{"id":713,"date":"2026-04-11T00:45:26","date_gmt":"2026-04-11T00:45:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/713\/"},"modified":"2026-04-11T00:45:26","modified_gmt":"2026-04-11T00:45:26","slug":"bellingham-returns-to-real-madrid-lineup-but-old-frailties-persist-in-draw-with-girona","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/713\/","title":{"rendered":"Bellingham returns to Real Madrid lineup but old frailties persist in draw with Girona"},"content":{"rendered":"

MADRID (AP) \u2014 Jude Bellingham’s<\/a> first start since Feb. 1 was not enough to spark a Real Madrid<\/a> revival as they drew with Girona<\/a> 1-1 and missed a chance to put pressure on La Liga<\/a> leader Barcelona<\/a> on Friday.<\/p>\n

Bellingham was withdrawn after 10 minutes in a game against Rayo Vallecano<\/a> and subsequently missed nine club matches, including the twin victories over Manchester City that took Real Madrid into the Champions League quarterfinals.<\/p>\n

He made three substitute appearances in Madrid\u2019s previous three games but started against Girona in a fixture the home side needed to win to cut into Barcelona’s seven-point lead.<\/p>\n

Instead, Madrid ended the night ruing missed opportunities.<\/p>\n

Federico Valverde<\/a> put Madrid 1-0 up six minutes into the second half when the Girona goalkeeper allowed his long-range shot to squirm through his hands. But visiting Girona wasted no time in levelling the scores after French midfielder Thomas Lemar<\/a> rifled home from outside the box.<\/p>\n

Bellingham bowed out moments later but neither his replacement Arda Guler<\/a> nor any of \u00c1lvaro Arbeloa\u2019s other four changes were able to bring Madrid and the 70,000 fans present the three points they coveted.<\/p>\n

As so often this season, Madrid was unable to convert pressure into chances and it was suspect at the back once again.<\/p>\n

The result was hot on the heels of 2-1 losses to Mallorca<\/a> in La Liga and at home to Bayern Munich in the first leg of the Champions League quarterfinal.<\/p>\n

Girona remained in 12th place.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP soccer: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/soccer<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MADRID (AP) \u2014 Jude Bellingham’s first start since Feb. 1 was not enough to spark a Real Madrid…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":714,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[642,643,640,84,91,85,82,83,641],"class_list":{"0":"post-713","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-madrid","8":"tag-arda-guler","9":"tag-event_recap","10":"tag-federico-valverde","11":"tag-girona","12":"tag-jude-bellingham","13":"tag-laliga","14":"tag-madrid","15":"tag-real-madrid","16":"tag-thomas-lemar"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}