Manchester City midfielder Rodri’s surprise appearance on the front cover of Spanish paper AS on Wednesday might have produced a feeling of deja vu for those who have followed Real Madrid’s transfer dealings in recent decades.
The story inside said Rodri, 28, had become “an almost priority objective” for the Madrid hierarchy, as they have already begun to think about “strengthening their project” for the 2025-26 season.
📰 ¡Ya está aquí la #portadAS del miércoles, 4 de septiembre!
🇪🇸 ¡Rodrigo 2025!🔗 https://t.co/h2WhUuFsoU pic.twitter.com/xoO2QSlTKY
— Diario AS (@diarioas) September 3, 2024
The tone echoes the public recruitment process the Spanish club honed in signing players including Nicolas Anelka, Ronaldo, David Beckham, Cristiano Ronaldo, Luka Modric, Gareth Bale and Eden Hazard, through to Jude Bellingham and Kylian Mbappe in the past two summer windows.
If this does turn out to be the start of another public pursuit of a high-profile player, then history tells us how it is likely to play out.
It begins far in advance of any deal ever being done — just after the previous summer’s transfer window has closed, say — with a big cover splash in AS, or its competitor Marca, loudly announcing Madrid’s interest.
There is analysis of how the player would fit within the current squad, some possibly true details about their deep connection to the Santiago Bernabeu, unsubstantiated suggestions they may be unsettled at their current club, and an unspoken assumption that Madrid are the greatest club in the world so any player would jump at the chance of joining them.
Mbappe’s presentation came after a decade-long pursuit of the Frenchman (Jose Hernandez/Anadolu via Getty Images)
It would be no surprise for Madrid head coach Carlo Ancelotti to be asked about Rodri at an upcoming press conference.
Ancelotti could then raise his famous eyebrow and say that he admires him as a player, but he does not like to talk about players under contract at other clubs, and is very happy with the midfield options he currently has (even if none of Federico Valverde, Eduardo Camavinga, Aurelien Tchouameni and Bellingham have yet to show they can provide the team with the now retired Toni Kroos’ range of skills from deep midfield).
Rodri’s Spain colleague Dani Carvajal could also be asked what he thought of the midfielder linking up with him at club level while on international duty. Carvajal would be unlikely to follow an old example from Madrid’s Clasico rivals Barcelona, when Gerard Pique and Carles Puyol forced then-Arsenal midfielder Cesc Fabregas to wear a Barca jersey during Spain’s 2010 World Cup victory celebrations (Fabregas joined Barca a year later). But even a bland answer about a potential future Madrid team-mate can keep the momentum going in the Spanish media, feeding fans the idea that Rodri is already on the way to being one of theirs.
There is always a risk that the media speculation can upset the current clubs of reported Madrid targets — regardless of whether it is being directed by the Bernabeu hierarchy. In 2003, Manchester United chief executive Peter Kenyon was annoyed by constant speculation regarding Madrid’s interest in Beckham. That April, Madrid president Florentino Perez publicly denied any intention of signing the United and England midfielder. Less than three months later, Beckham was unveiled at the Bernabeu.
When Madrid first went for another Old Trafford hero, Cristiano Ronaldo, in 2008, it was United manager Sir Alex Ferguson who was most angered. That was during Ramon Calderon’s time as club president, but the playbook was not really different.
Cristiano Ronaldo’s signing caused friction with United (Salvador Rodriguez/AFP via Getty Images)
After Ronaldo said publicly he wanted to join Madrid, United officially claimed to FIFA, world football’s governing body, that an illegal approach had been made (FIFA declined to take any action). Even after the Portuguese was persuaded to stay that summer, Ferguson remained livid, believing defender Gabriel Heinze, who had joined Madrid from United in summer 2007, was constantly calling Ronaldo to persuade him to move to the Bernabeu.
“What made it really obscene was that Madrid, as General Franco’s club, had a history of being able to get whoever and whatever they wanted before democracy came to Spain,” Ferguson told the BBC in October 2008, referring to the Spanish dictator. Marca reacted with a series of pictures showing Ferguson’s face morphing into Franco’s, and quoted Calderon as saying: “I admire (Ferguson’s) history, but recently he has gone a bit senile.”
