Real Madrid C.F.

"Real Madrid" redirects here. For the basketball team, see Real Madrid Baloncesto. For
the football club in South Africa, see Real Madrid (South Africa). For other uses,
see Real Madrid (disambiguation).

Real Madrid Club de Ftbol (Spanish pronunciation: ; Royal Madrid Football Club),
commonly known as Real Madrid, or simply as Real, is a professional football club
based in Madrid, Spain.
Founded in 1902 as Madrid Football Club, the team has traditionally worn a white
home kit since. The word Real is Spanish for Royal and was bestowed to the club
by King Alfonso XIII in 1920 together with the royal crown in the emblem. The team
has played its home matches in the 81,044-capacity Santiago Bernabu Stadium in
downtown Madrid since 1947. Unlike most European football clubs, Real Madrid's
members (socios) have owned and operated the club since its inception.
The club is the most valuable sports team in the world, worth 2.5 billion ($3.4 billion)
and the world's highest-earning football club for 2013-14, with an annual revenue of
549.5 million. The club is one of the most widely supported teams in the world. Real
Madrid is one of three founding members of the Primera Divisin that have never been
relegated from the top division, along with Athletic Bilbao and Barcelona. The club
holds many long-standing rivalries, most notably El Clsico with Barcelona and the El
Derbi madrileo with Atltico Madrid.
Real Madrid established itself as a major force in both Spanish and European football
during the 1950s. The club won five consecutive European Cups, and reached the final
seven times. This success was replicated in the league, where the club won five times in
the space of seven years. This team, which consisted of players such as Di
Stfano, Ferenc Pusks, Gento, Raymond Kopa, and Santamara, is considered by some
in the sport to be the greatest team of all time.
In domestic football, the club has won a record 32 La Liga titles, 19 Copa del Rey,
9 Supercopa de Espaa, 1 Copa Eva Duarte, and 1 Copa de la Liga. In international
football, the club has won a record 10 European Cup/UEFA Champions League titles
and a joint record 3 Intercontinental Cups, as well as 2 UEFA Cups, 2 UEFA Super
Cups and a FIFA Club World Cup.
Real Madrid was recognised as the FIFA Club of the 20th Century on 23 December
2000, and named Best European Club of the 20th Century by the IFFHS on 11 May
2010. The club received the FIFA Centennial Order of Merit in 2004. The club is ranked
first in the latest IFFHS Club World Ranking, setting a new ranking-points record. The
club also leads the current UEFA club rankings.

History
Real Madrid's origins go back to when football was introduced to Madrid by the
academics and students of the Institucin Libre de Enseanza, which included
several Cambridge and Oxford University graduates. They founded Football Club
Sky in 1897, playing on Sunday mornings at Moncloa. It split into two clubs in
1900: New Foot-Ball de Madrid and Madrid Football Club. On 6 March 1902, after a
new Board presided by Juan Padrs had been elected, Madrid Football Club was
officially founded. Three years after its foundation, in 1905, Madrid FC won its first
title after defeating Athletic Bilbao in the Spanish Cup final. The club became one of
the founding sides of the Royal Spanish Football Federation on 4 January 1909, when
club president Adolfo Melndez signed the foundation agreement of the Spanish FA.
After moving between grounds the team moved to the Campo de O'Donnell in 1912. In
1920, the club's name was changed to Real Madrid after King Alfonso XIII granted the
title of Real (Royal) to the club.
In 1929, the first Spanish football league was founded. Real Madrid led the first league
season until the last match, a loss to Athletic Bilbao, meant they finished runners-up to
Barcelona. Real Madrid won its first League title in the 193132 season. Real won the
League again the following year, becoming the first side to have won the championship
twice.
On 14 April 1931, the arrival of the Second Spanish Republic caused the club to lose the
title Real and went back to being named Madrid Football Club. Football continued
during the Second World War, and on 13 June 1943 Madrid beat Barcelona 111 in the
second leg of a semi-final of the Copa del Generalsimo, the Copa del Rey having been
renamed in honour of General Franco. It has been suggested that Barcelona players
were intimidated by police, including by the director of state security who "allegedly
told the team that some of them were only playing because of the regime's generosity in
permitting them to remain in the country." The Barcelona chairman, Enric Pieyro, was
assaulted by Madrid fans. However, none of these allegations have been proven and
FIFA and UEFA still consider the result as legitimate. According to Spanish journalist
and writer, Juan Carlos Pasamontes, Barcelona player Josep Valle denied that the
Spanish security forces came before the match. Instead, at the end of the first half,
Barcelona coach Juan Jos Nogus and all of his players were angry with the hard-style
of play Real Madrid was using and with the aggressiveness of the home crowd. When
they refused to take the field, the Superior Chief of Police of Madrid appeared,
identified himself, and ordered the team to take the field.

