Spanish midfielder Isco has stated that at the moment, the Champions League winners do not miss their former Portuguese superstar.
Cristiano Ronaldo left Madrid in the summer and is now at Juventus where he has so far been unable to score a single goal in their first three games.
In contrast, Madrid are flying, having won their opening 3 games in some style, Isco thinks the team is doing quite well.
He did concede that he expects the media to turn on them the moment anything goes wrong.
Speaking to a news conference, Isco said: “Cris is an extraordinary player,
“He guaranteed you 40 to 50 goals. But if we win, they’ll say we don’t miss him and if we don’t win, they’ll say we do.
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“We’re playing very well now; players who didn’t score as many goals last year are now filling their boots. We don’t miss him at the moment. I wish him all the best at Juve.”
Isco and his teammates will be locking horns over the weekend with Semi-finalists England and he’ll be doing so under a boss he faced off against while at Barcelona– Luis Enrique
“We knew him already. He has a lot of character. He’s won many things,” the Spanish midfielder said of his coach,
“In the end, the philosophy and the idea are the same. He changes a few things, he has his way of seeing football, but it’s similar.
“We have had a few training sessions with him, we have to adapt but we’re very happy. We’re very enthusiastic at this stage.
“Every game requires a way to play. If you play against 11 behind the ball, there isn’t much more you can try. We haven’t won with long balls. We have to improve, but we have to continue from this point.”
Isco also praised Enrique’s new rule of no cell phones during dinner, “It’s important to have boundaries,” Isco said. “The mobiles at dinner rule seems good to me. It will be good for us not to have them with us all the time. Sometimes, we’re more aware of them than our team-mates.”