Greatest Real Madrid XI, Manager and President in 120 years

Voters choice: The Greatest Real Madrid XI, Manager and President in 120 years

A look at the Greatest Real Madrid XI, Manager and President in 120 years

ABC readers, through various polls, selected the best Real Madrid president, coach, and players on the club’s anniversary.

The eleven chosen by ABC readers have a strange coherence, not so common in this type of survey, representative of the different eras of the club and its characteristic way of being and playing. 

Despite the usual preference for the most recent players and their achievements, the fans recognizes the team that won five European Cups in the mythological figures of Di Stéfano and Puskas, as well as Miguel Muoz, coach at the time.

The second glorious phase in the history of Real Madrid, citing the team that won the Champions League from 2013 to 2018, have strong player figures like Cristiano, Modric, and Ramos. Despite the natural tendency of forgetfulness, there is a certain balance between these eras.

Recognizing both generations there is a balance in the voting .Casillas, Roberto Carlos, Zidane, Raul are intertwined with Puskas, Fernando Redondo, and among all of them there is a generational identity. 

They are in the memory of the fans, linked to the feats of the Champions League at the end of the 90s and the beginning of the 21st century. Casillas and Zidane are the heroes of Glasgow; Raul scored in two finals; Redondo gave him that pass at Old Trafford, after an unforgettable backheel; and Roberto Carlos participated in all three European Cups.

What do these players have in common, straddling one century and another? They participated to varying degrees in the Seventh (1998), the Eighth (2000), and the Ninth (2002), three European Cups in just five years.

Although the Madrid of those years was not hegemonic, the players of the nineties were close enough to be remembered and far enough to be remembered with nostalgia, and perhaps that is why they are the ones with the most presence in the eleven: five, if we add Round. More than Cristiano’s Madrid and more than Di Stéfano’s.

There is a curiosity. Iker Casillas is the only player who has been in two of those victorious cycles. He reached the final in Lisbon, against Atlético de Madrid. Zidane was also in two stages, but in the second as a coach. This peculiarity of Casillas was typical of Paco Gento, winner in the fifties and with the yeyés, but the sixth European Cup does not appear in the eleven, and the Pirri, Amancio, and Velázquez remain as a “lost generation” in relative oblivion.

All those chosen made history in Madrid because they won the European Cup, with the exception Camacho. If the sixties are scarcely represented in the eleven, Camacho encapsulates the seventies and eighties (he was signed in 1973 and retired in 1989).Camacho’s figure focuses on the forgotten Madrid, that of the low cycle, the minor decades, and national triumph (the bread of the Leagues), and his football represents struggle and caste.He was the guardian of essences, a transmitter of non-spectacular, non-galactic values, which were the flag of Madrid.

There is the foreign figures, and in this sense, the resulting eleven resembles Florentino’s “model,” he agrees: academy, great Spanish players, and Ballon d’Or.

The eleven is a compendium of technique in its highest degree and of character in reference to captaincy.

Camacho, Hierro, Raul, and Ramos, almost forty years of captaincy transmitted from one to another.

Voters still recognize, above all things, the patriarchal figure of Bernabéu, “The Father of Real Madri”, with 58% of the vote, although Florentino Pérez also has 35%.

No other coach to lead the team than Miguel Muoz,: the ex-soccer player, connoisseur of the house, conciliatory, gentlemanly, with more common sense than scientism and systematization followed by Del Bosque and Zidane.

Iker Casillas, the top representative of a type of great, traditional goalkeeper, received most votes to be the goalkeeper.

Of the four defenders, three had tremendous offensive qualities. Both Hierro and Ramos are among the highest-scoring central defenders in the history of football, and Roberto Carlos scored 69 goals for Madrid.

There is the Ballons d’Or representatives in the midfield: Zidane and Modric with class and elegance encompassing magic moments.

The forwards represents the top scorers in the history of the club.Di Stéfano was the obsessive winner in the fifties, Ronaldo, in his egotistical way, in the 21st century, and Raul “pulled the strings” in the 90s.

This eleven summarizes the history, style, and values of Madrid.