This Real Madrid looks promising

Posted Tuesday, July 23, 2013 by Marca.com

This Real Madrid looks promising Carlo Ancelotti's reign kicked off with a goal fest, with encouraging signs from recent signings and the permanence of some good habits, like its competitiveness and Cristiano Ronaldo's goals.

This new-look Real Madrid put on a solid performance with very little experimentation from its Italian manager. Ancelotti is still awaiting the arrival of those players who took part in the Confederations Cup and the Under-20 World Cup, as well as one or two tweaks before settling on his final squad.

Once the opposition's enthusiasm subsided, Real Madrid found exactly what it was looking for, a testing ground. A place to start fine tuning ahead of next season. There was of course, a notable difference between one of Europe's biggest teams and one recently promoted to the Championship, the second tier of English football.

Ancelotti fielded a very logical starting XI. Dani Carvajal and Isco Alarcón were the new faces in the line-up. Both had a great game. The defender was daring, whilst the midfielder was active throughout, playing with freedom on the pitch. Afterwards, Asier Illarramendi came on for the second half, as did Russian Denis Cheryshev, promoted from Real Madrid Castilla to play at left-back. He is another alternative being considered by the Italian manager.

The rest was business as usual, a predictable starting XI, with the exception of Nacho at centre-back, in the absence of Sergio Ramos and Raphael Varane.

Cristiano Ronaldo was the main threat to Bournemouth, a team that quickly accepted its role as underdog. The Portuguese, highly motivated, opened the scoring with a powerful free-kick after missing on two previous occasions.