Written by Paul Michael Ezeoha
Later this night Real Madrid will face RCD Mallorca in match day 36 of La Liga.
They know the title race is as good as being over after the defeat to Barcelona away at the Estadi Lluis Olympic Companys last Sunday, which did increase the point gap between both teams to 7 points with only 3 games left to play. So, mathematically it simply means that Real Madrid would have to win all their remaining La Liga matches while Barca lose all of theirs- something that might need a Jupiter to be realized- if they are to claim the La Liga title and avoid going trophyless this campaign.
Conversely, RCD Mallorca are going into this tie fully bent on securing a place in Europe next season- having last played in a European competition since more than two decades ago.
So, this might prove to be quite a tough challenge for the Los Blancos as Mallorca would aim to come out of this tie with at least a point in order to keep their European dreams alive.
HEAD-TO-HEAD
Below is the scoreline for their last five La Liga encounter.
In these ties, Real Madrid have the most win - 3: 23rd of April 2024(0-1), January 3,2024 (1-0), September 11(4-1). Mallorca on the other hand have only one win, happening on February 3, 2024 (1-0). One of these ties ended in a 1-1 draw which was at the Estadio Campo de Futbol de Son Moix on the 18th day of August last year.
RECENT PERFORMANCES IN LA LIGA
To ascertain this, we shall consider both team's performances in their last 5 La Liga games.
Real Madrid is in great form so far. They had 4 wins and only a lose - which was in their last match against Barcelona.
RCD Mallorca haven't really been in good form so far. They only have 2 wins, 2 lose and a draw. Prior to their victory at home against Real Valladolid last week Saturday, the last time they won a match was almost a month ago against Real Sociedad.
ABSENTEES
Real Madrid have been plagued with a lot of injury crisis. More than 11 senior players are absent for this match, with Lunin, Vinicius Jr, Lucas Vasquez and Brahim Diaz being the recent players to be included to this list.
With this, Carlo Ancelotti would be forced to introduce couple of academy players into the team in order to balance things up with the few remaining senior players.
This is a serious problem for Real Madrid, as some of these players have been key to Real Madrid's performance so far this season.
Mallorca do not have serious injury crisis like Real. They are only without Nevarro, Morlanes, Chiquinho and Prats.
So, this is an area where Mallorca are at the vantage.
CONCLUSION
Finally, based on the statistics, Real Madrid can be said have the edge over Mallorca as they've been in good form prior to this game and, also, they've had more wins against them in their past five encounters.
They also play at home. So, this is another vantage point for them.
Although the stats say that Real Madrid are the favourites to emerge victors, their injury crisis could pose serious problem for them in this tie - something Mallorca could take advantage of - and maybe, really maybe, the result could skew against statistics.
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