Real Madrid Will receive The Best award on Monday

Ahead of Sunday's LaLiga game against Eibar, Real Madrid coach Zinedine Zidane pondered just why he was going to receive an award for being the best coach in the world.

The Frenchman clearly preferred to deflect any praise away from himself and onto his team.

"I do not feel that way," Zidane said in his pre-match press conference.

"I feel that I'm in the best club in the world, but the other way around? Not at all."

Real head into the match with five first team players still unavailable and a relatively poor record at the Estadio Santiago Bernabeu this season.

"We play every three days and we know that we have seven games before another break," Zidane continued.

"We had two days to recover and we're fine.

"We like to play at the Bernabeu but it's true that if you look at the results, it's not what is expected.

"I'm not worried because I know that we will overcome it.

"People have forgotten that we have already won two trophies this season and we have another one to play for in December."

Criticism of striker Karim Benzema has stung the coach, who felt compelled to respond.

"Not only Karim, everyone," he said.

"It bothers me.

"Karim will not score 60 goals but he's going to score 30 and he's going to assist for 40 more and that's what matters to me the most.

"It's annoying to hear trash talking about my players, and I want to clarify that for me, Karim is the best [centre-forward] by far."