Alvaro Arbeloa and Vinicius hail the Uruguayan and say victory showed character
Real Madrid’s Federico Valverde has been praised by his manager as “everything a Real Madrid player should be” after his deflected stoppage time strike saved three points for Real Madrid at Balaiados and kept their title hopes alive.
Celta Vigo’s Borja Iglesias scored before the half hour to cancel out Aurelien Tchouameni’s early goal and for much of the tie the score remained at 1-1, before Valverde’s effort in stoppage time.
“Fede is everything a Real Madrid player should be,” Arbeloa said. “He has the spirit of [club legend] Juanito. He has that quality which the great players in our history have had, and today he carried the team on his back.”
Vinicius Junior equally praised the Uruguayan for the victory, describing him as a player who “is always available for us, helps us every day and does everything for our team”.
He also believes the effort to win at the death was evidence of his side’s character.
“It has been a very difficult match in which we have lacked many players, but we have come here to win,” Vinicius said. “We have worked, we have suffered a lot and in the end we have been able to win, which was the most important thing to gain confidence for Wednesday’s game [against Manchester City in the Champions League].
“We must also thank the children of the quarry [Madrid Castilla] who have come in to help and all the players who have come, because we knew it was going to be a very difficult game, with many injured players and others suspended.
“We had to bring out our best version and nothing better than, on our club’s birthday, giving this gift to our fans.”
