Lamine brings the talent, Madrid brings its chaos, and Modric brings a little bit of light between the blows.

It all started too well. Like in a B-movie horror film, it was almost a bad omen . There was a penalty in favor of Madrid on the second play of the match. "Penalty in favor of Madrid!" the decent people shouted in the streets. Wars, dictatorships, penalties in favor of Madrid. The dark triad. But it was, there was no doubt about it. Thanks to Barça's high defense and Cubarsí, a legendary player who sculpts his legend with tremendous errors. Mbappé shot with fear gripping his ankles and it was a goal. Miraculously. So early that it was tiring just thinking about the long game and that Barça hatred, violent and carnal, that is at the origin of the Catalan club.

In the white team, there were two full-backs with a comical edge: Lucas Vázquez and Fran García. The Madrid of Fran and Lucas, an inclusive Real Madrid where everyone can play. Ancelotti ended the season trapped in a character worthy of Visconti. Mature, expressionless, with a cruelty to which the impeccable suit gives a blue, distant pulse. Locked in his obsessions, like a monarch in his winter palace. But the blame for playing the crucial part of the season with the two worst full-backs in elite European football isn't Ancelotti's. It's the club's. That was the burden of these years of asceticism and miracles. And that ended today. It's not a warning, it's a sentence. With full-backs like that, any effort is like climbing the north face of K-2. Only the fog, the cold, the fall, and death await. There's nothing else.

A breath later, Mbappé's second goal arrived. Vinicius, from his wing, delivered a sweet, curved ball, the kind that has eluded his feet all season. Kylian emphasized too much with his body, but he scored. At the far post. It was 2-0, and no Real Madrid fan was calm or happy. It was a banal joy, that of a truce in a war they know they're losing. Two goals from the Frenchman in which his power stood out, but not his star quality. In both shots, there was a forced tone, in his body, in his instep, which contrasts with the fluidity demanded of the great figure. That simplicity with which he rises to the day. The same one that Vinicius had last year. The same one that the first Raúl, Karim, had throughout his career. Or Lamine Yamal.

But Kylian was in the game, like Vinicius. That difference marked the first 15 minutes and could determine Madrid's future. If there is a future, there are serious doubts about that.

The quality of the match was subterranean. It resembled that Goya painting, the clubbing duel with the opponents mired in mud. The minutes ticked by, and the VAR continued to review Madrid's goal, a constant feature of the season. First it's the VAR, then the UN, and finally UNICEF gives the go-ahead after thoughtful deliberations. Madrid's goals have to be flawless and have some kind of pedagogy behind them to be accepted. Otherwise, they are ceremoniously disallowed.

Barça continued to weave their false mirror game, a mixture of faith and the miracle of Yamal's left foot. They moved the ball around and the Real Madrid players tripped over each other. So they had no choice but to score a somewhat sloppy goal from a corner as stupid as all the corners they've taken against Real Madrid since Militao's absence.

At that moment, the remnants of Madrid ceased to sound. There was no more music, no more midfield, no more threats to space. It was that simple. Madrid's structure was merely a exploitation of the technical and spatial capabilities of two greyhounds against a mediocre defense . The rest of the team was like Saddam Hussein 's tanks. Inflatable models randomly placed on the field to simulate fierce resistance.

Valverde tried to amputate Lamine's leg but failed. It was a tackle worthy of the 1980s, but there was no anger in it, only nostalgia for a time that will never return. The Uruguayan began the season as the team's best player, but lately his play has become useless. In a cacophony, only those who maintain order shine, which is why Modric changed the game slightly in the second half. Federico is an aristocrat on horseback who wages war on his own; he is neither a servant nor a lord. He needs structure and clear order. His energy turns against himself otherwise. Today, he only served to put out fires, not even to mend the edges, and that is a waste.

One could make an ellipsis and overlook a long period in which Madrid became a comedy of manners. Players collided with each other while others wandered desperately, staggering around the field, like Bellingham , who was always on a different plane from the game , as if evil forces were preventing him from making contact with the ball.

