It is now common knowledge that Austrian defender David Alaba has agreed to a deal to join Real Madrid as a free agent in the summer, just after his current contract at Bayern Munich must have expired.
Barely five months after helping the German side to completing a remarkable treble-winning campaign, the 28-year-old – who has been at the club for over a decade – has decided that he’s had enough at the Allianz Arena, refusing to acede to an extension of his contract beyond the end of this season.
The contract row between Alaba and the club started back in July 2020 when then Bayern president Uli Hoeness accused the player’s agent of being a ‘greedy piranha’ for demanding a lot more than expected for the extension. Then George Alaba – the player’s father – hit back at Hoeness and the club for spreading ‘dirty lies’. From thence, following negotiations proved abortive as Alaba’s party would not move grounds.
Now in January, with the player legitimately free to discuss with other clubs as he’s already in the final six-months of his contract, Real Madrid have swiftly won the race to sign him, beating a number of Premier League giants in the process. In fact, the chance of placing a wager on his possible destination, for those interested in betting on NetBet is already off, although there are yet several other players you can bet on.
Now to the question.
How will the experienced left-back, who has also been on good form while playing the center-back role for the Bavarians lately, fit in the Real Madrid set-up? At first glance, you can already confirm that the Los Blancos have got very good personnel at the left side of defence with Ferland Mendy. The center-back partnership between Sergio Ramos and Raphael Varane is also quite formidable, not to mention their other options in the role including Eder Militao and experienced Spaniard Nacho.
Real have such a backline that not many defenders would manage to break in. But speaking of a fact, Alaba could provide something the Spanish giants unnoticably lack: a left-footed center-back (LCB). Currently, all their center-backs are right-footed but with someone like the ever-dependeable Ramos playing LCB, no one was going to notice a potential weakness.
Like Alaba, Ramos is also in the final six months of his contract with Real Madrid but it’s unlikely we will see the 34-year-old team captain swapping the Los Blancos for another side come summer. But there remains a possibility anyways. With reports suggesting he could be forced to taking a paycut, he could just begin to fancy a move to the money-spinning Premier League, or maybe a PSG switch would interest him — and these possibilities could give way to Alaba having a straight walk in to fill in the role of the LaLiga great.
It will be tough, but Alaba could also beat Varane to his center-back role, giving way for Ramos to play rather on the right at center of defence. Or maybe Zinedine Zidane is actually planning to allow the Austrian earn his place at his natural position – left-back, providing good competition for Mendy since Marcelo seems to be somewhat dancing out of the picture at the moment. Alaba undoubtedly offers more on the attack, but Mendy – although much younger (22) – has already grown a reputation for being such a good full-back that many world class wingers will seriously sweat to beat. So, it promises – if it turns out that way – to be a really interesting and and healthy competition for the team’s good.
By and large, the most uncomplicated doorway through which Alaba can walk into Real Madrid’s starting XI will be the one that sees Ramos exit in the summer.
