Thibaut Courtois says Barcelona's 4-0 win over Real Madrid in last month's El Clasico was a "fluke" result.
The world of football was stunned when Barcelona, who had been in disarray for much of the season, turned up to Santiago Bernabeu and blew their bitter rivals away with a scintillating display of attacking football.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored twice on his first Clasico appearance, with the other Barcelona goals supplied by former Manchester City forward Ferran Torres and central defender Ronald Araujo.
Real have since recovered their composure after the defeat, and reached the semi-finals of the Champions League in midweek - largely thanks to the continued brilliance of Karim Benzema, who scored four times across the two-legged quarter-final with Chelsea to help Los Blancos into the last four.
But speaking to El Capitan, Courtois referenced the desperately disappointing defeat to Barcelona, and claimed the result shouldn't be over analysed - suggesting it was a freak result because of how Real have performed in other games before and since.
"It was a very bad night, but we recovered quickly, because you shouldn't have to think too much about defeats," Courtois said.
"I'm disappointed, of course, but I think it was clear that there is a before and after that defeat. If you look at our results and our performance it was a fluke."
Real hold a 12-point advantage over Barcelona, who are now up into second place in La Liga after winning five consecutive league games. Xavi's side have taken advantage of a dip in form from Sevilla, though they did crash out of the Europa League to Eintracht Frankfurt after a surprise 3-2 (4-3 on aggregate) defeat at Camp Nou.
This article was originally published on 90min as Thibaut Courtois claims Barcelona victory in El Clasico was a 'fluke'.
Source: www.90min.com