Madrid Faces Injury Crisis Ahead of Champions League Opener
Madrid’s first stumble of the season came with an unwelcome twist.
Defeat to Real Betis was damaging enough, but the sight of Cucurella limping off late on turned a bad night into something far more complicated for Jose Mourinho just days before the Champions League kicks off.
The Spanish left-back has only recently nailed down the starting role, edging ahead of Alvaro Carreras in Mourinho’s plans and bringing balance and bite to Madrid’s back line. So when he signalled to the bench in the closing stages, alarms went off.
Mourinho moved quickly to calm the noise.
“Carreras coming on for Cucurella due to cramps,” he told reporters after the match, stressing it was a precaution rather than a full-blown injury. Fatigue, not a tear. Cramp, not a crisis.
But the calendar doesn’t care.
Madrid now face a race against time to get the recent World Cup winner ready for midweek. The turnaround is brutal: back to training on Sunday, Champions League opener against Inter Milan on Tuesday. A couple of days to recover, reset, and convince the medical staff he can go again.
And if he can’t, the problems pile up.
Cucurella risks joining a growing absentee list that already stretches Mourinho’s squad to its limits. Aurelien Tchouameni, Eder Militao, Rodrygo, Ferland Mendy, and Endrick are all in the treatment room, each absence chipping away at the spine and depth of this Madrid side.
There is at least a sliver of optimism. Inside the camp, there remains hope that Tchouameni or Rodrygo might make it back in time to feature against Inter. Even one of them returning would change the dynamic of Mourinho’s options.
But just as the injury situation bites, suspensions cut even deeper.
Arda Guler, Bernardo Silva, and Eduardo Camavinga are all ruled out through bans, stripping Mourinho of creativity, control, and rotation across midfield and attack. Between injuries and suspensions, entire sections of the pitch feel threadbare. Every decision now carries risk.
The timing could hardly be worse.
Inter Milan arrive as seasoned European operators, and Madrid head into their Champions League opener on the back of their first domestic defeat of the campaign. Confidence has taken a hit; now resilience will be tested.
Sunday’s training session will be more than a routine workout. It becomes an assessment line. Cucurella’s movements, his reaction to workload, every stretch and sprint will be watched closely. If there’s the slightest doubt, Mourinho may have to pull him out of the firing line.
If that happens, Carreras is next man up.
The full-back, recently displaced from the XI, suddenly stands on the brink of starting one of the biggest nights of Madrid’s early season. A domestic setback, a mounting injury list, a high-stakes European opener — this is the kind of week that can shape a campaign, and define who Mourinho really trusts when the margins tighten.