Barça scored two goals, and they seemed like too few. It's the great discovery of their season. They're a team of children believing in things that aren't yet. They build glass palaces that collapse with the first rains of autumn. They play for all four seasons in the same minute. The sun rises and suddenly it's winter. Then spring and summer arrive in the same perverse touch of Lamine. They cease to exist in the next second and concede two goals without drama, which they recover whistling their Boy Scout tune. And so on forever until they run out of breath and the real war begins. The one Inter fought against them. The one Inter won against them.

The Italians are a tough, thin team that's far from the quality of the European giants of recent years: Madrid, City, and Liverpool ; but they are a realistic team . And that realism was poison against the Blaugrana's gigantic hope. Barcelona is a team made in half. Lamine's left foot, Rapinha's aim, Pedri's bursts. Teenagers playing at being gods. They 're reminiscent of the fifth division. Attacking like that is easy. The difficult thing is to save the funds and master the game of football with balance. And they haven't taken that path.

After Modric's introduction, a different game began to unfold . It was as if an ancient god had suddenly appeared on Gran Vía. Everything became serious and coherent. They didn't take the ball away from him, he didn't fall at the first touch, he didn't rush, he thought with the ball at his feet and seized a second to make the perfect pass. His presence, his impact on the game, made Ceballos look ridiculous, a player who was important this year because he played a necessary role, not because his quality was decisive.

The army of Madrid

Fran, Ceballos, Asencio. Madrid's small army of Spaniards wouldn't be more than supporting players in the grand landscapes of the Baroque. Ascencio isn't a player whose limits are obvious, in the sense that he is a limit himself. He doesn't carry that indefinable brilliance that is talent. He has speed and a decent touch, doesn't give up in bad times, and grits his teeth a lot, but that's only half of what's required of a Madrid center-back. Being a starter this year will hurt him, just as it has hurt Rodrygo.

Being a starter for Real Madrid is like living embedded in a mythological battle with snowy landscapes and a Renaissance depth of field. And everything else, real life or the bench, hurts like a punishment. Like paintings that are no longer fashionable and are no longer on public display. They're taken down to the basement and there they die of cold and loneliness.

Madrid is going to have to make a signing. Bellingham is an exceptional but unusual player. Unusual for the Spanish palate, accustomed to the scribbles of Pedri or Isco, those footballers you have to spear through the heart to take the ball from. The Englishman is easily defeated. Occasionally, he finds winding paths, but he does so sporadically, brilliantly. He doesn't know how to command from normalcy.

Güler is trained in the land of triangles and is the shining light of this part of the season, but he didn't make an appearance in front of Barcelona's midfield. Neither player knows how to maintain possession when the house is falling apart. And that's precisely the moment that opens up impossible paths. In fact, Luka did it a couple of times, and two scoring chances emerged as if by magic. A held ball, a pause, and a through ball to Vinicius, who passes it to Kylian.

That's how it should be.

Make it look easy.

That's what Isco, Xavi, and Kroos did . People who accumulated vast amounts of possession without their opponents knowing how to get close to the secret box. And once they've drawn the opponents in, the pass or the change of direction comes, and then it's all horizon, traveling shot , gallop, and goal. With Vinicius and Mbappé, Madrid needs exactly what it lacks. What it had and no longer has. If it doesn't find it in the market, or Güler doesn't learn what he still doesn't know, next season will be stillborn.

At the end of the match, a Madrid youth player came out. He didn't look like a footballer . This may be the only time in his life he'll be on TV. They gave him a free ball for the equalizer, and he hit it so poorly and so awkwardly that the ball went far away from the goal and out of the corner of the world. He'll surely be part of an asteroid cloud now, and that's something to be proud of.

In the final act , Fermín scored a goal, but it was disallowed after consulting the Supreme Court . The Catalans had gone wild celebrating. But Madrid was already exhausted; they didn't even manage to open their arms and demand mercy from fate, which has been the theme of the entire year.

The match ended 4-3, a manageable and easy-to-digest result. Modric still exists, Barcelona won't win the Champions League, and Mbappé will be the league's top scorer. We should celebrate life's little joys.