Copa del Rey 2018-19, UD Melilla vs Real Madrid CF: 5 Talking points
Santiago Solari's reign at the club began with a bright 0-4 victory 400 miles away from home in the North African district of Melilla, an autonomous Spanish city at the border of Morrocco.
He picked a largely different starting eleven from the one that started the Clasico on Monday, naming nine changes in total with only Ramos and Benzema retaining their places, but that could be accredited to injuries in defense to Varane, Vallejo, Carvajal, and Marcelo.
Melilla fought quite well for a few patches of the game when they pressed Real players in possession, particularly Asensio and Ceballos.
They were quite solid in defense and picked out gaps in the makeshift backline that featured Alvaro Odriozola, Castilla captain Javier Sanchez, Sergio Ramos, who was replaced at halftime by Nacho, and Sergio Reguilon.
The midfield featured Marcos Llorente, who had his first start of the season, alongside Dani Ceballos, and Marco Asensio playing behind Karim Benzema as a No. 10 and running into the pockets of spaces that were made by those running ahead of him.
Mariano Diaz was also out with the injury bug that's strangling Madrid, as he suffered a pull in his right hamstring in training earlier this week, which lead to Benzema starting the game. The French striker was later replaced by midfielder Fede Valverde at half-time, probably keeping the upcoming fixture against Valladolid in mind.
Vinicius Junior got his first start for the club, alongside Lucas Vasquez, who played on the left and right wings respectively.
Here are my observations, as Madrid absolutely cruise through the first leg of the Round of 32 of the Copa del Rey.
#1 Solari was bang on with the selections
One major issue with Julen Lopetegui era was the coach's inability to field players based on form instead of reputation. This lead to a lot of dismal displays from star players who were either not fully fit or just not up to scratch anymore (Benzema).
He failed to pick Dani Ceballos in matchups, choosing to field the still not fully fit Isco, who's just returned from an appendicitis surgery a couple of weeks ago and gave the club's only two attacking signings a combined total of 271 minutes in all competitions (256 for Mariano from 11 appearances and 15 for Vinicius from 2 appearances).
He kept benching players who were raring to have a crack at the first team (Odriozola, Llorente, Ceballos, Vinicius, and Mariano) and the results of those selections were a major part of the reason he was the man with the shortest stint as a full-time manager of Los Blancos.
Santiago Solari fielded all of these players, and the result was a thrilling performance, and a much-needed result for Real Madrid and their fans around the globe.
They were never really against the strongest opposition, but playing away in cup games can always be tricky, and having just been humiliated in the previous game, it could have become a banana skid had they gotten a bad result tonight.
Fortunately, for Solari, that wasn't the case as his eleven cruised past modest opposition, brushing them away by four goals, producing one of the best performances of the season by the club.