Miscellany: Interview, Varanisms, Birthday Article, Bromantic Tension (!) & General Mesuty News!

[jenny-jenkins.livejournal.com]

Interview 

(Updated with pamita87's translation!)

Commentator: On the day of his 23rd birthday Mesut Özil had the gift of victory against Betis, the German appeared satisfied with the 3 points won against a rival that with their good playing did not let us see the best version of Mesut, in spite of that it was a victory and özil was happy.

Mesut: We worked with determination to win the game, we had some difficulties in the first part but it all changed just after the start of the second half. It all worked out and we played really well. Betis and their city rivals, Sevilla, are two very difficult teams to play against; it was clear that this was going to be a difficult game but we played at home and we wanted to win, and that is what we did, 4-1 a great result for us.

I want to stay in shape, stay healthy; I would like to have a season that is even more successful than the last one, so it would be great for Real Madrid to win more titles. We now want to win the next two games, Lyon and Malaga, first we have to focus on Lyon and we know it will be a complicated match, but we are playing at home again and we want to continue winning all our games.

Thank you pamita87!


Raphael Varane Notes Something Interesting...

...on the Real Madrid website.

Sobre la relación que tiene con los jugadores, Varane valoró la gran implicación del técnico blanco con todos los futbolistas y con el equipo. "A Benzema, Lass y a mí nos habla en francés. A Özil y Khedira en inglés. A Kaká, Cristiano y Marcelo en portugués y a otros en español. Te puede dar un mensaje en un pasillo antes o después del entrenamiento, en un partido. Son pequeñas frases que te hacen crecer”, reveló el defensa.

"With Benzema and Lass Mourinho speaks in French (and also, presumably with Varane), With Ozil and Khedira in English, with Kaka, Cristiano, Marcelo in Portuguese or Spanish! Erudite fellow!



Varane celebrating the cracker-jack goal that Mesut assisted.


Wouldn't it be lovely if Mesut ever gave an interview in English? Don't hold your breath though!



Birthday Greetings From RealMadrid.com & A Profile Update!


The Real Madrid website celebrated Mesut's birthday with the following mini-article and by updating the profiles of all the players. Here's Mesut's new profile and the mini-article!

Ozil Turns 23

The German midfielder was a starter against Betis at the Bernabeu on a very special day

Realmadrid.com / Translation by Michael J. O'Donnell

Mesut Ozil celebrated his 23rd birthday with a victory over Betis at the Bernabeu. The German international is in spectacular form, as evidenced by his masterful performances of late and the magnificent goal he scored against Belgium.

Ozil only needed two months to become a fan favourite at Real Madrid thanks to spectacular performances that helped him become the newcomer with the most league victories in the club's history. He served a total 25 assists last season, seven of them in the Champions League.

This is meant to be the campaign that crowns him as an international star and he's off to a good start. He scored the team's first official goal of the season in the first leg of the Spanish Super Cup and he recently gave stellar performances with Germany. He is also Real's best assist-man this year thanks to serving four passes that resulted in goals. [He's had 5 assists actually. I suppose they are not counting his assist for Varane's header?]

Training Notes!

Mesut and the other lads were back in training immediately since they will be facing Lyon tomorrow afternoon (only two days after their league-match).

Here are pictures from October 16, when Mesut took part in a recovery session.

He seems to have been fooling around with Pipita a great deal!





It looks as though Mesut bent down to tie his shoe-laces and that Gonzalo stuck around to wait for him.







Mesut also slowed down at one point (note the tiny little steps he takes) to watch Sergio Ramos's trickery with the ball!





And of course - stretching!





And here are pictures from today - October 17 - when the lovely turquoise training kits made a re-appearance and Mesut spent the time fooling around with Sami (as always) and making Benzema the perennially jealous third-wheel. Oh the poor duck! Doesn't Mesut have any idea how cruel he's being?







Pepe also hung around, being sweet...





...and making sure the German speaking trio + sad, lovelorn, French hanger-on weren't getting lonely...





But mostly it was Sami - with puppy-dog-eyes looking miserable.





And my favourite picture of the afternoon - Mesut being affectionate and silly -






Off To Concentracion!


Mesut and Sami headed off to concentracion together (what a shock!) - as always!





Game-day tomorrow, at home, against Lyon in the Champions League. Good luck Mesut, Good luck lads!

Applause please for andriy_7 whose work for this post was quite indescribable - and includes all the highly original gifs in this post, as well as all research. I literally had nothing to do.

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