"Leave my dad in peace. Every time they mention him regarding a comeback we mess it up. I just want a bit of respect".

Sent by Real Madrid fan Roberto Gomez in the wake of the club's 2-0 loss to Wolfsburg, those tweets perfectly summed up the absurd levels of hysteria created in the Spanish capital these days any time Los Blancos need to overturn a difficult first leg result.

Why? Roberto is not just a fan. He is also the son of Juan 'Juanito' Gomez, a Madrid forward from the 1970s and 80s who was tragically killed in a 1992 road accident at the age of 37. Juanito's quality as a player and, above all, his strong character made him the embodiment of the club's perceived refusal to give up, regardless of the odds stacked against them.

He is also the focal point of what has increasingly become one of the most overused clichés in Spanish football. Nowadays, any time Madrid find themselves in a moderate spot of bother the "espiritu de Juanito" - spirit of Juanito - is evoked. One line in particular is trotted out more than any other. When Madrid lost the first leg of their 1985-86 UEFA Cup semi-final 3-1 to Internazionale, Juanito famously assured the Inter players in pidgin Italian that "90 minuti en el Bernabeu son molto longo" - ninety minutes in the Bernabeu are very long. He was right. Madrid scored five goals in the second leg and won the tie, before going on to win the competition.

Juanito's battle cry became the stuff of legend, but overuse has cheapened it, to the point that the boundaries of good taste were well and truly obliterated last season. In January 2015, Madrid-based daily AS produced a video of one of their high-profile journalists using an Ouija board to 'contact' Juanito's spirit from beyond the grave, asking him to help Los Blancos turn around a first leg loss from their Copa del Rey last 16 game with Atletico. 'Journalism', Spanish style.

After that absurd and above all disrespectful event, it is little wonder that the fallen hero's son has asked for a more level-headed approach now that Madrid are in the hunt for yet another comeback, this time in the Champions League against Wolfsburg. He is also right to suggest that rolling out his dad's name has had little to no tangible impact on results: on 14 of the 15 occasions in the last decade that Madrid have tried to turn around a first leg loss from a two-legged knockout tie, they have failed.

In fact, the last time Madrid turned over a two goal deficit from the first leg of a European tie was 23 years ago, in 1987, when they battled back from a 4-2 away loss to Red Star Belgrade with a 2-0 home win in the quarter-finals of the European Cup. Crucially, unlike their present day quest to do the same against Wolfsburg, they had two away goals to help their cause.

Long gone, then, is the era of Juanito, or the Quinta del Buitre, when Madrid really did earn their reputation for fighting back into ties, downing the likes of Borussia Mönchengladbach, Celtic, and Anderlecht on top of the aforementioned Red Star and Inter draws where the Spaniards trailed going into the return leg.

On Tuesday, Zinedine Zidane needs to pull off a turnaround that has evaded his club for generations. Since the 1980s, to be specific.

Perhaps if Zizou can can make a miracle happen, Juanito will finally be left in peace.