Federico Valverde talks about poor run post-World Cup

By | Niranjan Bhargav 8 Feb, 2023

Early World Cup exit the reason for Valverde’s poor form

Los Blancos midfielder Federico Valverde has spoken out on his poor run of form. The Uruguayan believes that an early exit from the World Cup may have led to his poor run of form at the club level.

The Real Madrid academy graduate arrived in Qatar as the most in-form player in Europe. However, his side was eliminated in the group stages.

Ever since club football resumed, Valverde looked like a shadow of his previous self. Since then, the midfielder has failed to score or even provide an assist in 11 games. Moreover, his side lost the Super Copa final to Barcelona and sit eight points behind their arch-rivals.

Valverde Explains

While explaining his recent dip in form, Valverde said “The World Cup affected me. When you go for a goal, you have such illusion and optimism that everything will go well with your country, you go with the dream of a child representing millions of people to try to go as far as possible and fighting to win, not being able to do it makes you sad. Everything we work on seems to have been of no use and it hurts.”

“It has to serve to continue improving my physical shape and to take certain opportunities. Good things don’t always happen in football and you have to know how to handle it.

“I arrived [at the World Cup] in very good form and It’s not the same now, but it’s part of football. There are always bumps and you have to continue with the same attitude to continue being important at Real Madrid, to be captain as I always wanted, and, little by little, to return to my good performance.”

Talking about the added pressure Valverde added, “I try to enjoy myself on the pitch but when the results don’t come through and on a personal level either, it generates frustration and anger.”

“I came out sad against Atletico and the same against Mallorca.

“We are very competitive; we always want to win and when I leave with a bad result I don’t want it to make me angry. I have to keep improving and learning because you can’t always win even if you work to win as much as possible.”