Jude Bellingham’s performance against Manchester City in Tuesday’s quarter-final first leg generated a great deal of comment about his recent form in Spain.
For the first time since his summer arrival — for an initial €103million (£88m; $110m at current rates) plus a possible further 30 per cent in add-ons, a deal that could become a club record — it has been suggested he is going through something of a dip.
Bellingham’s displays have, on the whole, been outstanding — and despite going without a goal since the start of February, he is La Liga’s top scorer with 16. No other Madrid player has more than his 20 goals in all competitions, nor his 10 assists (although Vinicius Junior also has 10).
His impact has been unprecedented, on and off the pitch, playing for (Madrid fans would say) the biggest club in the world, in a new league and in an unfamiliar more advanced position that has often seen him shoulder the burden left behind by Karim Benzema’s surprise departure.
Bellingham has been Madrid’s big player, or their match-winner, on so many occasions over the 2023-24 season — but that wasn’t the story on Tuesday night, as Carlo Ancelotti’s side drew 3-3 with City.
“He didn’t score, but we scored three goals, the work up front was very good,” Madrid’s manager said when asked about the 20-year-old Englishman in his post-match press conference.
“Vinicius, Bellingham and Federico Valverde have done a fantastic defensive job and that has allowed us to have more control.”
Ancelotti opted to make key tactical tweaks for the City game. He put Rodrygo on his preferred left flank, relocating Vinicius Jr to a more central position. He set up his side to play on the counter-attack, asking his players to move the ball quickly and to try less elaborate, more direct connections — especially in transitions.
In La Liga (and often in the Champions League, too), Madrid are used to dominating play — encountering teams who set up defensively against them.
Against City, Madrid had just 39 per cent of the possession, and Bellingham could not link with Vinicius Jr and Rodrygo as he has done this season. It also reduced opportunities for his very successful box-crashing runs.
The passing network map below also shows from the colour of Bellingham’s circle that he did not contribute a huge amount in terms of passing value (ie, contribution towards his team’s chances of scoring). That has been very rarely the case.
Madrid’s 4-4-2 shape out of possession meant he and Valverde had a disciplined role off the ball to close down City’s defenders (he was assigned to press Ruben Dias especially), trying to force them into mistakes, which often worked well.
Tuesday’s game was a chaotic meeting between two giants, another crazy entry in this glittering modern European rivalry (Madrid and City have now scored 23 goals in their past five meetings) but it also had its tactical themes — as explained by The Athletic’s Thom Harris. From a Madrid point of view, their game plan was at least partially successful.
Early on Wednesday morning, back at Madrid’s Valdebebas training complex, it was time to review the match. Ancelotti and his colleagues analysed everything that had happened — including Bellingham’s performance.
Bellingham and Ancelotti in discussion during the City game (Manuel Reino/DeFodi Images via Getty Images)
Madrid coaching staff sources spoken to for this article — like all sources cited here, they preferred to remain anonymous to protect their position — said Bellingham might not have had his “most brilliant” game, but that he had performed the “dirty work” assigned to him very well.
They also recognised that he was the player whose regular style suffered most from the shift in tactical approach — which cast Rodrygo as the main protagonist in attack.
“We wanted to keep Rodrygo on the left because his form has been better than Bellingham’s and that penalised Jude,” one of the coaching staff sources said. “Normally it’s the other way around and Rodrygo has to sacrifice more for the team.”
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Last season’s humbling defeat by Pep Guardiola’s side (4-0 at the Etihad in the second leg of their Champions League semi-final) sparked concern at Madrid about the gap between them and City. In 2022, they had come out on top against their English rivals — but only individual brilliance propelled them past superior opponents.
These concerns only had an impact on the club’s mid-term thinking. There was no knee-jerk reaction — and in terms of Bellingham, the deal to sign him was pretty much wrapped up by the time they played. But Tuesday’s reunion with City was the exact type of occasion where it was hoped his signing would make the difference.
Bellingham was taking on the club he turned down to sign up at the Bernabeu, too. There was an expectation that he would play a central role, and the fact he didn’t likely factored into some fans’ disappointment. As is perhaps to be expected of a player of his standing — and the club where he is playing — some media commentators in Spain were quick to criticise.
Bellingham hit the ground running at Madrid – and kept going (Helios de la Rubia/Real Madrid via Getty Images)
From August to December — when Bellingham was the undisputed leader of a Real Madrid side depleted by injury to Vinicius Jr — he scored 17 goals and provided five assists in 21 matches. Since then, he has contributed three goals and five assists in 12 appearances.
However, Madrid sources stress they have no concerns over Bellingham’s recent displays.
“Physically, he’s not going through his best moment but we’re not worried, all players go through these moments,” coaching staff sources say. “And his first part of the season was off the charts.”
Other sources at Valdebebas recently pointed out how injury and the two-match suspension he served after being sent off at Valencia (for protesting the disallowing of his stoppage-time winner) may have affected his rhythm.
“The stoppages have been detrimental because he has had to slow down when he was starting to pick up speed again,” they said.
And despite some signs of fatigue in Tuesday’s game, sources in Madrid’s fitness department, led by Antonio Pintus, did not see anything out of the ordinary.
“He worked a lot in the defensive phase and then appeared less in the offensive phase,” they said.
“He played in a position that allowed him to stand out less.”
(Top photo: David Ramos/Getty Images)
