“Remontada,” said Jude Bellingham with a smile.
Real Madrid's midfielder was asked for the word he had heard the most in the dressing room prior to Wednesday's second stage against Arsenal. He didn't have to think twice. The Spanish sentence, which means comeback, is on everyone's lips in Madrid.
The mood among fans and players in the Spanish capital is almost unbelievably positive. The alignment with a local radio telephone for the Bellingham press conference on Tuesday made that clear. A 5-1 home win was a popular prediction. Some were more conservative. They thought the hosts might need extra time.
Bellingham did not go that far, but his self -confidence was clear. “It's a night made for Real Madrid,” he said. “You can't in games like these think that there will be something other than a comeback. There is a busy, but that's what it's all about, right?”
The last rule was supplied with a shoulder pick up. Like Kylian Mbappe's “of course we can” when asked if Real Madrid could still claim in the mixed zone after the first stage of last week at the Emirates Stadium.
The holders were also hit 3-0 in that game. You wouldn't know to listen to them now.
Their reports are part of the legendary Decálago de la Remontada of the club, an effective manual for European comebacks in the second legs, written by club legend Juanito before he helped them destroy a shortage of two goals to beat Celtic in the quarterfinal of the European Cup in 1980.
It describes the importance of generating faith in the comeback immediately, starting by talking about it in the team bus after the first leg, then building in the game itself, using the atmosphere in the Bernabeu during warming, with the help of intimidating tactics in the tunnel and the early stages that make the opponent so uncomfortable.
Arsenal has everything to come on Wednesday evening. In the meantime, Real Madrid continues to read from their playbook. No costs were saved on the motivational videos in the club of the club of the club, with clips from recent comebacks against Paris Saint-Germain, Manchester City and Bayern Munich.
The videos certainly ensure emotional watching. “It's really motivating things,” said Bellingham. They are also a memory of the Aura This young Arsenal side will be against the Bernabeu.
Real Madrid has the weight of history behind them, as well as the quality of Mbappe, Vinicius JR and the rest. “We have all the means we need to turn the draw,” said Carlo Ancelotti.
But there is a difference between those tires and this one, and that is the size of Arsenal's lead. Even Real Madrid, kings of the comeback, with their legendary history in Europe, have no shortage of three goals in the era of the Champions League.
They are also not as strong as they were in winning the competition to complete a Treble last season. They only lost once in 54 games in all competitions in that campaign. Last week's defeat at the Emirates Stadium was their 11th in 53 games in the current one.
They are also confronted with a formidable opponent in this Arsenal side, whose European campaign has been a different story than their domestic ones. The side of Mikel Arteta was due to the competition phase. They only admitted a total of six goals in 11 games. No team in the competition has limited their opponents to fewer shots or fewer expected goals per match.
Such a resilience is nothing new. Arsenal has not been lost with a margin of four goals since a 4-0 defeat by Liverpool in Anfield in November 2021. You have to go back to 100 games, to a 4-3 victory in Luton in December 2023, for the last time they have admitted more than two.
They showed their defensive power to hold a clean leaf in the first leg, although there were examples of how dangerously Real Madrid could be. Arsenal needed David Raya to deny Mbappe, who also had a good chance in the first half.
Bellingham mentioned those opportunities, even in the context of the poor performance of Real Madrid, as a reason for optimism in his press conference on Tuesday. Raya was now the chosen player who had Arsenal's message with them and repeated a desire to win the game, as well as the draw.
“We have to think about ourselves and what we can control on the field with the ball,” he said in response to a question about dealing with the atmosphere in the stadium. “We must be convinced that we can be better than she and win the game,” Arteta added.
It is still to be seen whether the conversation about playing to win, instead of just holding out, will sound on the field, but it offers Arsenal's most likely route to success. All the talk in the structure of the game has been around the importance of an early goal of Real Madrid, but Arsenal could kill the draw with one of them.
They must believe in their ability to score it, especially against a Real Madrid side that this season was the first in 18 games in all games, including, of course, last week.
Arsenal is probably not the same territorial dominance as in the Emirates Stadium. They will sometimes have to resist heavy pressure. But their permanent force is always a weapon and they also pose a growing threat in transition.
Their goal in the 1-1 draw against Brentford on Saturday, scored by Thomas Pidey after an exciting break led by Declan Rice, was their ninth of a quick break in the Premier League this season. It is more than in an earlier campaign under Arteta.
That level of incompatible threat, with Gabriel Martinelli in form on one flank and Bukayo Saka Fit to the other, is another potential difference for them in the Bernabeu.
But that is only if they can hold their nerve in the face of the non -repellent faith of a European opponent in contrast to another.
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