74th minute of the match against Almeria – the referee blows the offense on Luka Modriciu, and David Alaba is preparing to enter the field. The Austrian replaced Ferland Mendy, but he did not go to the left back, but towards the ball, which was already placed in front of the opponent’s penalty area by Karim Benzema and Toni Kroos. The defender quickly got along with his teammates and after his precise shot with his left leg the ball bounced off the post and fell into the net. The Królewski team took the lead for the first time that evening.
It was also Alaba’s first contact with the ball, which only confirms how confident he feels when performing set pieces. The goal against Almería was the second free-kick goal of the Austrian defender in a shirt Los Blancos. Earlier, he did it in last year’s edition of the Champions League during the away match with Sheriff Tiraspol.
Scoring goals from free kicks is not a big news for Alaba. During his adventure at Bayern Munich, he scored a total of ten goals in this way. What’s more, despite the fact that he has only one full season behind him in Madrid, he can already boast of being the most successful freelance performer in the team – no other player in the current Royal squad has managed to score more than one goal in this way. Overall, Real Madrid scored their last free league goal against Barcelona in April 2021.
In the current season, Alaba has already scored two goals – apart from yesterday’s against Almería, he also scored a hit in the final of the European Super Cup with Eintracht Frankfurt. In total, as a player of Real Madrid, he has five hits and all of them on trips – Barcelona, Tiraspol, Pamplona, Helsinki and Almería.