This xeet (pronounced “sheet”) hit the fan today:

I’d love to say I was shocked by this; alas, I was not. Let’s be honest, Real Madrid is basically a toddler in a billion-dollar branded pull-up diaper who throws a whiny temper tantrum every time something doesn’t go their way. They make the U.S. president look reasoned by comparison.

Let’s look at some of their more recent tantrums (they call them “responses”):

• Boycotting the Ballon d’Or
  • It apparently wasn’t enough to win three of the seven awards. Despite the award being a secret, they got wind that their golden child Vinicíus Jr. would play second fiddle.
  • What’s worse, the winner would be Rodri, a Spaniard whose biggest crime was playing a few seasons for Villareal and – gasp! Atléctio Madrid and -the horror! Champions League arch-rival Manchester City.
  • Previously profligate spending executives swiftly caught a chronic case of the frugals, and -ahem- ADVISED anyone associated with the club to avoid the whole star-studded gala. Because, you know… cost-saving.
• Blaming the Referee
  • Everyone does it on the couch, at the pub, in the stadium, and on the touch line. And sometimes the complaints are justified; most of the time they’re either wrong or it’s simply subjective.
  • But Real Madrid has gone so far to pen a missive to the Spanish Football Federation claiming the “Spanish officiating system is completely biased” (the “against us” is implied) back in January after an Espanyol player only received a yellow card for hacking down Kylian Mbappé.
    • Of course, the club was silent as a graveyard when Mbappé committed the same infraction against YY. Any positive comment just wouldn’t fit the narrative, now, would it?
• Pre-Shaming
  • This a new low, even for Real Madrid.
  • On Thursday, Real released a carefully edited hit piece on their internal TV channel RMTV targeting the referee of this weekend’s Copa del Rey final. The piece highlighted every “mistake” the referee had made in a number of previous matches.
  • Ricardo de Burgos Bengoetxea, the referee in question, responded in a press conference early Friday, tears in his eyes, saying: “It is not right what we are going through for many colleagues, not only in professional football, but also in grassroots football. Let everyone reflect on where we want to go, on what we want from sport and from football.”
  • Tell me how attacking the referee BEFORE the match is helping the game. Go on. I’ll wait.

I’d love it if Real boycotted/forfeited. But they won’t. They’ve already set the story on the trajectory they want. If they win, they’ve overcome the most impossible odds and adversity. If they lose? Well, it was “their” fault.