Real Madrid have a home tie against Valencia to negotiate in La Liga on Saturday, but already there will be one eye on their upcoming Champions League clash. There is concern at the Santiago Bernabeu that they could be without defensive stalwart Antonio Rudiger for the cfirst leg against Arsenal in London.
Last week UEFA announced that it had opened a disciplinary investigation into four Real Madrid players for their actions during the Round of 16 victory against Atletico Madrid at the Metropolitano on penalties. Vinicius Junior was seen gesturing ’15’ to the Atletico fans, taunting them over the number of Champions Leagues Los Blancos have, while Dani Ceballos and Kylian Mbappe are perceived to have overstepped the mark in their celebrations, with the Frenchman grabbing his crotch.
Similar happened to Jude Bellingham last summer while on England duty, with UEFA handing him a suspended one-game ban and a fine at Euro 2024 for grabbing his genitals in front of the crowd. According to Marca, they believe that similar punishment might be about to befall Ceballos, Mbappe and Vinicius, with the verdict due to be published on Friday, three days before they face Arsenal.
However there is more concern over Antonio Rudiger’s availability. The German defender scored the winning penalty against Atletico, and ran the length of the pitch in his celebrations towards the Real Madrid fans. However as bottles and objects rained down on the Real Madrid players from the Atletico fans in that area, Rudiger was seen making a ‘cut-throat’ gesture to the fans. The Madrid-based daily say that this did not go down well with UEFA at all, and it was seen as threatening, placing his presence at the Emirates in doubt.
It will no doubt grate on Real Madrid that Atletico appear to have escaped punishment for the objects being thrown at their players during the same instance. If they are without Rudiger, they will likely rely on Raul Asencio and David Alaba at the back, although the Austrian srtruggled significantly against Real Sociedad on Tuesday, as he continues his comeback from a serious knee injury. Arsenal are also nursing a number of doubts over their own backline for next Tuesday, picking up multiple injuries over the last two weeks.
credit: All Football
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