Santiago Bernabu Yeste and European success

(194578)
Santiago Bernabu Yeste became president of Real Madrid in 1945. Under his
presidency, the club, its stadium Santiago Bernabu and its training facilities Ciudad
Deportiva were rebuilt after the Spanish Civil War damages. Additionally, during the
1950s former Real Madrid Amateurs player Miguel Malbo founded Real Madrid's youth
academy, or "cantera", known today as La Fbrica. Beginning in 1953, he embarked
upon a strategy of signing world-class players from abroad, the most prominent of them
being Alfredo Di Stfano.
In 1955, acting upon the idea proposed by the French sports journalist and editor
of L'quipe Gabriel Hanot, Bernabu, Bedrignan and Gusztv Sebes created an
exhibition tournament of invited teams from around Europe that would eventually
become what today is known as the UEFA Champions League. It was under Bernabu's
guidance that Real Madrid established itself as a major force in both Spanish and
European football. The club won the European Cup five times in a row between 1956
and 1960, which included the 73 Hampden Park final against Eintracht
Frankfurt in 1960. After these five consecutive successes, Real was permanently
awarded the original cup and earning the right to wear the UEFA badge of honour.
The club won the European Cup for a sixth time in 1966 defeating Partizan Belgrade 2
1 in the final with a team composed entirely of same nationality players, a first in the
competition. This team became known as the Y-y. The name "Ye-y" came from the
"Yeah, yeah, yeah" chorus in The Beatles' song "She Loves You" after four members of
the team posed for Diario Marca dressed in Beatles wigs. The Ye-y generation was
also European Cup runner-up in 1962 and 1964.
In the 1970s, Real Madrid won five league championships and three Spanish Cups. The
club played its first UEFA Cup Winners' Cup final in 1971 and lost to English
side Chelsea 21. On 2 July 1978, club president Santiago Bernabu died while
the World Cup was being played in Argentina. The International Federation of
Association Football (FIFA) decreed three days of mourning to honour him during the
tournament. The following year, the club organized the first edition of the Trofeo
Santiago Bernabu in the memory of its former president.

Quinta del Buitre and seventh European Cup

(19802000)
By the early 1980s, Real Madrid had lost its grasp on the La Liga title until a new batch
of home-grown stars brought domestic success back to the club. Spanish sport journalist
Julio Csar Iglesias gave to this generation the name La Quinta del Buitre ("Vulture's
Cohort"), which was derived from the nickname given to one of its members, Emilio
Butragueo. The other four members were Manuel Sanchs, Martn Vzquez,
Mchel and Miguel Pardeza; all five footballers were graduates of Real Madrid's youth
academy. With La Quinta del Buitre (reduced to four members when Pardeza left the
club for Zaragoza in 1986) and notable players like goalkeeper Francisco Buyo, rightback Miguel Porln Chendo and Mexican striker Hugo Snchez, Real Madrid had one
of the best teams in Spain and Europe during the second half of the 1980s, winning two
UEFA Cups, five Spanish championships in a row, one Spanish cup and three Spanish
Super Cups. In the early 1990s, La Quinta del Buitre split up after Martn Vzquez,
Emilio Butragueo and Mchel left the club.
In 1996, President Lorenzo Sanz appointed Fabio Capello as coach. Although his tenure
lasted only one season, Real Madrid was proclaimed league champion and players
like Roberto Carlos, Predrag Mijatovi, Davor uker and Clarence Seedorf arrived at
the club to strengthen a squad that already boasted the likes of Ral, Fernando
Hierro, Ivn Zamorano, and Fernando Redondo. As a result, Real Madrid (with the
addition of Fernando Morientes in 1997) finally ended its 32-year wait for its seventh
European Cup: in 1998, under manager Jupp Heynckes, they defeated Juventus 10 in
the final with a goal from Predrag Mijatovi.

