Real Madrid's failure in Andalusia: a stumble or the start of a downfall?
A pivotal point facing the fledgling project
Real Madrid's defeat to Real Betis was not merely three points dropped in the title race. It was the first genuine test of character for José Mourinho's project in his second spell in charge.
Los Blancos had made a perfect start, taking maximum points from their first three matches. Then came the fall in Andalusia, a 1-0 defeat in which Madrid enjoyed long spells of control and plenty of chances but lacked the final touch. Kylian Mbappé missed a penalty in stoppage time, and Troy Parrott had already struck Betis's only goal in the 81st minute.
Losing a single match is not the problem. The real question is how Real Madrid respond to their first setback.
Mourinho himself reckoned his side played well, but football hands out no points for possession and chances. That makes the coming fixtures matter far more than the Betis result itself.
Bad timing
Mourinho won't get long to catch his breath. Just days later, Real Madrid host Inter Milan in the opening game of their Champions League campaign on Tuesday 8 September, before facing Rayo Vallecano in the league on 12 September, travelling to Elche on the 15th, then heading to the Metropolitano to face Atletico Madrid in the capital derby on 20 September.
That makes the fall against Betis land at just about the worst possible time. The Inter clash is no ordinary European match but a test against one of the continent's giants, on an occasion that carries huge significance for Mourinho in particular after he led the Italian side to the Champions League title in 2010.
The next stage also puts Real Madrid in front of four matches in 12 days, including a Champions League tie and the Madrid derby.
Midfield crisis
The hardest part? Mourinho goes into the clash with Inter while suffering a genuine crisis in midfield.
Arda Guler, Eduardo Camavinga and Bernardo Silva all sit out through suspensions carried over from last season. Aurelien Tchouameni, meanwhile, is still struggling with injury and has yet to begin his season.
By Mourinho's own admission, Fede Valverde has become almost the only first-choice midfielder available from the first-team squad. That may push the coach to change his style of play or to use players in unfamiliar positions.
Jude Bellingham heads the list of proposed solutions, although Mourinho prefers to deploy him behind the striker and close to the penalty area, given his goalscoring abilities.
The Englishman could prove a logical option to drop back into midfield, with Brahim Diaz coming in as playmaker and the 4-2-3-1 formation staying intact.
Trent Alexander-Arnold also stands out among the options. Mourinho has used him before in roles that give him freedom to move into deeper areas, and the coach may resort to a 4-3-3, with Trent, Valverde and Bellingham in midfield.
History gives Mourinho a glimmer of hope
Cast your mind back. Mourinho's first defeat during his initial spell with Real Madrid was a brutal one, Barcelona thrashing them 5-0 at Camp Nou on 29 November 2010.
That kind of collapse could easily have marked the start of a crisis for the project. What followed proved the opposite.
Real Madrid won their next five matches on the bounce. They beat Valencia 2-0, then hammered Auxerre 4-0 in the Champions League. A 3-1 win over Real Zaragoza and a 1-0 edging of Sevilla followed, before they capped the run by crushing Levante 8-0 in the Copa del Rey, Karim Benzema and Cristiano Ronaldo each grabbing a hat-trick.
A genuine warning
It may be unfair, in the end, to place Mourinho's new project before the guillotine of judgement after a single defeat. The loss to Real Betis was painful, mind, and it came at a time that allows for little calm.
Real Madrid did not lose their project in Andalusia, and the perfect opening weeks have not turned into an illusion overnight. What the side did receive was their first real warning: this road will not be paved with victories, as it seemed at the start.
A pivotal point
This is where the character of the new Real Madrid will show itself. Great projects aren't judged by the wins they rack up when everything goes to plan. They're judged on how they respond when things turn difficult.
Can Mourinho turn the Betis defeat into a lesson? Can he cover the absences without the team losing its balance? Can Mbappé, Vinícius and the rest of the stars carry the burden of leading the response? The answers are still to come.
The start of the real test
Come through the run of difficult matches ahead, and the Andalusian night becomes a passing chapter rather than the start of a crisis. Win those games, and everyone will look back on it as the moment that proved the team's strength of character.
Repeat the mistakes, though, and the picture darkens. If the struggles against opponents continue and the fragility of the project is exposed under the first real pressure, the loss to Betis becomes more than a stumble. It turns into the first sign that the new build is not yet complete, and that Mourinho's name alone cannot restore prestige to the Santiago Bernabeu.
Nobody can say yet whether Andalusia was a stallion's stumble or the beginning of a fall. One thing is certain: the real test of Mourinho's project began after the final whistle against Betis, not before it.
