{"id":40495,"date":"2025-09-26T09:31:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-26T13:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/sin-categoria\/xabi-alonso-i-like-to-see-vinicius-smile-in-the-madrid-derby\/"},"modified":"2025-09-26T09:31:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-26T13:31:09","slug":"xabi-alonso-i-like-to-see-vinicius-smile-in-the-madrid-derby","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/soccer\/xabi-alonso-i-like-to-see-vinicius-smile-in-the-madrid-derby\/","title":{"rendered":"Xabi Alonso: &#8220;I like to see Vin\u00edcius smile&#8221; in the Madrid Derby"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>Xabi Alonso Highlights Vin\u00edcius J\u00fanior&#8217;s Performance Before the Madrid Derby<\/h2>\n\nCoach Xabi Alonso has expressed his satisfaction with Vin\u00edcius J\u00fanior&#8217;s performance, highlighting his performance in Real Madrid&#8217;s recent triumph. The Brazilian forward, who has been a key player in the team&#8217;s scheme, has generated positive expectations for the upcoming derby against Atl\u00e9tico de Madrid.\n\nVin\u00edcius, although not always an undisputed starter under Alonso&#8217;s management, demonstrated his worth with a spectacular goal and a notable performance in the 4-1 victory against Levante. This performance has reinforced confidence in the player ahead of Saturday&#8217;s crucial match.\n\nReal Madrid arrives at the derby as the leader of the LaLiga table, with a perfect record of six wins in six matches. Meanwhile, Atletico Madrid has had a more complicated start to the season, needing a late comeback to beat Rayo Vallecano and placing themselves nine points away.\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>&#8220;Vini is a fundamental player for us. The other day he played a great game. I really liked the things he did. I like to see him smile,&#8221; Alonso commented in the press conference before the match.<\/p><cite>Xabi Alonso<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/a3.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2025%2F0923%2Fr1550072_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"\"><\/figure>\n\n\nVin\u00edcius hasn&#8217;t been a guaranteed starter under Xabi Alonso&#8217;s management until now.\n\nThe two LaLiga derbies from last season ended in 1-1 draws. In the Champions League, Real Madrid defeated Atl\u00e9tico in the round of 16 after a penalty shootout.\n\nAtl\u00e9tico has made a significant investment in the transfer market, incorporating several players, but has only achieved two victories in six LaLiga matches.\n\n&#8220;Atl\u00e9tico has changed their squad a lot, so I&#8217;ve focused more on their matches this season,&#8221; explained Alonso, when asked if he had analyzed last season&#8217;s matches.\n\n&#8220;Atl\u00e9tico evolves every year and this year they have made smart changes, very good players have arrived. It&#8217;s very early, they can aspire to everything this season&#8230; It&#8217;s a team that has a lot of energy, that demands a high pace.&#8221;\n\nAlonso insisted that Madrid &#8220;cannot rest on its laurels&#8221; after its impressive start to the season, facing its biggest test yet at the Metropolitano.\n\n&#8220;We have to be consistent. If we win many games, we can get many points, but we can&#8217;t relax, because then a mistake can be made&#8230; We have to see how flexible we can be, being unpredictable with the ball, not having a single way to attack. But without the ball, we have taken steps forward.&#8221;\n\nAlonso also confirmed that midfielder Jude Bellingham is fit to start after playing 19 minutes as a substitute against Levante.\n\n&#8220;[Bellingham] can participate in the build-up and the finishing of plays, he has that ability to cover a lot of ground,&#8221; said Alonso. &#8220;He&#8217;s starting now, he&#8217;s training and playing more minutes&#8230; There are players who are more positional and more static, but Jude is not one of them.&#8221;","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Xabi Alonso Highlights Vin\u00edcius J\u00fanior&#8217;s Performance Before the Madrid Derby Coach Xabi Alonso has expressed his satisfaction with Vin\u00edcius J\u00fanior&#8217;s performance, highlighting his performance in Real Madrid&#8217;s recent triumph. The Brazilian forward, who has been a key player in the team&#8217;s scheme, has generated positive expectations for the upcoming derby against Atl\u00e9tico de Madrid. Vin\u00edcius, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40496,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[2704,158,254,402],"class_list":{"0":"post-40495","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-soccer","8":"tag-atletico-madrid","9":"tag-laliga","10":"tag-real-madrid","11":"tag-vinicius-junior"},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40495\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=40495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}