Real Madrid kicked off their preseason with a comeback victory over Milan, recovering a 2-0 deficit to win 3-2 in the second half.
The game began very much in Milan’s favour although the Italians, like Real Madrid had not put out their strongest line-up. Despite Jude Bellingham’s good work on his Real Madrid debut, Milan took the lead through a Fikayo Tomori header after 35 minutes, and their lead was doubled through a brilliant long-range effort from teenager Luka Romero.
Los Blancos tried out their new diamond midfield formation, which struggled to cope defensively, but improved greatly after Carlo Ancelotti made eight changes at half-time. Bellingham remained on the field until the 64th minute, when he was substituted for youngster Nico Paz to mkae his debut in the number 10 role too.
By the time Bellingham went off, Los Blancos were level. Fede Valverde, the only outfield player to complete the match, first scored from a goalkeeping error, but then pounced on a loose ball to fire into the corner from outside of the box for a second time.
— Adrián González Helguera (@adrihelguera) July 24, 2023
Rodrygo Goes and Vinicius Junior were on up front by this point, and were making their danger felt. With just over five minutes remaining Luka Modric found Vinicius in behind the defence, who wrestled off his man and slotted home calmly for the winner.
Their new system left positives and negatives for Carlo Ancelotti, who will no doubt be pleased with the response from his team and Valverde. Los Blancos next face Manchester United at 02:30 CEST in the early hours of Thursday.
Valverde scored 2, made 2 interceptions at 2-2 and 3-2 and ran like posessed.
I’d sat thats a man of the match and a good days work.