Real Madrid president Florentino Perez has called a press conference for later on Monday, at which he is expected to address the fall-out from the Clasico thrashing at the hands of Barcelona on Saturday.
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Despite his claims, Zidane would be a popular choice among the Madrid faithful, as he spent five seasons at the Bernabau as a player, winning the Champions League in 2002.
Goals from Luis Suarez and Neymar saw Madrid trailing by two goals at halftime, before Andres Iniesta and again Suarez piled even more misery on the home side after the interval.
“I understand the unhappiness and the anger of the fan base with what happened on Saturday, but I ask them that they support the team”.
The former Valencia, Liverpool, Inter Milan, Chelsea and Napoli manager, the 10th Perez has hired, could be replaced by former Real and France great Zinedine Zidane, who is now in charge of the club’s B team, local media have reported.
Benitez arrived at Madrid with the unwanted tag of preferring a more pragmatic and defensive game than his predecessor.
“When you lose a game against Barcelona the fans are going to be unhappy”.
Similarly, star-turn Karim Benzema started in attack and played the full 90 minutes despite the fact that he was returning from injury and looked off the pace, giving the Barca defence a largely comfortable evening.
“We were better”, he said.
“We are at the beginning of the project, we have confidence and there are still plenty of games left to play”.
“With the match now over, we can clearly say that the lineup didn’t work”, said the coach, who was hired by Madrid less than six months ago. Last week, the coach was forced to public deny rumors that some of the top players, including Cristiano Ronaldo, organized a meeting to demand changes in the team’s tactics. Neymar leads the league with 12 goals, one more than Suarez.
“It was a complete game from us”.
Real’s next outing is Wednesday’s Champions League Group A match at Shakhtar Donetsk.
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The result means Barca are now six points clear of Madrid at the top of the table and piles further pressure on Benitez’s shoulders ahead of a crucial few weeks before the winter break.
