La Liga
BALE RETURNS TO MADRID’S SQUAD AFTER INJURY LAYOFF
Gareth Bale is expected to make his return to Real Madrid’s line-up in a Copa del Rey match this week after being sidelined for more than two months because of injuries.
According to AP, Madrid coach, Zinedine Zidane said Monday that the Wales forward has recovered from a left leg muscle injury and will play at least part of Tuesday’s match against Fuenlabrada at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium.
Madrid won the first leg 2-0 against the third-division club.
Bale hasn’t played since Madrid’s 3-1 win at Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League on Sept. 26. Plagued by injuries this season, his latest ailment came in practice while trying to recover from another muscle injury.
“He will be with us tomorrow and will play,” Zidane said. “But I still don’t know for how long he will play. We will see how the match goes.”
The coach did not say whether the 28-year-old Bale will start or come off the bench.
Bale has played only nine matches with Madrid this season, scoring three goals. He missed the final World Cup qualifiers with Wales, which was eventually left out of next year’s tournament in Russia.
Zidane said he is looking forward to seeing Bale, Cristiano Ronaldo and Karim Benzema playing together again, although that is not likely to happen on Tuesday.
“We will take a look at some of the players from the youth team,” Zidane said. “It’s important to do that.”
Ronaldo and many other regular starters were left out of the first leg last month.
Zidane said goalkeeper Keylor Navas is fully fit again and will be available for Tuesday’s match, as will defensive midfielder Mateo Kovacic, who also had been nursing an injury.
Defender Sergio Ramos, who broke his nose in the Spanish league match against Atletico Madrid nearly 10 days ago, has been practicing with a protective mask but will not play Tuesday.
In other matches this week, Barcelona defends a 3-0 first-leg win against Murcia, while Atletico Madrid looks to overcome a 1-1 draw against Elche.
It was mission accomplished, said Real Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti after his side fought back from two-goals behind to snatch a rip-roaring 4-4 draw on Tuesday for a 5-4 aggregate win that put them through to the Copa del Rey final.
Ancelotti brushed off questions about a sub-par performance by his side and praised his players’ effort in what he considered a highly entertaining encounter.
“We have achieved our goal today which was to reach the final and there is not much time to think about it,” Ancelotti told a press conference.
“It was an entertaining game with some mistakes and a lot of good things. It was fun and we are in the final.
“I never saw ourselves out of it because anything can happen at the Bernabeu. When we have to come from behind, we never give up. We never give up, especially at home, with the fans by our side.”
Ancelotti said David Alaba was not to blame after he deflected two balls into his own goal, calling it “bad luck” by the Austrian defender, but urged his defence to play with better focus moving forward.
“It’s not good to concede four goals in a game,” Ancelotti said.
“Right now we are a team that has a lot of effectiveness up-front, but little balance.
“However, we can’t ignore what we did in attack, scoring four goals against Real is not that easy. I think we are doing quite well.”
Real Madrid, who have won the Spanish Cup only once in over a decade, will play either Barcelona or Atletico Madrid in a mouth-watering final in Seville next month.
Atletico fought back to hold Barca to a thrilling 4-4 draw ahead of Wednesday’s second-leg in Madrid.
-Reuters
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Real Madrid’s legendary coach Carlo Ancelotti will go on trial next week for allegedly failing to declare income to Spain’s tax office, the Madrid court which will hear the case has said.
Prosecutors are seeking a jail term of four years and nine months for the 65-year-old Italian, accusing him of having cost Spain’s treasury more than one million euros ($1.1 million) in undeclared earnings from image rights in 2014 and 2015.
The trial will begin on Wednesday and it is expected to last two days, a spokesman for the court said.
Ancelotti, who as a coach has won a record five Champions League trophies including three with Real, must be present for the hearings, he added.
Prosecutors accuse him of only declaring in his tax returns the personal remuneration received from Real Madrid during those two years even though he himself declared himself to be a tax resident in Spain and indicated his home was in Madrid.
They accuse Ancelotti of allegedly setting up a “confusing” and “complex” system of shell companies to hide his extra earnings from his image rights as well as from other sources such as real estate.
A Spanish court in 2023 ordered Ancelotti to stand trial over the affair, but did not set a date.
Ancelotti dismissed the affair last year as “an old story that I hope will be resolved soon” when he was asked about the case.
He took over at Real Madrid in 2013, leaving in May 2015, before being appointed at Bayern Munich the following year.
The former Italy international midfielder, who as a player won the European Cup twice with AC Milan, later managed Napoli and Everton before returning to Real Madrid in 2021.
Aside from his success in the Champions League he has won domestic league titles with Madrid and Milan, in England with Chelsea, in Germany with Bayern Munich and in France with Paris Saint-Germain.
-AFP
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Spain’s former soccer chief Luis Rubiales told Reuters on Thursday he would appeal a court ruling which found him guilty of sexual assault for kissing player Jenni Hermoso without her consent.-
-Reuters
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