Los Galcticos (20002006)

In July 2000, Florentino Prez was elected club president. He vowed in his campaign to
erase the club's 270 million debt and modernize the club's facilities. However, the
primary electoral promise that propelled Prez to victory was the signing of Lus
Figo from arch-rivals Barcelona. The following year, the club got its training ground
rezoned and used the money to begin assembling the famous Galcticos side including
players such as Zindine Zidane, Ronaldo, Lus Figo, Roberto Carlos, Ral, Fabio
Cannavaro and David Beckham. It is debatable whether the gamble paid off, as despite
winning the UEFA Champions League and an Intercontinental Cup in 2002, followed
by the League in 2003, the club failed to win a major trophy for the next three seasons.
The few days after the capturing of the 2003 league title were surrounded with
controversy. The first controversial decision came when Prez sacked winning coach
Vicente del Bosque. Over a dozen players left the club, including Madrid captain
Fernando Hierro, while defensive midfielder Claude Makll refused to take part in
training in protest at being one of the lowest-paid players at the club and subsequently
moved to Chelsea. "That's a lot [of players leaving] when the normal rule is: never
change a winning team", stated Zidane. Real Madrid, with newly appointed
coach Carlos Queiroz, started their domestic league slowly after a hard win over Real
Betis.

The 200506 season began with the promise of several new signings: Julio
Baptista (24
million), Robinho (30
million)
and Sergio
Ramos (27
million). However, Real Madrid suffered from some poor results, including a 03 loss at
the hands of Barcelona in the Santiago Bernabu in November 2005. Madrid's
coach Wanderley Luxemburgo was sacked the following month and his replacement
was Juan Ramn Lpez Caro. A brief return to form came to an abrupt halt after losing
the first leg of the Copa del Rey quarterfinal, 61 to Real Zaragoza. Shortly after, Real
Madrid were eliminated from the Champions League for a fourth successive year, this
time at the hands of Arsenal. On 27 February 2006, Florentino Prez resigned.

New president Ramn Caldern (20062009)

Ramn Caldern was elected as club president on 2 July 2006 and subsequently
appointed Fabio Capello as the new coach and Predrag Mijatovi as the new sporting
director. Real Madrid won the La Liga title in 2007 for the first time in four years but
Capello was sacked. On 9 June 2007, Real played against Zaragoza at La Romareda.
Zaragoza led Real 21 near the end of the match while Barcelona were also winning
against Espanyol 21. A late Ruud van Nistelrooy equalizer followed by a lastminute Ral Tamudo goal sprang Real Madrid's title hopes back into their favour.
The title was won on 17 June, Real faced Mallorca at the Bernabu,
while Barcelona and Sevilla, the other title challengers, faced Gimnstic de
Tarragona and Villarreal respectively. At half time Real were 01 down, while
Barcelona had surged ahead into a 03 lead in Tarragona; however, three goals in the
last half-an-hour secured Real Madrid a 31 win and their first league title since
2003. The first goal came from Reyes who scored after a good work from Higuan. An
own goal followed by another goal from Reyes allowed Real to begin celebrating the
title. Thousands of Real Madrid fans began going to Plaza de Cibeles to celebrate the
title.

