Real Madrid coach Jose Mourinho pointed fingers at his players, his club and the referee following Los Blancos’ 1-0 loss to Real Betis on Saturday. The result meant that the deficit between Real and hated rival FC Barcelona at the top of the La Liga standings grew to 11 points.

"I congratulated the Betis players because they gave it everything they had, they fought and showed a great deal of character and it's not their fault that [Karim] Benzema's goal was wrongly disallowed and the clear penalty in the last few minutes wasn't given,”  Mourinho said in his post game press conference. “They deserve my respect because they were the better team."

Mourinho attributed the loss to a poor start and his team having to play two games in four days. "I try to be fair and objective and I don't reach for excuses when my team loses,” the Portuguese said. “It's obvious that if you play on Wednesday, you shouldn't play on Saturday. It's obvious that other teams have more control over the fixtures than we do, but we are talking about top professionals and they showed a lack of mental strength, ambition and spirit of sacrifice.”