This is the latest instalment of a series re-assessing the most famous individual performances of the modern era.
Some will be legendary displays by established world-class players, others will be once-in-a-lifetime cameos that have nevertheless gone down in history.
It’s easy to look back upon historic displays through rose-tinted spectacles, or to revise our memories of particular performances based upon what came afterwards. So a second look at these games can be revealing.
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Going under the microscope this week is Ronaldinho’s performance for Barcelona against Real Madrid in November 2005.
Why this performance?
This is the standout display from Ronaldinho’s glorious spell as the world’s greatest footballer during the middle of the 2000s.
Chiefly, it’s remembered for the standing ovation he received after scoring his second goal, 15 minutes from full-time, to make it 3-0 to Barcelona — supposedly only the second Barcelona player to earn that honour at the Bernabeu, after Diego Maradona.
You can see the goals on YouTube, but the nature of Ronaldinho’s all-round display has probably been forgotten. Were Real Madrid supporters applauding two isolated moments of magic, or were those goals merely the icing on the cake of a legendary performance?
What was the context?
Barcelona travelled to the Bernabeu in mid-November one point ahead of Real Madrid in the league, although the sides were only second and third, with Osasuna — yes, you read that correctly — setting the early pace.
But the wider context here is more important. During this period, although Real Madrid and Barcelona were the biggest clubs in Spain and generally the title favourites, they weren’t as dominant as they have become in recent years. Both were even slightly shambolic at times, with a revolving-door approach to managers and a player recruitment policy based around presidential election promises.
That’s particularly key here. This was Real Madrid’s famous — perhaps infamous — Galacticos period, where president Florentino Perez signed one superstar every summer. It was Luis Figo in 2000, Zinedine Zidane in 2001, Ronaldo in 2002, David Beckham in 2003 and Michael Owen in 2004. Of those five, only Beckham hadn’t won the Ballon d’Or.
The (future) Ballon d’Or winner they missed out on was Ronaldinho. In the summer of 2003, the Brazilian was set to leave Paris Saint-Germain and there were three potential destinations: Barcelona, Real Madrid and Manchester United. Also on the move that summer was Beckham, for whom Barcelona had an offer accepted, although Beckham was determined to move to Real Madrid instead, partly because Barcelona weren’t in the Champions League at the time.
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To cut a long story short, if Beckham had gone to the Nou Camp, it might have meant Ronaldinho going to Old Trafford. Alternatively, it might have meant Ronaldinho going to Real Madrid. And then there’s Cristiano Ronaldo to consider — he ended up joining Manchester United in that same window, but Real Madrid and Barcelona had been sniffing around the Sporting Lisbon youngster, too.
For years, there was a suggestion that Real Madrid had turned down the prospect of signing Ronaldinho because he was “too ugly” and therefore not marketable enough — which seemingly started with a quote from an anonymous club dignitary and has probably gathered too much attention. But it tallied with the feeling that Real Madrid’s obsession with stars had spiralled out of control. Perez’s policy of “Zidanes y Pavones” — world record signings combined with kids promoted from the club’s youth system — created a top-heavy side who lacked tactical discipline, squad harmony and, perhaps most starkly, any sense of joy. For all the talk of Real Madrid being football’s Harlem Globetrotters, the players realised they were essentially political pawns. None of them enjoyed their peak years at the Bernabeu.
And then there is Ronaldinho, not only the world’s best footballer by a country mile at this stage, but also an entertainer, an artist and a comedian in one.
He starts this particular Clasico laughing and joking with international team-mate Ronaldo and then, a couple of minutes after kick-off, Ronaldinho is out on the left touchline and tries to trap a simple short pass from Deco, but the ball slides under his studs and out of play.
Ronaldinho simply laughs, looks down at the pitch in a manner that appears self-deprecating parody rather than a genuine accusation of culpability, and gets on with the game. It’s not simply that he’s so much better than Real Madrid’s attackers, it’s that he is enjoying his football, which helps us enjoy it too.
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Was he as good as we remember?
No. He was much better than that. With the exception of the aforementioned miscontrol, this is a truly incredible performance. Within 40 seconds, he’s spun away from Michel Salgado with a tremendous change of direction. This is going to be the most difficult night of Salgado’s career.
Ronaldinho gave Salgado, the Spain full-back, a torrid time that night (Photo: Javier Soriano/AFP via Getty Images)
Among dangerous dribbles and pretty passes, Ronaldinho also proceeds to stand up Salgado near the touchline, feinting to move away from goal before backheeling a pass in behind him for the onrushing Deco. Later, he receives a long pass and pops the ball over Salgado’s head, thinks about doing the same thing in the other direction, and then decides to charge towards goal instead.
When he gets the ball in behind Salgado, he does the same thing to a young Sergio Ramos. A long, diagonal Xavi pass sees Ronaldinho barely break stride because he’s confident enough to control the ball in mid-air with the outside of his right foot, slightly stretched out behind him, before fooling Ramos with a stepover which nearly causes the defender to fall over. Samuel Eto’o opens the scoring, incidentally, with a fine goal after a Lionel Messi dribble.
In contrast — and all this is crucial, given the coming standing ovation — the Galacticos are absolutely hopeless.
Up front, Ronaldo is no longer fit enough to lead the line, newcomer Robinho looks dangerous out wide but infuriates his team-mates with poor crosses. Raul manages to miscue a long-range effort so badly, having knocked the ball with his standing foot, that it causes him to limp off injured. In deeper positions, Beckham is searching for unnecessary 60-yard crossfield passes, Roberto Carlos is trying to get on the end of them but is constantly out of position, and Zidane is playing more like Francisco Pavon.
