Carlo Ancelotti claims Barcelona fixture wasn’t behind squad rotation vs Shakhtar

Real Madrid manager Carlo Ancelotti has claimed that his squad rotation decision against Shakhtar Donetsk wasn’t about this weekend’s game against Barcelona. 

Madrid were held to a frustrating 1-1 draw by Shakhtar Donetsk on Tuesday night in the Champions League but the draw was enough for the Whites to seal their place in the round of 16. 

Ancelotti benched the likes of Luka Modric, Vinicius Jr, David Alaba and Eduardo Camavinga against Shahktar Donetsk and his gamble backfires after Real went behind just seconds after the interval. 

After the Italian boss brought in the likes of the players mentioned above, they salvaged a point in the injury time, thanks to a brilliant header from Antonio Rudiger. 

Real Madrid will host Barcelona at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium on Sunday in what would be a top-of-the-table El Clasico clash. 

Ancelotti has claimed that his decision to rest some of his key players against the Ukrainian side on Tuesday was due to the fact that they didn’t have enough time to prepare for the Shakhtar game, having played at Getafe on Saturday night.

Speaking after the final whistle, Ancelotti said: “When you play on Wednesday and then on Sunday you have all the time to recover well. I made changes to avoid problems.

“The problem was playing today because we played on Saturday night and we had a long trip. That was the reason for the rotations and not to think about the Clásico . It may be that whoever doesn’t play today won’t play in the Clásico either.”

Toni Kroos played 90 minutes and provided the assist to Rudiger’s injury-time equaliser and Carlo Ancelotti is open to having the German beyond this season. 

“He will choose if he wants to stay or stop his career here,” Ancelotti told Real Madrid’s official website. “He has been one of the best, just like Rüdiger . In the last minutes we put a lot of crosses and we needed height. He, with Militão , is the best we have to finish off with a header.”