Alvaro Arbeloa on the brink at Real Madrid after La Liga title slip-up as club weigh up managerial options for next season

With the La Liga crown now appearing out of reach, the manager's future is effectively hanging by a thread. According to AS, the Real Madrid hierarchy is weighing up its options for next season, and only a deep run in the Champions League might be enough to save his position. Madrid face a daunting path in Europe, starting with a high-stakes quarter-final against Bayern Munich. Success there would likely lead to a collision with heavyweight opposition like PSG or Liverpool. The hierarchy’s mood has soured significantly, as they watched a team lacking spark at a moment when they could ill afford any slip-ups in the domestic race.

Arbeloa’s record since taking the reins has come under intense scrutiny, with the numbers painting a worrying picture. In his first 18 games, he has suffered five defeats. To put that in perspective, former boss Xabi Alonso only lost five times in his first 28 matches. Arbeloa now finds himself among the coaches with the worst starts in the club's history, alongside figures like Michael Keeping and Luis Molowny. Perhaps more damning is his lack of tactical impact when games go against him. Madrid have only managed to come back and win two out of seven matches in which they conceded first under his watch. Disappointing losses to Albacete, Benfica, Osasuna, and Getafe have highlighted a perceived inability to change the momentum of a match through substitutions or system tweaks.

In the wake of the Mallorca disaster, Arbeloa was quick to fall on his sword, stating: "This defeat is mine, entirely and absolutely mine. What I need from the players is for them to already be thinking about Tuesday's game. When they leave the locker room, this game is already over for them. I'm the one who makes the decisions, the one who picks the lineup, the one who makes the substitutions, the one who chooses how we have to play, and this defeat belongs entirely to the Real Madrid coach."

However, despite claiming full responsibility, the coach also aimed a thinly veiled critique at Eduardo Camavinga for defensive lapses. Discussing the match-winner, he noted: "In a mismatch they have scored a goal against us. Here we get distracted for a moment, we didn't adjust well, we lost a mark, we didn't follow it and it cost you a goal."

Until this recent slump, the Real Madrid board had maintained strong confidence in Arbeloa’s methods. He has been praised for managing a star-studded dressing room containing the likes of Jude Bellingham and Vinicius Junior, while successfully integrating youth prospects like Thiago Pitarch. The elimination of Manchester City in the Champions League round of 16 was seen as a turning point that should have propelled the team forward.

However, the defeat at Son Moix has frozen that positive momentum. While the club values his work with the academy graduates, the lack of a domestic trophy is a difficult pill to swallow for president Florentino Perez. Everything comes down to the Bayern tie. Arbeloa simply has to deliver a result there if he expects to stay in the Bernabeu dugout long-term.