Real Madrid’s week has two doors in it: Elche at the Martinez Valero on Tuesday, then Atletico Madrid at the Metropolitano on Sunday.
The second of those is the one Jose Mourinho’s players have circled, and the Julian Alvarez Real Madrid subplot has just become the most interesting thing about it. Atletico’s Argentine forward missed the weekend with a muscle problem – and, per Marca, he has spent the past 48 hours being told the derby is still on for him.
The Julian Alvarez Real Madrid derby fitness race
Alvarez was the headline absentee from Atletico’s win at Anoeta, ruled out by an overload in the quadriceps that forced him out of the closing stages of training last Saturday. Marca report that the subsequent tests came back clean: no tear, no significant injury, and a player considered recoverable for Sunday at the Metropolitano.
That is the optimistic reading. The cautious one is that muscle complaints in a forward who has just played 90 minutes at Anfield rarely resolve on a timetable anyone can guarantee. Alvarez will work through the whole week with one target in his head, but his day-by-day response is what decides it.
Why Alvarez has been running on empty
The context matters, and it is not flattering to Atletico’s pre-season. Alvarez only reported for duty on 10 August after his involvement in the World Cup final, then spent a week away from full group training. What followed was a spell of hybrid work – some sessions with the squad, some on an individual plan – all of it playing out against the noise of a summer-long saga about his future that, per Marca, took a physical and emotional toll.
Last Wednesday at Anfield was the first time this season he had completed 90 minutes. He finished it with discomfort, and the overload followed. For a striker of his profile, that sequence is less a freak setback than the bill arriving.
Atletico’s week: Osasuna first, then Madrid
Atletico host Osasuna on Wednesday before the derby, which gives them an obvious incentive to keep Alvarez wrapped in cotton wool until the weekend. They are already without Pablo Barrios, whose injury rules him out until after the international break, so the shape of their midfield against Los Blancos is unsettled regardless of what happens up front.
For Madrid, the calculation is simple enough: an Atletico side without Alvarez is a materially different proposition to one with him. He is the player who stretches a back line, drops to link play and punishes the loose second ball – precisely the three things this Real Madrid defence has looked least comfortable with in the opening weeks.
What it means for Mourinho’s back four
Mourinho has reportedly already settled on the defence he wants for the derby, and he does so with Eder Militao and Ferland Mendy still working their way back. Thibaut Courtois, at least, came through the weekend’s shoulder scare and should be behind that line at both the Martinez Valero and the Metropolitano.
Rodrygo remains a long-term absentee. Madrid, in other words, go into the biggest week of their season so far with their own selection questions, which is why the state of Atletico’s leading forward is being watched so closely at Valdebebas.
The Metropolitano wound Madrid still want to close
There is history here, and it is not the kind Madridistas enjoy revisiting. Marca frame this run as a six-point demand at two grounds where Madrid dropped points last season – Elche and the Metropolitano – and describe the derby defeat as one of the deepest wounds of that campaign. The newspaper’s own footage from the afternoon is filed under Atletico Madrid 5-2 Real Madrid, with Alvarez among the scorers.
Before any of that, there is Elche on Tuesday, a 21:30 CEST (20:30 UK) kick-off at a ground where Madrid were held to a controversial 2-2 draw last November, as Mundo Deportivo recalled. Take care of that, and Federico Valverde’s side arrive at the Metropolitano with the title race still in their own hands.
Whether Alvarez is waiting for them is, for now, a question only his quadriceps can answer.
