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Should We Crown Real Madrid as La Liga Champion Already?

Real Madrid's Cristiano Ronaldo celebrates after scoring

Let’s be honest, the Spanish La Liga consists of Real Madrid, Barcelona and other 18 teams. It’s a two-tier competition in which only the top two have the chance to win. You can make it three-tier if you count Valencia, which finds itself in between greatness and mediocrity.

Ten points separate Madrid from Barcelona, which is in second place. There are 11 points separating Barcelona and Valencia, which is in third place and seven points away from Athletic Bilbao in fourth place. To sum it up, there are 28 points between the highest rank inhabited by Real Madrid and Athletic Bilbao, the top team of the peasants. The level of competition in the so-called peasants league, however, is simply astonishing. Only seven points separate Athletic and Villareal in 17th place.

I can’t help but to visualize La Liga in a MotoGP race. The frontrunners are led by Real Madrid with Barcelona falling behind. Twenty-one seconds later, Valencia crosses the line by itself because it has no competition. For quite a long period, there’s a Zen-like peace in the circuit without any muffler noise until a group of road race wildcard riders, who have been overlapped a couple of times, cheerfully pass the grandstand while waving to the bored spectators.

On a more serious note, a 10-point difference is a huge gap to close in any league, let alone in La Liga where Madrid and Barcelona’s duopoly reigns. Barcelona only has itself to blame following its inability to maintain the race with Madrid. The Catalan side outsmarted Madrid when the two titans met earlier this season at the Santiago Bernabeu and consequently closed the gap. But underperformance, including a 3-2 defeat to Osasuna during the weekend before last, canceled out the memorable victory.

Even the likes of Lionel Messi, Xavi and Andres Iniesta would find the title race now a tough mountain to climb. They can tiki-taka as long as they wish, but the gap will not be bridged overnight night. The well-groomed Pep Guardiola must have felt an incurable itch on his chest, knowing that even a demolition of Madrid when the capital team comes to the Camp Nou for the return fixture may not be enough to retain the title.

A combination of injuries, fatigue and, maybe, lack of ambition has made Barcelona inconsistent recently. Ever since the victory in Madrid — where Guardiola’s reinvention of the three-man defense line excited the pundits worldwide — Barcelona drew with city rival Espanyol and Villareal and lost to Osasuna. Seven points were dropped, and that kind of thing is intolerable when you’re competing with a Jose Mourinho team at its peak.

As he has shown in his previous tenures with Chelsea and Inter Milan, Mourinho has always been result-oriented and he will take a victory at any cost. Not a single point has been dropped by Madrid since it lost at home to Barcelona, and it shows how serious Madrid is to capturing its first league title since 2008.

Slowly but surely, Mourinho is starting to prove his incomparable value when it comes to consistency. He’s not always been a favorite in every club he’s been to. His pragmatic approach looks tedious to some, not to mention the fans and board of directors of Real Madrid whose demands of stylish football have taken its toll on several managers. But when Mourinho was signed by Florentino Perez a couple of years ago, he was signed for his ability to win trophies, not for showcasing Total Football, and you know how trophies love Mourinho and vice versa.

Some suggest that even if Madrid wins the league this season, the triumph will be flawed if it doesn’t beat Barcelona. As a matter of fact, Madrid is unlikely to beat Barcelona at the Camp Nou, but Mourinho couldn’t care less as long as his team wins the league.

As Kevin Keegan would have testified from his days with Newcastle United, being 10 points ahead should not make you complacent. Lose to Barcelona in April and the gap will be narrowed into seven points. Who knows how it will affect Madrid’s mentality? If Madrid stumbles again, the gap could narrow even further. Yet that it may not be enough for Barcelona.

To put it into perspective, let’s say Barcelona defeats Madrid in the Camp Nou. The reigning champion still needs Madrid to lose twice and draw once, at least. Even the most optimistic Cules couldn’t hope for a Mourinho team to stutter that bad. Having said that, Barcelona needs to win all its matches to maintain the gap. Considering how capricious its form is lately, it will be a difficult task for Barcelona.

My congratulations card for Real Madrid is half-done. The title is theirs to lose.

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