho's Madrid has begun to recognize itself with a configuration that allows it to approach old, non-dysfunctional and very successful versions. There is already a lineup to go to blindly at key moments, such as the classic and the visit to Valencia just before the national team break, the eve of the Metropolitano match. At least one of the two teams that precede him in the table will leave points there, which will put pressure on a League that the Portuguese coach wants to tie the knot on. Their plan for these occasions is very clear, starting with a midfield with Tchouameni and Bernardo Silva, with Valverde occupying the right back, and Güler, Bellingham, Diomande and Mbappé ahead.
With this picture, Madrid has left behind the pasty games in which they got tangled in the middle chewing the ball. Now it flows, as the footballers ahead also flow. The team carburetes at other revolutions in increasingly constant sections. From time to time all the pieces fit together. Starting with the expansive and omnipresent character of Bellingham, which does not cause disorder but dynamism. What used to look like chaos has made sense.
Madrid does not even wait as before for the rival to reach a point of maturation that makes it easier to approach it. It goes full steam ahead from the start. Find the rival area and press your way out. He plays with a reactivated appetite ordered around Tchouameni when he has to protect himself. Although it was precisely a mistake by the Frenchman that paved the way for Valencia's first scare. Mayol took advantage of his parsimony, stole the ball and shot into the top corner. But Courtois flew there, with an extra life for the team as always.
Javier Aguirre's team, stuck at the bottom of the standings, protected its limitations with an extra point of caution. He ventured into few elaborations in view of Madrid's voracity to put pressure on him. They preferred to skip that construction phase to search for Sadiq with long shipments, immersed in a constant struggle with an increasingly brave Huijsen.
The matches of Mourinho's team share more and more patterns. An extraordinary save by Courtois usually precedes a definitive flash on the other side. Mbappé ran into the barrier in a direct free kick and the ball fell to Valverde in the front, his favorite hunting area. With Valencia packed into his area, he had the time to control, aim and find the net with a whip that cut through a congested forest with laser precision. Another great goal from the Uruguayan just three days after completing the comeback against AEK in Athens.
The goal appeased Valencia by one more point, supported only by Maffeo's spirit of street insolence, always uncontrolled against Madrid. This time Vinicius was missing and he got tangled with Cucurella, and even with the reporter who, by contract, put the microphone in front of him when he arrived at half-time: "I don't feel like doing this interview at all. I think it's shit."
But before reaching that point, Bellingham, exuberant throughout the game, gained the baseline and took a cross that rose after touching a defender and landed at the point reached by Güler, who pushed in the second.
In these situations of favorable winds, Madrid does not adapt. Mourinho pushes to drown out the games as soon as possible with more goals and his people do not let up. Tchouameni hardly allowed anything in the center. Waves were born from his thefts, dizzying slaloms like a Diomande dancer and hand-to-hand chances that Mbappé and Güler wasted.
Until the Turk hugged Pepelu, stole the ball from him and left Mbappé alone with a pass from memory, in a play that summarizes the extraordinary point he has reached, a mix of quality and physical progress. The Frenchman eluded the goalkeeper and scored, the seventh consecutive game in which he found the net. Mbappé smiles, Mourinho enjoys his tight creation and the League tightens, while Mestalla, in its last great nights, crumbles into rubble.