Second Prez term and the Mourinho era (2009

13)
On 1 June 2009, Florentino Prez regained Real Madrid's presidency. Prez continued
with the Galcticos policy pursued in his first term, buying Kak from Milan for a
record-breaking sum of 56 million, and then breaking the record again by
purchasing Cristiano Ronaldo from Manchester United for 80 million.
Jos Mourinho took over as manager in May 2010. In April 2011, a strange occurrence
happened when, for the first time ever, four Clsicos were to be played in a span of
eighteen days. The first fixture was for the Liga campaign on 17 April (which ended 11
with penalty goals for both sides), the Copa del Rey final (which ended 10 to Madrid),
and the controversial two-legged Champions League semifinal on 27 April and 2 May
(31 loss on aggregate) to Barcelona.

In the 201112 La Liga season, Real Madrid won the league, a record 32nd time in La
Liga history and finished the season with a number of records including 100 points in a
single season, a record 121 goals scored & goal difference of +89, and a record 16 away
wins and 32 overall wins. In the same season, Cristiano Ronaldo become the fastest
player to reach 100 goals in Spanish league history. In reaching 101 goals in 92 games,
Ronaldo surpassed Real Madrid legend Ferenc Pusks, who scored 100 goals in 105
games. Ronaldo set a new club mark for individual goals scored in one year (60), and
became the first player ever to score against all 19 opposition teams in a single season.
Real Madrid began the 201213 season by winning the Supercopa de Espaa, defeating
Barcelona on away goals, but finished as second in the league competition. A major
transfer of the season was signing from Tottenham Hotspur of Luka Modri, for a fee in
the region of 33 million. In the Champions League, they were drawn in the "group of
death" with Borussia Dortmund, Manchester City and Ajax, finishing second with ten
points behind Dortmund. In the 16 round they defeated Manchester
United, Galatasaray in the quarter finals, and reached their third straight semifinal finish
in the Champions League, when they were again stopped by Dortmund. After a
disappointing extra time loss to Atltico Madrid in the 2013 Copa del Rey final (which
broke a 14-year skid for Atleti), Florentino Perez announced the departure of Mourinho
at the end of the season by "mutual agreement". Mourinho returned to the English
Premier League with Chelsea, a team he managed from 2004 to 2007.

Ancelotti and La Dcima (20132015)

On 25 June 2013, Carlo Ancelotti succeeded Mourinho to become the manager of Real
Madrid on a three-year deal. A day later, he was introduced at his first press conference
for Madrid where it was announced that both Zinedine Zidane and Paul Clement will be
his assistants. On 1 September 2013, the long-awaited transfer fromSpurs of Gareth
Bale was announced. The transfer of the Welshman was reportedly the new world
record signing, with the transfer price expected to be around 100 million. In Ancelotti's
first season at the club, Real Madrid won the Copa del Rey, with Bale scoring the
winner in the final against Barcelona. On 24 May, Real Madrid defeated city
rivals Atltico Madrid in the 2014 UEFA Champions League Final, winning their first
European title since 2002, and they became the first team to win ten European Cups, an
achievement known as "La Dcima".
After winning the 2014 UEFA Champions League, Real Madrid signed
goalkeeper Keylor Navas, midfielder Toni Kroos and attacking midfielder James
Rodrguez during the summer of 2014. The club won the 2014 UEFA Super
Cup against Sevilla with two goals by Cristiano Ronaldo, the club's 79th official
trophy. During the last week of the transfer week, Real Madrid sold Xabi Alonso to FC
Bayern Munich and ngel Di Mara completed his move to Manchester United F.C. for
a British record fee of 75m (59.7m), two key players in last season's Champions
League success. This decision from the club was surrounded by controversy with
Ronaldo stating "If I was in charge, maybe I would have done things differently", while
Ancelotti admitted "We must start again from zero."
After a slow start to the 20142015 La Liga season, which included defeats to Atltico
Madrid and Real Sociedad, Real Madrid went on a record breaking winning streak,

which included wins against FC Barcelona and Liverpool F.C., surpassing the previous
Spanish record of 18 successive wins set by Frank Rijkaard's FC Barcelona in the 2005
2006 season. In December 2014, the club extended their winning streak to 22 games
with a 20 win over San Lorenzo in the 2014 FIFA Club World Cup Final, thus ending
the year with 4 trophies. Their 22-game winning streak ended in their opening game of
2015 with a loss to Valencia, leaving the club two short of equalling the world record of
24 consecutive wins. The club failed to retain the Champions League (losing 32 on
aggregate vs Juventus in the semi-finals) and also the Copa del Rey (42 aggregate loss
to Atletico) - further disappointment in failing to land the league title (finishing two
points and a place behind champions Barcelona) preceded Ancelotti's sacking on 25
May 2015.

