Pellegrini joined Real on a two-year contract last summer but his first campaign in charge of the Spanish giants ended without any silverware with Barcelona tonight getting the win over Real Valladolid that guaranteed them the title.

Madrid had needed Barca to slip up at home to the Primera Division strugglers and to beat Malaga to snatch the league away from their arch rivals, but neither result went their way.

Pellegrini had already been under pressure following premature exits from the Champions League and Copa del Rey and over the last few weeks speculation linking Inter Milan coach Jose Mourinho with a move to the Bernabeu has intensified.

Speaking after tonight`s matches, Valdano said Pellegrini`s future would be a matter for discussion inside the club.

"We need to congratulate Barcelona, a worthy champion. With regards to the coach, now we will discuss this inside the club and we`ll see what decision we take. Today is not the day to take decisions," Valdano was quoted as saying on Canal Plus.

"The end of the season has arrived, now we have a lot of time ahead and we`ll see what course we take next season.

"We aren`t going to talk outside the club about something we haven`t yet talked about inside."

Madrid may have ended up empty-handed this season but they pushed Barca all the way in the league, finishing with 31 wins from 38 games, 96 points and 102 goals in their favour.

"The team did themselves proud and I refuse to talk of failure, although it`s true that we cannot finish the season without titles," Valdano said.

"The team has fought until the end and next season we will continue with this effort."

Valdano did suggest Madrid would be investing in the squad again during the close season, although not at the same level as last summer when they spent 250million euros on new players.

"Last season we started this project and this year we need to continue it. There won`t be as many changes as last year but there will be adjustments to have the team at the highest level and improve on this season."

With regards to today`s comments from Mourinho, who said he was still "very very far away from being Real coach", Valdano said: "We aren`t going to get into this. Mourinho has other battles and we have to continue forward independent of opinions and outside statements."

Pellegrini remained tight-lipped when asked about his future following the draw with Malaga, a result that came after Madrid had won 18 of their last 19 league matches.

"It's logical that at the end of the season they assess things at a club as big as Real Madrid, but it's not my place to publicly defend my job," he said.

The Chilean also heaped praise on his players for fighting to the end in La Liga, but admitted there was lots of work to do to get them to the level of champions Barca.

"I want to thank them all for the season they had. They've been a hard-working group who have shown exemplary conduct on and off the pitch," he added.

"They've had a brilliant league season which has been undervalued because we didn't win the title and because we had a great Barcelona in front of us.

"I'm very grateful to them, in the future we cannot settle for being second and we need to continue getting closer to Barcelona.

"We need to work much more to correct certain aspects of our game and try to overcome a team that has been playing great football for a long time.

"In the future people may realise that it isn't easy to get this amount of points and the statistics that this team have achieved."