Real Madrid beat Barcelona in El Clasico, Alonso found a way to use Bellingham wisely

Today’s game is very interesting. I won’t talk about the specific details of the game. The scene was a bit trivial. I will talk about Alonso’s use of Bellingham.

To say that Real Madrid was able to defeat Barcelona 2:1, Alonso's tactics were successful, and his tactical arrangements for Bellingham achieved the desired effect.

For example, in the picture above, it is the overall position of Real Madrid at the moment Mbappe scored an offside goal. This position analysis chart before the goal just illustrates Alonso's thinking in this game and his usage pattern of Bellingham.

In the starting lineup, Alonso arranged a formation close to 4231 or 433.

The four backs are from left to right, Carreras, Huizen, Militao and Valverde, a very standard system of two central defenders + two fullbacks. The two defensive midfielders are Camavinga + Chuameni, a very standard defensive configuration.

These two people happen to be dark and tough candidates in the Real Madrid team, and their defensive role will be greater than their offensive role.

The point of contact and support in the middle is Guler, who is still the core of the team's offense, so there is nothing wrong with it.

In terms of the frontcourt combination, Vinicius is on the left, Bellingham is on the right, and Mbappe is in the center. In other words, Alonso placed Bellingham on the right, which was in sharp contrast to Guler and Vinicius' left-field approach.

Judging from the ideas on the left of Guler and the right of Bellingham, Alonso is leaning towards the "dual core" strategy. It is equivalent to hoping that the team's attack will be launched in two lines. The left side relies on Vinicius's impact and Guler's organization to break the game; while the right side will be handed over to Bellingham. This way there will be no collisions and the team will not be overcrowded on the left.

Judging from the layout of the scene, Alonso's effect of handing over possession of the ball and seizing the space behind him achieved quite good results. Real Madrid can't compete with Barcelona in controlling the ball, so they don't emphasize possession rate, but push speed and use Mbappe's off-ball movement to create opportunities for counterattacks.

This combination of one left and one right is really good. The team's space becomes wider. There is no overlapping movement or collision between the players. Everyone has found a comfortable and reasonable position.

In addition, Alonso is also quite flexible in using Bellingham. Although nominally from the starting lineup, Bellingham is positioned as a right winger or right midfielder, in actual games, Bellingham is more inclined to be a "midfield free man".

That is to say, his position is mobile and has no fixed position.

This decision is also based on Valverde's excellent offensive and defensive thinking. Valverde is a player with good defensive tenacity, good awareness, fast recovery speed, and abundant physical fitness. Then Alonso's defensive tasks can be left to Valverde, and Bellingham will be the "right core" of the team.

This idea is somewhat similar to the left wing combination of Real Madrid Carlos + Zidane.

I don’t know if the old fans still remember Real Madrid’s hiring ideas. The starting list was 442. Zidane was the left midfielder. During the game, Zidane was not the left midfielder. He would often lean towards the center, kicking Carlos and then go forward and come to the frontcourt to play.

When Valverde concentrates on defense and is responsible for covering the right wing, Bellingham can freely roam the court and cover everywhere in the frontcourt without any desire.

The ghostly movement brought about the picture above. Without anyone noticing, Bellingham came to the penalty area and received a header from his teammate to score the goal.

It seems that Bellingham scored the goal very easily, but in fact, this is because the Barcelona players were confused by Bellingham's illusory position. Sometimes he went to the right, sometimes he pushed forward near the penalty area, leaving the Barcelona players defense at a loss.

After several experiments, Alonso finally found a way to use Bellingham, which is the "B2B" idea I mentioned earlier, a free midfielder.

Give him a frontcourt position, but not limited to his performance on the field. He can move freely according to the situation on the field. If you want to score, go forward into the penalty area. If you want to defend, retreat and cooperate with your teammates. Try to focus on right-side coverage to achieve a balance between offense and defense for the entire team.

The above employment ideas are the new model used by Alonso for Bellingham. He wants to shape him into the "deputy core" of the team. The main core is Guler and the deputy core Bellingham, starting an offensive play with dual cores on the left and right.

However, there will be a drawback to operating this way, that is, Guler may be targeted by opponents, and he needs to have strong ball control and ability to get the ball out of the encirclement.

Since it is a dual-core strategy that relies heavily on Juler's ball play, Guler will frequently retreat to the backcourt to receive passes from teammates like Modric did before. However, it is not yet said that Guler can reach Modric's level of maturity.

He still lacks experience in handling small details of the ball, and sometimes he will be busy.

Real Madrid's loss of goals is also related to the disconnect between the backcourt and the frontcourt. Barcelona pressed hard, but the Real Madrid players failed to respond in time, resulting in the intercepted opponent seizing the opportunity of your mistake to score.

Real Madrid still needs to improve on the connection between the ball and the midfield. Barcelona is suffering from injuries in this game and is not playing with the strongest lineup. If they encounter an opponent like Atletico Madrid, the problems in the midfield will still be exposed.

In terms of support and teammate support, Guler and Bellingham still need to establish a tacit relationship. After playing more games and running in, I believe this problem can be alleviated.

But no matter what, Alonso has found a good idea regarding the integration of Bellingham. In terms of usage and tactics, the decision-making is on the right path. We will see how to adjust the details later..

I have said before when talking about the game that Bellingham is still useful in tough battles. His all-round attributes, defensive enthusiasm and offensive threat are great. Real Madrid cannot use him without him. It would be a pity to give him up as a substitute.

Because he has the awareness to chase back and defend, he is much better than Rodrigo and others. Strong dialogue can play a very good role.

For Alonso, what he has to worry about now is the locker room issues of Rodrigo and Vinicius. Vinicius was substituted early midway to express his dissatisfaction and all kinds of complaints. I am afraid that the locker room is not peaceful.

How to do a good job in the ideological work of players and obey team discipline, Alonso still has a lot of work to complete next.

I hope that this El Clasico victory can give Real Madrid a good start and rebuild their confidence. I also hope that Bellingham, Mbappe and others can perform better.

Mini-game recommendations:Unicycle Mayhem