MADRID (dpa) – The electronic scoreboard at Bernabeu Stadium looks like a gargantuan advent calendar, counting down the days to the big jubilee. And Wednesday will see the zero that means party time.
Real Madrid will be exactly 100 years old, and to celebrate, the Spanish capital’s “royal” footballers will (they hope) add their first silver of the new century by beating Deportivo la Coruna in the Spanish Cup final, taking the trophy for the 18th time.The club truly is the most successful in the world. Football’s governing body FIFA has declared it “the best club in the 20th Century” – an easily-defined accolade given its sporting riches.It has won the European Champions Cup eight times, the UEFA Cup twice, the Spanish championship 28 times, the knock-out cup 17 times and the world club champions cup twice. The only trophy it has never won is the Cupwinners Cup – a competition now defunct.The superlatives have come thick and fast as the club revels in its success with commemorative medallions, special stamps and a specially-composed anthem.The celebrations will last not a day, not a week, not a month but a year. Next December football worldwide will come to a standstill for a day in honour of Real Madrid.Just when the club was born is not exactly clear. What is clear, though, is that the club’s founders held their first board meeting on March 6, so that’s the date being used for the centennial.The Madrid Football Club, as it was first known, was first entered into the register of clubs on 18 April 1902, and the first official match was played in May 1902 on a field next to Madrid’s bullring.Fittingly, the match was against the team who would become arch- rivals down the years – FC Barcelona. It was the visitors who won, by three goals to one.The club did not get its “Real” (royal) title until June 1920, courtesy of then monarch King Alfonso XIII. But there’s on thing about all this early history that they’re not trumpeting today.Real, as “La Vanguardia” newspaper recently told its readers, has a rather dirty little secret. It founders, two brothers, came from, er, Barcelona.Juan and Carlos Padros, the first two club presidents, had a fashion business in Madrid. It was this which also served as the club’s first base.As the celebrations go ahead, Real will prefer to recall the grand contribution to their history made by two other men – Santiago Bernabeu and Alfredo di Stefano.Bernabeu began as a striker with the club, went on to become coach and then, from 1943 to his death in 1978, was club president.He helped Real establish itself at its present stadium in Madrid’s Chamartin district, and was a co-founder of the Spanish league, the national cup competition and the European Cup.Di Stefano, Argentinian-born, turned the side into the best in the world. The “Saeta Rubia” (blond arrow) was a striker with the legendary team that won the European Cup five times in a row between 1956 and 1960, scoring in all finals.The 1960 final, in which Real beat German side Eintracht Frankfurt 7-3, went into history as one of the greatest games ever. Today, Di Stefano is the club’s honorary president.It was not he, though, who won most titles with the club, but Francisco Gento, the legendary left-winger of the 1950s and 1960s. The “Gelerna del Cantabrico” (Cantabrico North Wind”) won six European Cups and 12 national titles in his 18-year career.Madrid fans regard it as their right to win titles with spectacular football using the world’s best players – latest of which are French and Portuguese midfield artists Zinendine Zidane and Luis Figo, acquired by new club boss Florentino Perez.In Perez, though, opponents see confirmation that since the era of the Franco dictatorship (1939-1975) Real has always been the “government club”.Building developer Perez is close to the conservative People’s Party of Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar – himself a self-confessed ardent fan.
