Rafa Benitez had plenty of positives to take from Real Madrid’s first defeat of the pre-season. Speaking at a press conference after the game against Bayern Munich, the Spanish manager confessed it was a good chance to assess the youngsters.

“I feel good about the experience for the young players and the work they put in, but sad about the defeat. They are a great team, they have that extra gear and you could see it. We needed more possession to create more danger. We had the odd counter but it wasn’t enough.”

Benitez believes that playing two matches in two days was key for the team’s poor performance: “I always say that we have to get better but have a good team. Today we had a few missing and that hurt us with two games in a row. We are going to try and do what we’ve done and use the players we have, there’s a lot of quality available.”

The three starting forwards –Cristiano Ronaldo, Gareth Bale and Karim Benzema– were unable to feature due to physical problems, and the Los Blancos coach said that was determinant: “If you take away an attack of that quality the absence is obvious. In defence we’ve taken a lot on board. In attack we have power and a cutting edge and we have to see if we are capable of maintaining that cutting edge while keeping the balance in defense.”

Pepe also had to leave the field with muscle problems. Benitez explained they are going to treat all injuries very carefully: “Pepe had a few niggles yesterday and today they recurred so we substituted him. We wanted to rest Danilo, Varane and Bale. Danilo came on in the end as they were getting at us on that wing and to freshen things up. With Benzema we’re going to work with him and follow his progress.”