Cucurella opens up: picks Arda Güler as the most talented, defends Vinícius and calls Real Madrid the best in Europe

Some interviews are just a formality, and then there are the ones where a player actually lays his cards on the table. Marc Cucurella's sit-down on COPE was the latter. The Catalan left back touched on almost everything surrounding Real Madrid right now, and along the way he dropped a surprise or two.

First up, he was asked who the most talented player in the locker room is. The expected answer would have been one of the usual names, and he did mention a few, but he didn't stop there: "I mean, I could tell you Mbappé, Bellingham, Courtois... But I'm going to name someone who flies a bit under the radar, and that's Arda Güler. When he's on the field, the team plays better. He's the one who's surprised me the most." Quite the shoutout for the Turkish midfielder, who tends to stay in the shadows when people talk about the team's biggest stars.

Then came the question every Madrid fan wants answered with confidence: who's the best team in Europe right now? Cucurella didn't dance around it: "Us. We're coming off a really good run and the team is very focused." And when he was asked to weigh Real Madrid against back-to-back European champions PSG, he didn't hesitate either: "Honestly, I don't watch their games much. They're clearly very good, but right now, it's Real Madrid."

Vinícius's situation and the comparison with Diomandé

The full back also waded into one of the more delicate topics in the locker room: the current form of Vinícius Júnior, who has managed just one goal so far this season. Cucurella asked for patience: "I can see it... You have to understand, he's spent five years as one of the best players in the world. He wants to train, he's putting in the work, and I think his quality is going to turn things around for him, for sure."

There's also been a lot of talk about the Brazilian doing less defensive work than Yan Diomandé, who is currently playing on his flank. Cucurella, who knows that position firsthand, pushed back on the comparison: "Diomandé makes one run back and he's everywhere. Vinícius makes three and then there's one he doesn't make, and that's the one people bring up, the one he didn't make. If he were scoring three goals a game nobody would say a word." He wrapped it up with a line that sums up pretty well how the locker room feels about the Brazilian:

The most important thing for us is that he gets back to his best level, because if he's at his prime, we have a hell of a team.Marc Cucurella

Finally, there was no way around comparing the two leagues he knows best. Cucurella spent five years in the Premier League before moving to Spain, and he's crystal clear on the difference: "It's the intensity of the match. Here the quality is higher, every team tries to actually play, but physically the Premier League is way more intense. Over there, everything can change in a single minute." His bottom line leaves little room for doubt: LaLiga is more technical, the Premier League is more physical.