Thibaut Courtois furiously accused La Liga of a “lack of respect” for Real Madrid over their scheduling decisions.
The Spanish giants have enjoyed a positive week as they overcame city rivals Atletico Madrid to reach the Champions League quarter-finals. It took extra-time and a controversial penalty shootout for them to finally progress.
And they built on that result as a Kylian Mbappe brace saw off Villarreal on Saturday. But Courtois was still angry at the timing of that match, kick-off coming barely 72 hours after their game against Atletico had finished.
Speaking to AS, the Belgian goalkeeper said: “In the end, we play when we have to play. We don’t want excuses, I’m happy to be able to speak and say that we haven’t lost despite the lack of rest. It is not normal to play 120 minutes on Wednesday, penalties, with all that wear and tear, and today to play at 18:30.
“I understand that La Liga does not like to put the big three on the same day. But sometimes it’s what it takes, the Premier League does it many times.
“I think it was a lack of respect for our team. It may be that we leave with an injured player due to the lack of rest. You could play on Sunday, a super Sunday, like in England. That Real Madrid play before and then Atleti and Barcelona. For TV is also good, but other interests play sometimes.”
Courtois’ comments are very similar to those of Real boss Carlo Ancelotti, who was also left angry at the scheduling of the game. The Italian said: “I’m very proud.
“It was a trap game, because of everything that happened, because of the hours of rest and because of the strength of the opponent, who are a good team, but we watered down physically. The team ended up exhausted, it’s quite normal. It’s a victory that says a lot about this team and the resources of this squad.”
He added: “The explanation is that this team has something special, character, commitment, they can’t always do it, sometimes I even get angry with them. We must thank these players for their enormous effort since January 3. Even more so today.
“It’s the last time we’re going to play before 72 hours. We are never going to do it again. We have asked La Liga twice to change the schedule and nothing has happened. This is the last time we played a game without 72 hours of rest. We won’t play if it happens again.”
Real Madrid currently sit three points clear at the top of La Liga. They will take on Arsenal in the quarter-finals of the Champions League.
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