Wins over substance for Varane and Real Madrid

Raphael Varane said Real Madrid prefer to win than play well as the defender revelled in Thursday’s confidence-boosting victory in the Copa del Rey.

Spanish and European champions Madrid were below their best again as a last-gasp winner from Marco Asensio spared the club’s blushes in a 1-0 win at Leganes in the first leg of their Copa del Rey quarter-final.

Madrid – 19 points adrift of bitter rivals and runaway leaders Barcelona in LaLiga – had only won one of their past five games heading into the away fixture amid growing pressure on head coach Zinedine Zidane.

“It is important to get a win for the team’s confidence, and we kept a clean sheet,” said Varane.

“The coach told us we needed balance and the team’s focus was great. We played worse than the other day but won. Other times we have played well and lost.

“We want to win and get on a good run. We are playing the same as last year but things are not coming together. We enjoy winning we love to compete and relish coming out on top.

“We’re not thinking about the PSG tie yet, we’re just focussed on winning games. We have many games left, we want to get better and be hard to beat like today.”

 We certainly enjoyed celebrating that goal at the Municipal de Butarque! What a hit!

 @marcoasensio10#RMCopa | #HalaMadrid pic.twitter.com/nIAB9Ug6Cr

— Real Madrid C.F. (@realmadriden) January 18, 2018