Real Madrid are having a tough season after winning La Liga in 2020. Their policy of recruiting young and promising players hasn’t delivered the expected results with the likes of Éder Militão, Luka Jovic, Vinicius Junior, Martin Odegaard or Rodrygo failing to become regular starters so far. This has led Real Madrid to use almost the same core of players who won the UEFA Champions League three times in a row between 2016 and 2018, but these players are getting older and their replacements don’t seem to have the level required to fill their void in the short term.
In this kind of situation, turning to academy players is a natural and cost-effective reaction for clubs. Real Madrid have seven U25 players in their first team and none of them is 100% an academy product, with Federico Valverde being the only one we could consider as an academy graduate even if he signed for Real Madrid when he was 18. From the eight academy players who have made their La Liga debut in the last five years, only the three most recent ones are still at the club, showing how the club is failing to produce talents who can settle in the first team.
In this data analysis, we will take a look at Real Madrid’s B team, Castilla, to see which defenders are showing potential competing in Segunda B (Spanish third division) and could be ready to make their move to the first team soon. With Marcelo declining game after game and Sergio Ramos’ future in the air, Real Madrid could look at their academy to find cheap solutions in these uncertain times.
Methodology
This is a short and concise data analysis on Real Madrid Castilla’s goalkeepers, centre-backs and full-backs, comparing them to all the players in Segunda B and seeing which players stand out and could potentially contribute in La Liga. Keep in mind there are 102 teams in Segunda B this season and it’s a senior and professional league so standing out here means the young players are ready to play at a higher level of senior football.
In each position, we have used scatter plots with different relevant statistics (data taken from Wyscout) to compare players in the selected position. We’ve only considered players who have played at least 400 minutes in the current season to avoid non-significant results. Real Madrid Castilla’s players are marked in red in each graph.
Each scatter plot has two grey areas between the 25th and the 75th percentile, meaning 50% of the players are inside that area. Players outside the grey area in the top or bottom 25% of the selected metric and it makes it easier to visualize how much did a player stand out.
In order to cover the three positions in a single analysis piece, each separate analysis is just a first approach and it would require further data analysis to make a decision. There will be a second data analysis covering midfield and attacking players.
Goalkeepers
Real Madrid have Thibaut Courtois as their clear first-choice goalkeeper with the 22-year-old Ukrainian Andriy Lunin as his backup. They seem to trust Lunin a lot and at the moment there aren’t any issues here as Courtois should have at least four or five years left at the highest level.
Toni Fuidias is the only goalkeeper who has played more than 400 minutes for Real Madrid Castilla this season so he’s the only one we’re considering in this analysis but they have used two other goalkeepers and the position doesn’t have a clear pick.
In the graph below, we see two of the most important statistics to evaluate goalkeepers: goals avoided per 90 (expected conceded goals minus conceded goals, y-axis) and save rate (x-axis).
Fuidias doesn’t rank very well in either metric, conceding 0.03 goals more than he should and ranking in the bottom 25% for save rate with 63.64%, well below the average of 71.3%. He’s still 19 and goalkeeper is a very age-sensitive position but he doesn’t seem to be ready to compete with Lunin for the second goalkeeper position in the first team.
Just to add some context and compare, Iñaki Peña, the 21-year-old Barcelona B goalkeeper, has avoided 0.75 goals per 90 and his save rate is 82.76%, well over the average in both statistics. It seems like Fuidias is still some way from making an impact at a higher level.
