This is how Isco reconnected to professional football: "The most important part was the motivation he had to return"

It is a label that has followed him almost throughout his career, but that has been repeated especially in his last stretch as a Real Madrid player. “Am I fat?” asked Isco Alarcón (Benalmádena, 1992) on his social networks in 2018 while showing himself shirtless with marked abs. “I also hear the noise that I am lazy,” he recently said in an interview in Marca about the scrutiny he is subjected to in the same social media.

Rodrigo Carretero, co-founder of Crys Dyaz & Co and one of the Malaga soccer player's personal trainers, also recalls the criticism the player received. “When we caught him, he was in Madrid without playing, compared to his teammates, they told him he was fat,” explains Carretero. The man from Malaga started with them with a body fat index of 10% (elite athletes are between 6% and 12%) and with supplementation and training they managed to lower it to 8%, in a short time.

Critics aside, Isco is back. The man from Malaga has signed for Betis after spending six months without a team after terminating his contract with Sevilla. He does it after a break in which he has taken the opportunity to get “physically like never before”, according to Rodrigo Carretero.

View this post on Instagram

Isco has been carrying out, at his home in Madrid and at the gym, double daily sessions from Monday to Friday and “homework” for the weekend. “He works harder than in his entire life,” explains Carretero. Something that can be verified by watching the videos of their sessions on the player's social networks. “He has come to do squats with 150 kilos,” says the coordinator of his training sessions along with another coach, Dani Jiménez, who appears in many of the audiovisual pieces published by the man from Malaga.

But these six months without a team, like any footballer, have made him lose speed and something of a technical-tactical level.. Carretero, to improve in the physical section, worked with the footballer on short and long reactions, both in the gym and on athletics tracks. They also rented soccer fields to replace the ball part, although he admits that it is impossible to replicate the collective part. “The dynamics of the team is important, but Isco has a magic wand, with a touch and a quality that is not seen. He is well above any First Division player and that keeps him going,” says the personal trainer.

In addition, there is a relevant part, which is what Pedri wore this summer: the importance of the cupero's upper body, which Isco has also worked hard with the team coordinated by Carretero. “Obviously, the lower body is the most important because it is the one that plays the most,” he points out. However, the coach equates footballers with sprinters and believes that to make them more complete they need to have a strong core and arms like them.. “In addition, the more muscle mass, the less fat percentage,” he adds.

Another fundamental part that the man from Malaga has worked on has been the mental part. Even if he turned to a specialist, he also relied on his coaches to be able to unload everything that tormented him.. “The mental part is very important, it is linked to the physical. If you look good, you will feel stronger, without pain”, adds Rodrigo and reviews the “great heart of the man from Malaga”.

View this post on Instagram

Precisely, the footballer himself has been the one most responsible for being prepared for his return with Betis. A return that he chose himself and in which the factor Manuel Pellegrini, the coach who gave him birth as a footballer, was decisive when choosing the Verdiblanco club. “He is mentally very tough, he is used to putting up with pressure,” reveals Carretero. Isco will have to endure a lot.

After the failure in Seville and the frustrated signing by Unión Berlin, Betis could be the last trick to relaunch the career of the man from Malaga. A player who shone in Madrid, who shone in Spain and who elevated Málaga, but his light soon lost intensity. Although he, more than anyone, wants to turn it back on.

“The most important part of his comeback is the motivation he has given him,” Rodrigo says, adding that “he sees him looking forward to it” and that his desire “was the key to keeping him in shape outside of a team”. The work of the man from Malaga and his assistants have already put him in the spotlight again.