Friday, August 24, 2007

FOOTBALL: MADRID'S CRAZY POLICY

I have been complaining non-stop since Capello was sacked. It is great now that Capello had reviewed behind the scenes of the things happening in Real Madrid when he was the coach. The signing of Heinze and Robben are the latest in the lists of players coming to Real Madrid this season. The selling of some players like Cicinho, Helguera, Emerson, Reyes and the great hope to sell Baptista is just making me extremely sad with the club's policy. It is as if you have rival members in the board aiming at dismantling the team to as many pieces as possible so the uphill task at hand will be achieved to be trophyless for another century. All the decisions that are done by the club's board is extremely without logic and sense.

I am left wondering what is the next crazy step they will take. The better the player performs, the more excited they are in getting the player out of the club. The worse the player, the more they want to guarantee the player an automatic starting eleven berth. You just cannot stand their decisions. They have Drenthe, Marcelo, Torres and now Heinze as leftback. Any club out there get 4 great players on a single position? As for Robben, I hope he will not dive, injure easily as well as selfishly attack alone. The president must be happy now that at least one of the three players he promised arrived in Madrid. Fabregas and Kaka will be distant dreams.

Some of Capello's remarks are really shocking. Now, I know it is not him who wanted to bench Beckham. Here are some of the things he said which is on the news.

"They appointed me to do a serious, tough and difficult job and we had a very difficult dressing room to deal with."

"There were many conflicting groups and each one had its leader who blamed the others when things weren’t going well."

"But we pulled the team together, recoevered the team spirit and they played with belief and enthusiasm."

With this, he admitted some level of respect for the players that won the league trophy. But he saved no such redeeming words for president Calderon.

He said of the boss, "What hurts is that I have never heard anything from Calderon. He has never called me. I think I deserved some respect from someone I helped win the elections and succeed as President."

The ex-Juve player went on to remark on the David Beckham saga, blaming the club's hierarchy for the English superstar's time out of the team in the aftermath of his signing a pre-contract with LA Galaxy.

"The decision was taken beacuse the club’s management said that he had negotiated with them when he had already signed a contract with Los Angeles."

"They said that they couldn’t count on a player who wasn’t going to remain at the club."

"When I work I always wear the team colours and defend my employers in every way I can."

Interesting words from Capello - particularly when compared to his utterances earlier in the year.Indeed, his take on the Beckham situation was quite different in January, when he said:""Beckham will train with the team but he won't play. He has always been a great professional but if a player has such an important contract with another club you cannot count on him. You can't have the same enthusiasm when your mind is on other things."

"The strange thing is that they only gave me 30 million euros to make signings," he said, compared to the Madrid total this year that's already topping the 100 million mark.

What's more, he said that, in the transfer market, timing is everything - and they almost got it wrong last year.

"We made a miracle in building the squad that we did.You can't form a winning team in July. That's what seems to be happening to them now," he claimed.

And with this, he reflected on a wider theme: the lack of planning in the transfer market."It's necessary to make signings in May," said Capello.

"We had everything prepared to sign players, but they are not signed, never signed."

"We had a 6 million (euro) bid for Chivu in April, with 3.5 for the player. [Franco] Baldini [sporting director] had it all sorted, but it wasn't possible to close the deal because they told us, 'We don't love players who come from the Italian league."

Seemingly, Italy wasn't the only problem. Brazil, was, too. Pato, Brazilian wonderkid who just signed for AC Milan, was apparently also a target.Capello said, "Beldini went to Brazil and saw Pato. He called [Pedrag] Mijatovic [sporting director] and said, 'I've seen a lad here, and he's an extraordinary player."

"With a bit of luck - and considering he shared a representative with Emerson - we could have got him for 2 million euros... but Madrid said, 'No, too young.' And now he's worth 20 million..."

Capello also revealed that he pleaded with Mijatovic not to sell Roberto Carlos, but this request fell on deaf ears. Equally futile, he claims, is anything relating to Kaka.The Italian coach blasted, "For me, we never even had the possibility of signing him. I have always said that to Pedja and the president."To [president Ramon] Calderon I said, you are failing here. [Milan president] Berlusconi doesn't lack money and has a 'pretty face' at Milan - who is it? It was Maldini before, but now it is Kaka."

The boy in all the photos is Kaka. And Berlusconi, who lives an aesthetic life, and loves the aesthetic players, will never let such a man go."

Capello closed by wishing new coach Bernd Schuster the best of luck and pledging his support to the side for the new season, but ruled out a third strike at the Bernabeu job.

He said, "I've returned once and made extraordinary work...but I won't return to Real Madrid to coach. Count on it."

At least now we know the Beckham matter was not his fault. He could be solely be responsible of the Ronaldo matter. Many blamed him for letting the talent go but I see no reason to keep Ronaldo. In fact, I wish he would go long ago because whenever he is in the field, he is like Raul, the club is playing with a player less. Lazy, not interested to chase the ball or help the team in defence when required. As for Schuster, he keeps asking for a player in a new position for every defeat he faces. I wonder what excuses he will give when all 11 positions are bought according to his demands. For me, he is totally clueless what they club really needs and I am fearing for the worst to come. Four years of suffering was a memorable painful experience. I cannot guess how long will this cycle last.

Whatever it will be, I really wish Capello the best in what he is doing and thank him for the great matches we missed for four years. Although it is a short spell, he is definitely incredible to be able to bring the spirit back and unite the club to win the league. Capello the Great! Let the nightmare begin in Madrid now!

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home