Madrid always played 4-1-3-2 when most successful in the Galactico Era...
-------------------- Cesar --------------------------
Salgado --- Hierro --- Helguera --- Roberto Carlos
------------------- Makelele ------------------------
Figo --------------- Zidane ------------------ Solari
-------------- Raul ------- Morientes ----------------
In CL Final 2002....
yeah but solari was a real worker. and makelele was superhuman and salgado was defensive-orientated.
if you tried that now
-------------------- Iker --------------------------
Ramos -------- Pepe ------ Garay --------- Marcelo
-------------------- Lassie ------------------------
Higuain -------------- Kaka ------------------ Robben
-------------- Raul ---------- Villa ----------------
ramos isn't as defensively-minded as salgado. neither pepe or garay is a defensive leader to organise the back-line. marcelo can't defend (carlos wasn't great but he was better than marcelo).
while higuain may work more than figo (that's not hard) he'll waste his talent there. robben is a pansy. kaka is more forward-thinking than zidane who tended to come deep towards the ball. and then raul is raul but older and less mobile, and villa probably works harder than morientes.
plus crucially... maka was a superhuman. lassie is not. djila is though so that could be a wash.
and then there's also the fact that real often took one of those forwards out of the lineup to add guti/whoeever to the midfield.