Real Madrid sealed another victory against Sevilla on Saturday night with another Fede Valverde strike from distance. It is becoming something of a habit for the Uruguayan, who has scored from outside of the box in his last three matches.
He did however suffer at the hands of Papu Gomez, who went in hard with his studs on El Halcon. Valverde appeared shaken up at the end of the match and Carlo Ancelotti was asked about it afterwards by Marca.
“He has a knock on his leg, it bothers him a bit, we have to see how he is. I don’t know if he will be able to recover. I think Benzema will return on Sunday.”
Ancelotti was referring to the RB Leipzig match on Tuesday, yet Real Madrid may well have decided to rest him anyway as group stage qualification has already been sealed.
Right now it appears that nothing can stop Valverde though. As Sam Leveridge points out, only Manchester City forward Erling Haaland has outperformed his expected goals more so than the Uruguayan.
Fede Valverde is outperforming his xG by 4.51 in LaLiga (6 goals from 1.49 xG).
The only man to do better in Europe’s top five leagues is Erling Haaland (5.21, with 17 goals from 11.79 xG).
— Sam Leveridge (@samleveridge) October 22, 2022
The improvement in Valverde’s finishing has been one of the stories of the season for Los Blancos. He is now top scorer for Ancelotti’s side and it seems as if every time he gets a chance to shoot, it finds the net.