The following July, a clearly overjoyed Ronaldo was presented at the Bernabeu as Madrid’s new world-record signing.
Summer 2012 was full of media speculation about Madrid’s interest in Modric, who was then at Tottenham Hotspur. The Croatian midfielder had already decided he wanted to join the Spanish side, and flat-out refused to go on Spurs’ pre-season trip to the United States. Modric says in his official autobiography that he “took the plane ticket to LA and tore it up”. A few weeks later, he was the one at Madrid’s stadium to receive the acclaim of his new team’s supporters.
The following summer featured another months-long saga involving Tottenham, with Bale now the player featuring on Marca and AS covers. This time, the negotiations were even tougher, and all the excitement in the Spanish press arguably worked against Perez. Spurs chairman Daniel Levy was able to squeeze a world-record €101million ($112m; £85m at current exchange rates) fee out of Madrid right at the end of the window, which led to an uneasy relationship right from the start, as Ronaldo did not like losing the ‘world’s most expensive player’ tag.
European competition can add extra spice to these long-running transfer sagas. Rodri’s former City team-mate Raheem Sterling and Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah have both featured regularly on Marca and AS covers in recent years, often around the time when their team were playing Madrid in the Champions League.
But when a player or his camp are the ones pushing the idea of Madrid’s interest, a transfer is generally less likely to happen. Mbappe’s case was especially notable. Years of Spanish media reports ensured that Perez’s ‘obsession’ with signing the Frenchman was well-known to all Madrid fans. That led to surreal situations such as when Madrid fans cheered Mbappe when he arrived to play for Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) against Madrid in a November 2019 Champions League tie.
In August 2021, PSG’s then sporting director Leonardo reacted angrily when reports emerged that Madrid had bid €160million for Mbappe late in that summer window. “From two years ago, Madrid have not behaved correctly towards us, contacting his camp — unacceptable, not correct illegal,” Leonardo told French media outlet RMC Sport.
Even Mbappe renewing his contract at PSG in 2022 did not stop the rumours that Madrid were still talking to the player’s camp about him joining them when that deal ended. Just last November, Madrid released a statement saying reports they were negotiating with Mbappe or his entourage were “completely false”. In February, PSG announced the player would be leaving them this summer. The open secret that he was joining Madrid on a free transfer was confirmed in May.
Bellingham’s situation was slightly different in that many Spanish press reports about the Englishmen when he was at Borussia Dortmund often mentioned how Madrid could not afford to pay as much as other suitors Manchester City or Liverpool, either in transfer fee or wages. But it all worked out: Bellingham decided he wanted to join Madrid and Dortmund accepted a fee below their initial €150million asking price.
Madrid have assembled a squad full of young talent in recent years (Diego Souto/Getty Images)
Madrid’s transfer focus has widened in recent years from the ‘Galactico’ approach of Perez’s first presidency, with emerging global talents from Valverde, Vinicius Junior, Rodrygo, Camavinga, Tchouameni and Bellingham all identified early and Spanish-Brazilian chief scout Juni Calafat important to the process.
Another new Brazilian starlet in Endrick just arrived this summer — but was already a household name for Madrid fans after appearing on many AS and Marca covers even before his €47.5m transfer was agreed when he was 16 in December 2022.
The end point of the whole process is that big Bernabeu presentation, where a heaving stadium is packed with excited fans eager for a first glimpse of their new hero in a Madrid shirt. The players themselves, whether established stars like Beckham, Ronaldo or Mbappe, or teenagers like Vinicius Jr or Endrick, are sometimes overcome by the reaction they receive.
It is still way too early to say whether Wednesday’s AS cover is actually the first step of a push to bring Rodri to Madrid and the club are unlikely to show their hand early. We also do not yet know whether the City midfielder himself is open to the idea. But history suggests that if this is the start of a public process, then plenty more prompts will follow.
(Top photo by Marvin Ibo Guengoer – GES Sportfoto/Getty Images)
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