"I want to win. I could say I want to play well, but I don't want to play well as we did against Betis and then lose. I want to win," Jose Mourinho said before Real Madrid's Champions League opener against Inter. Real Madrid lost 1-0 to Real Betis in their most recent league match, but Mourinho was not interested in treating that as the reference point for Tuesday.

He framed the group phase as an eight-match run to qualify and said the Inter tie should be handled as a one-off, separate from the rest of the campaign. Real Madrid have won four of their last five matches and scored 14 goals in that run, which fits Mourinho's argument that the issue against Betis was not the general level of attack. They have conceded only 3 in those five games, too.

The Trent Alexander-Arnold decision stays hidden

The other main question was Trent Alexander-Arnold's role. Mourinho said he has "three, four, five options" but would not say whether Alexander-Arnold would move into midfield against Inter. He also refused to comment on the plan in more detail, which leaves the debate open until team news lands.

The uncertainty is understandable. Alexander-Arnold has only 2 La Liga appearances for Real Madrid this season and has not yet settled into dominant form, so any midfield switch would be an experiment rather than a finished idea. Inter arrive unbeaten in their last five, with 3 wins and 2 draws, so Mourinho has a proper reason to keep one part of the setup private.

Endrick is back, but only briefly

Mourinho also gave a tight update on Endrick. The forward trained with the team for the first time yesterday, but the manager said he might be ready for only 5 minutes or 10, at most. That makes him an option from the bench, not someone to build a plan around.

The selection picture around him is still thin, and the missing names elsewhere will matter. Madrid are without Bernardo Silva, Eduardo Camavinga and Arda Guler through suspension, while the Inter game now sits as the next concrete test of how Mourinho wants this side to look when the result comes before the style.

Written by Daniel Hartley with AI-assisted research, cross-checked against 5 outlets. How we work →