Xabi Alonso admits Real Madrid spell “ended a little earlier than expected”

· YahooSoccer

After another highly successful stint with Carlo Ancelotti, Real Madrid have struggled to regain stability on their bench in the last few years. After the Italian tactician’s departure, the Merengue...

After another highly successful stint with Carlo Ancelotti, Real Madrid have struggled to regain stability on their bench in the last few years. After the Italian tactician’s departure, the Merengues appointed their former midfielder Xabi Alonso as their head coach, and the Spaniard arrived at the club with very high hopes, following his highly successful stint in the Bundesliga with Bayer Leverkusen.

However, his time with Los Blancos did not go exactly as planned. Despite some promising early signs, things started to worsen as the 2025-26 season progressed, and by January, he had left the club, right after losing the Spanish Super Cup final to FC Barcelona.

After a few months’ gap, he joined the Premier League side Chelsea , and he is now working to take the Blues back to the top. As MARCA has reported, Alonso recently appeared in an interview with Jamie Carragher, and among other things, talked about his departure from Real Madrid:

> “I’m left with the feeling that it ended a little earlier than expected, without knowing whether it was going to end well or badly. It happened halfway through the season, when we were still competing in La Liga and the Champions League, so…”

Despite this inauspicious end to his time on the Merengue bench, the Spanish coach was not resentful of his former club:

> “It’s an experience to manage in Madrid. Madrid is special in every way. It’s a little different from other clubs in every respect. I learned from that experience, and I don’t look back with anger. I look back and think: well, I tried, I tried to do my best.”

The way Xabi Alonso’s tenure at Real Madrid panned out was indeed quite sad. However, he is already working on another job, and hopefully, he will enjoy a lot more success in England with Chelsea than he did in Spain.

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