Thibaut Courtois slammed Real Madrid’s ‘unacceptable’ El Clasico display and questioned the tactics of manager Carlo Ancelotti after Barcelona secured a 4-0 win at the Bernabeu.
Former Arsenal skipper Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored twice on his El Clasico debut as Real Madrid suffered an embarrassing defeat at home to their arch-rivals.
Ferran Torres and Ronald Araujo were also on target for Barca, who as a result climbed to third in the La Liga table, 12 points behind league leaders Madrid with a game in hand.
Real Madrid had won the previous five Clasicos but produced a poor performance on Sunday and goalkeeper Courtois conceded it was an ‘unacceptable’ outcome.
‘Today we gave an unacceptable image for this club,’ Courtois told Movistar. ‘There are players missing, but you didn’t notice that it was them [Barcelona] who played on Thursday [in the Europa League].
‘They found a lot of space. We weren’t compact and weren’t able to keep the goals out. For the first goal, they anticipate better at the front post and we’re not switched on for the second either.
‘After the break, we think we can come back, and after 10 seconds Ferran Torres is one on one with me.’
Courtois, 29, also questioned Ancelotti’s tactics after the game and referenced the last time Madrid played with a false nine, in their 1-0 Copa dey Rey defeat to Athletic Bilbao in February.
The former Chelsea keeper added: ‘We will have to talk about the tactics internally. They haven’t worked at the start of the game or the second half, we have to discuss it internally, not here.
‘We played with a false nine in the Copa and hardly had any shots and it was the same here. We started okay, we had a chance with Fede Valverde which Marc ter Stegen saved well, but from there we dropped off.
‘We didn’t find the free man playing out and that makes it hard. Then in the second half, we cannot start like that. This badge demands that you fight and in the second half we did not. We could have lost by even more.’
Barcelona boss Xavi, meanwhile, refused to rule out a late push for the La Liga title after his team dispatched runaway leaders Real Madrid.
‘I don’t know if we can win the title, we can’t rule out anything,’ Xavi said after they extended their unbeaten run to 12 matches.
‘Maybe we’re a bit late, but this is a very big win for us. We were much better than Real Madrid. We played almost as a home team in the the ground.
‘It’s a day to enjoy, not only as a Barca manager but also a fan. We could easily have scored five or six. We changed our negative dynamic of losing the last few Clasicos.’