Crest and colours

Emblem
The first crest had a simple design consisting of a decorative interlacing of the three
initials of the club, "MCF" for Madrid Club de Ftbol, in dark blue on a white shirt. The
first change in the crest occurred in 1908 when the letters adopted a more streamlined
form and appeared inside a circle. The next change in the configuration of the crest did
not occur until the presidency of Pedro Parages in 1920. At that time, King Alfonso
XIII granted the club his royal patronage which came in the form of the title "Real
Madrid", meaning "Royal". Thus, Alfonso's crown was added to the crest and the club
styled itself Real Madrid Club de Ftbol.
With the dissolution of the monarchy in 1931, all the royal symbols (the crown on the
crest and the title of Real) were eliminated. The crown was replaced by the dark
mulberry band of the Region of Castile. In 1941, two years after the end of the Civil
War, the crest's "Real Corona", or "Royal Crown", was restored while the mulberry
stripe of Castile was retained as well. In addition, the whole crest was made full color,
with gold being the most prominent, and the club was again called Real Madrid Club de
Ftbol. The most recent modification to the crest occurred in 2001 when the club
wanted to better situate itself for the 21st century and further standardize its crest. One
of the modifications made was changing the mulberry stripe to a more bluish shade.
Home kit
Real Madrid's traditional home colours are all white, although before its foundation in
the club first game against themselves they adopted a blue and a red oblique stripe on
the shirt to differentiate the two teams (the club crest design has a purple stripe which
isn't associated to this. It was incorporated the year they lost the royal crown, as it the
traditional region of Castile colour); but unlike today, black socks were worn. Lastly, the
black socks will be replaced by dark blue ones. Real Madrid has maintained the white
shirt for its home kit throughout the history of the club. There was however one season
that the shirt and shorts were not both white. It was an initiative undertaken by Escobal
and Quesada in 1925, the two were traveling through England when they noticed the kit
worn by London-based team Corinthian F.C., one of the most famous teams at the time
known for its elegance and sportsmanship. It was decided that Real Madrid would wear
black shorts in an attempt to look like the English team but the initiative lasted only one

year. After being eliminated from the cup by Barcelona with a 15 defeat in Madrid and
a 20 defeat in Catalonia, President Parages decided to return to an all-white kit
claiming that the other brought bad luck. Years later,Leeds United switched their blue
shirt for a white one after marveling at Real Madrid's 73 Victory against Eintracht
Frankfurt in Glasgow's Hampden Park. By the early 1940s, the manager changed the kit
again by adding buttons to the shirt and the club's crest on the left breast (which has
remained ever since). On 23 November 1947, in a game against Atltico Madrid at
the Metropolitano Stadium, Real Madrid became the first Spanish team to wear
numbered shirts.
Real's traditional away colours are all blue or all purple. Since the advent of the replica
kit market, the club has also released various other one colour designs, including red,
green, orange and black. The club's kit is manufactured by Adidas whose contract
extends from 1998. Real Madrid's first shirt sponsor, Zanussi, agreed for the 198283,
198384 and 198485 seasons. Following that, the club was sponsored by Parmalat and
Otaysa before a long-term deal was signed with Teka in 1992. In 2001, Real Madrid
ended their contract with Teka and for one season used the Realmadrid.com logo to
promote the club's website. Then, in 2002, a deal was signed with Siemens Mobile and
in 2006, the BenQ Siemens logo appeared on the club's shirt. Real Madrid's shirt
sponsor from 2007 until 2013 was bwin.com following the economic problems of BenQ
Siemens. It is currently Fly Emirates.