The other four outfielders should largely be spared from blame. Holding midfielder Pablo Garcia, a relative nobody among the world’s best players, is stranded on his own in front of the defence. Centre-back Ivan Helguera is miles short of the speed needed to cope, while Ramos is just 19, in his first Clasico two months after a move from Sevilla and can’t fill the gaps either side of him. Iker Casillas, as ever, alternates between making fine saves and looking mournful at the state of the defending in front of him.
Salgado is on a hiding to nothing. Having mercifully survived 45 minutes without getting booked, he manages to collect perhaps the stupidest yellow card in football history with 10 seconds of first-half stoppage time remaining. Ronaldinho picks up the ball to take a throw, and Salgado sticks out his foot and pretends to poke the ball out of his hands. He’s booked, and now can’t make a tackle.
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In fairness, that barely matters because Salgado spends the second half in such advanced zones he’s miles away from being able to tackle Ronaldinho anyway. He’s AWOL for Barcelona’s second goal, where Ronaldinho goes down the outside of Ramos — who dives in with his wrong foot — and then cuts inside Helguera with such a dramatic change of direction that the centre-back ends up several yards away from him, before firing past Casillas.
Salgado doesn’t learn his lesson. Shortly before Ronaldinho’s second and Barcelona’s third, he’s in the opposition box having a left-footed toe-poke at goal, and is so exhausted that he can’t even manage a jog back towards his right-back position.
What was his best moment?
In truth, Ronaldinho’s second was less impressive than his first; he starts from closer to goal and beats only one player, the beleaguered Ramos. But it’s the fact that he’s done almost exactly the same thing for the second time in 15 minutes, in the biggest game in European football, almost without needing to put in too much effort, that makes it so memorable.
The defining moment isn’t the goal, it’s the applause. Most-remembered for two elderly Madrilenos almost reluctantly clapping him, there’s a much wider ovation from a range of supporters, many of whom look genuinely thrilled at what they’ve just witnessed. Having been promised the world’s greatest stars by Perez over the past half-decade, the best performance any of these supporters have witnessed during that period has been provided by the one Real Madrid didn’t get.
Many of those fans, incidentally, have seen enough.
At 3-0, there’s a mass exodus from the Bernabeu.
What might we have forgotten?
Two things.
First, everyone remembers Ronaldinho’s two goals — and nobody will ever forget his dribbling and trickery on the run throughout his spell with Barcelona.
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But the quality of his passing is often overlooked. At 0-0, Ronaldinho receives the ball on the left flank, shapes to cut inside and then, while glancing across to the opposite flank, hits a wonderful, no-look reverse chip over the defence to Eto’o, who pokes a one-on-one chance wide of Casillas’ far post. It’s reminiscent of a pass he would later play for Ludovic Giuly, for the only goal in the 1-0 Champions League semi-final victory over AC Milan at the San Siro.
The weight and accuracy of Ronaldinho’s passing is superb, and if anything it’s the simple passes that demonstrate it best. In the first half, 30 yards from goal in an inside-left position, he plays a 10-yard ball to Deco that is brilliantly weighted. If it is any slower, Real’s holding midfielder Garcia would dart in and intercept it. If it’s any faster, Garcia would simply stand off and look to keep goal-side of Deco. But Ronaldinho plays it so perfectly that Garcia thinks he can intercept, can’t quite get there, and therefore Deco can take the ball in his path and has the space to shoot.
Everything about Ronaldinho’s basic game was impeccable — the way he flicks the ball with the outside of his boot to guide it into the path of the overlapping Giovanni van Bronckhorst, in particular, is an absolute delight.
Second, Ronaldinho’s level of physicality is particularly notable. Barcelona aren’t quite tiki-taka-ing their way through Real Madrid here — often they launch big diagonals towards their Brazilian star. Midway through the first half, he holds off Salgado, wins a free kick, and the right-back gestures to the referee that Ronaldinho had elbowed him in the face. Ten minutes later, from a similar pass, Ronaldinho does exactly the same thing to Ramos, and is cautioned. Opponents who were tempted to get nasty with Ronaldinho discovered that he was capable of matching them in that respect, too.
What happened next?
Ronaldinho won his only Ballon d’Or a couple of months later, and Barcelona won La Liga and the European Cup at the end of that campaign. Things went downhill after that, and Ronaldinho’s relatively brief period on top of the world is often unfavourably compared to the longevity of Messi and Ronaldo since. But it wasn’t a particularly different trajectory to other Ballon d’Or winners of that period — Kaka, Andriy Shevchenko and (the Brazilian) Ronaldo all endured a sudden decline. It’s also worth remembering that Ronaldinho led Atletico Mineiro to win the Copa Libertadores, and was voted South American Footballer of the Year, in 2013 at the age of 33.
But Ronaldinho’s heroics at the Bernabeu had a bigger impact upon Real Madrid, as it essentially brought an end to the Galacticos era.
Within a fortnight, coach Vanderlei Luxemburgo had been dismissed. A couple of months later, Perez resigned and then Zidane announced his retirement. Most significantly, the following summer Real Madrid appointed Fabio Capello, a manager they had sacked nine years before after a single, title-winning campaign because his style of play was too boring.
Real Madrid were plunged into a full-on identity crisis, in part because they’d been absolutely torn apart by the world’s ultimate Galactico.
