Young Real Madrid center-back Raul Asencio has had quite the start to life at Real Madrid after making his debut in the first team in November 2024. Madrid’s main-stay center back Eder Militao was injured in November 2024 and is ruled out till the start of the upcoming season. While Antonio Rudiger has been Madrid’s main center-back since quite some time, we have seen Carlo Ancelotti deploy Tchouameni in the center-back pairing, having the French midfielder play out of his favoured position.However Militao’s injury also gave room for Raul Asencio to rise up the ranks and play for the Madrid outfit.
The 22 year old center-back has delivered some solid performances till date and has earned himself his maiden call-up for the Spanish national team under Luis De La Fuente. In a recent interview, the youngster was asked to choose between Robert Lewandowski and Kylian Mbappe, to which he responded by choosing his French team-mate over Barca’s Lewandowski. Both of these players are currently topping the goal-scoring charts of LaLiga, with only two goals separating the players.
Raul Asencio to play alongside his rival club’s team-mate in the national team
Asencio preferred choosing his team-mate over their rival team striker Lewandowski and spoke highly of his team-mate. He said, “He’s very humble, hard-working, calm and a wonderful person. He has a great sense of humour and a very positive attitude in all situations.” Mbappe who is also in his debut season for Los Blancos has really hit the ground running with 31 goals across all competitions.
As for the young-center back, his solid performances with the Madrid side has earned him a call-up to the Spanish national team for the upcoming international matches. Asencio is one of the young center-backs called up by De La Fuente alongside his rival-club Barcelona’s youngster; Pau Cubarsi. A lot of fans are anticipating that the partnership of these two young prospects will go a long way for the Spanish national team and will bring back memories from the past owing to the old Spanish defensive duo of Barcelona’s Gerard Pique and Real Madrid’s Sergio Ramos.
