29-year-old Real Madrid defender shows a worrying decline halfway into the 2024-25 season | OneFootball

Real Madrid have only 1 game left in the 2024 calendar year, which is set to take place against Sevilla on Sunday. After that, the players will leave for the Christmas holidays, and hopefully, they will return with their batteries fully charged as the second half of the season beckons.

This second half of the season is going to be extremely important for the Merengues, especially as they have been far from their best in the first half of the season, and need to cover a lot of ground in the UEFA Champions League if they are to advance to the latter stages of the competition.

Similarly, they are also engaged in a three-horse race for the leadership of the La Liga table, and cannot afford to lose many points if they want to retain the league title. They will also be kicking off their Spanish Super Cup and Copa del Rey campaigns in January, hoping to get both of these titles in their cabinet as well this season.

But beyond leading his team in all these tournaments, another task on Carlo Ancelotti’s hands for this second part of the season would be to recover some of his players who have been playing significantly below their expected standards this season.

One player who stands out in this regard is the defender Ferland Mendy, who has shown a worrisome decline in his performances since the start of this season. His performances have been so unconvincing that he has lost his starting spot to Fran Garcia recently, despite him being Ancelotti’s preferred left-back at the start of the season.

In fact, according to Sofascore, he is one of the lowest-rated Real Madrid players who has played at least 60% of minutes in this La Liga season, as his rating of 6.77 is only better than that of Endrick, who is rated at 6.67.

Mendy has never really impressed going forward, but his defensive capabilities mostly made up for his attacking deficiencies. However, this season, his performance with the ball at his feet has declined even further.

This is quite clear from the data collected by FBREF, which shows that he is attempting only 59.73 passes every game on average, which is lower than his average of 66.72 for the last league season.

Although his pass completion rate is relatively stable, his progressive passes have declined from 4.40 per 90 minutes last season to 3.06 this season. Similarly, he is also receiving only 3.53 progressive passes this season, which is significantly lower than his average of 5.02 for the last season.

On the bright side, his defensive performance has improved somewhat this season, at least statistically, even though he has received a lot of criticism for his defensive mistakes as well.

Last season, he was making 0.78 tackles and winning 0.52 of them every 90 minutes in La Liga, while this season, he has improved these numbers to 1.77 and 1.41 respectively. Similarly, this season, he is in the 99th percentile of the players who make tackles in the final third of the pitch.

Currently, Mendy is recovering from a muscle injury, which means he is unlikely to play again this year. Hopefully, he will be able to not only recover his fitness, but also his form, as the most crucial phase of the season approaches, and his defensive skills can prove to be differential for Real Madrid.