What a difference a day makes.
On Tuesday, Spain’s World Cup preparations were going exactly to plan but, all of a sudden, their tournament was thrown into disarray when Real Madrid announced that Spain manager Julen Lopetegui would be taking over at the Bernabeu following Zinedine Zidane’s shock decision to resign from his position as Real boss.
There was much speculation about Zidane’s successor as names like Mauricio Pochettino and Arsene Wenger were thrown about but, in the end, Florentino Perez looked towards the national team for a solution.
Tuesday’s announcement claimed that Lopetegui would begin his new job after Spain’s involvement in the upcoming World Cup came to an end but that plan changed on Wednesday morning, when a decision was made to sack the 51-year-old, just two days before Spain take on Portugal in their Group B opener.
The fact that Lopetegui was relieved of his duties with La Furia Roja means that Real Madrid won’t have to pay the release clause for their former goalkeeper, which was understood to be €2 million.
Royal Spanish Football Federation president Luis Rubiales has spoken about the decision to immediately part ways with Lopetegui, rather than see the tournament out and accept €2 million from Real.
“We are doing a great job at budgetary level and with other sponsors, the RFEF will have €20 million more than budgeted,” Rubiales said, as quoted by MARCA.
“This is a complicated situation but there are other issues and values that we must transmit. In that sense, we acted in conscience and with responsibility.”
