crinkly_ears | Open Training & Preparations For The Super-Copa

Alternative Title: Sergio Ramos Spends His Return To the Squad Admiring Mesut's Biceps.

The gifs and the photograph above are from yesterday - August 12, 2011.

Preparations For The Super-Copa

Tomorrow is August 14 - first leg of the Super Copa - and it will be Mesut's 6th game against Barcelona in just under 9 months. On Wednesday, he will encounter them for the 7th time. It will be Sami's 4th and 5th and, incredibly, Mourinho's 10th and 11th encounters with Barca in only two seasons for the coach. Let's hope the baptism of fire for last season's younger signings Mesut, Sami, and Angel has paid off. Most players would have to play for 4 seasons in the Liga before encountering Barca that often - provided they were allowed to play.

So here we have training pictures and video from earlier today - Sunday August 13. The training session, inexplicably, was open (and free) and held at the Bernabeu which is rather odd when one considers an important match is to be played there tomorrow.

After all, if all goes well tomorrow, you can cue complaints after the game from Xavi Hernandez & Co. that the pitch is best likened to a potato field, and how could any self-respecting team possibly pass and score under such conditions?

The fans turned out in force! Real Madrid TV were there to record part of the training.

Some lovely girls showed their impeccable taste in footballers with an equally lovely sign - very charming!

Google Translate is improving, somewhat!

As the video noted, the boys played a training game of the type that Mourinho favours - where the boys are allowed to use their hands as well as their feet.

But while the big news was that Ramos had returned to practice, it had of course, continued over the past few days in his absence - and in the absence of the players on International duty, from which Mesut and Sami were excused.

So here are photos from August 12 -

And, going back in time, here is a photo from the day before - August 11 - the day before the Internationals returned to Madrid.

As you can see, Mourinho is suppressing the urge to check out why Mesut's handshake is suddenly so firm.

And photographic evidence would suggest that our favourite player and his bestest friend remain joined at the hip!

Many thanks, hugs & kisses to andriy_7 who did the photographic research for this post!

Good luck to the boys tomorrow! Game Time at 22:00. Stay calm ladies, and try to avoid hitting the booze too early!

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