The Madrid dressing room has an appointment this summer with the plastic surgeon. The template can suffer the most lifting of recent years. Practically a third of the 25 footballers that Ancelotti has at his command can empty his locker in Valdebebas. Three players whose contract ends on June 30 will put an end to their stage in Madrid (Bale, Marcelo and Isco). Five other footballers, with their peculiarities, have the exit door open: Vallejo, Ceballos, Hazard, Jovic and Mariano. They are, in addition (and apart from Lunin), the eight players left behind in Ancelotti’s plans, who has had to deal with the management of the largest squad (23 outfield players) in recent times.
Marcelo, Isco and Bale spend their last months at the club. The Brazilian, who will turn 34 on May 12, will put an end to more than a decade and a half as a Real Madrid player. His prominence has been diminishing in the last four seasons. Solari left him marked and the arrival of Mendy in 2019 was the turning point. Marcelo has played 567 minutes this season, half of last year’s and less than a third of what he reached two years ago. He will leave as captain and with a track record only in the shadow of Paco Gento’s 24 titles. The carioca treasures, among his 23 trophies, four Champions and five Leagues. In the individual section, he will leave as the second foreigner with the most games (so far, 542) in the club’s history and 16 seasons at the service of Madrid, a mark that is only surpassed by five other historical players.
Isco and Bale will follow parallel paths (even with the same titles) almost from their arrival in Madrid until their farewell. They arrived the same summer, that of 2013, with Ancelotti at the helm of the locker room. And they will go with the Italian at the head of the white ship. Very questioned in his last years, his decline has also been almost even. The Welshman, 32 years old, began to fade in the first stage of Zidane, although he had flashes like his double in the final of the Thirteenth. Isco had been discussed before, but with the Frenchman he led the ‘unit B’ that won the brilliant double in 2016-17. The man from Malaga ended up displacing Bale himself from ownership. A few months later he was, along with Marcelo, the main victim of Solari’s decisions. He has not been the same since then and has missed the train of the National Team.
Although they leave with the letter of freedom, without leaving money in the coffers of the club, the three departures will bring relief to the accounts. They will release 60 million euros of salary mass to face the incorporation of Mbappé and the possible one of Haaland. The signing of Bale has an impact of 30 million euros per year in the accounts, Marcelo will free up 16 million euros per year and Isco takes 14 million gross per season.
Other possible outlets
Together with the three players whose contract is ending, Madrid will put another half dozen footballers in different circumstances in the showcase. Vallejo and Ceballos, both 25 years old, are two clear candidates. The center-back has hardly played any residual minutes and the midfielder, after recovering from the serious injury he suffered at the Tokyo Games, is not having the prominence that Ancelotti proclaimed. His future, as SER announced a month ago, may be at Betis.
The situation is different for three other footballers to whom the club is prone to facilitating an exit. They are, with their singularities, Hazard, Jovic and Mariano. The 31-year-old Belgian was called to assume the galactic stripes left vacant by Cristiano. Weighed down by injuries and by his physical condition, in three years he has not reached his level. This season is irrelevant (878 minutes). Madrid will listen to offers. The handicap for its sale is that the entity has left to amortize 40 million of what it paid for it. A transfer for less than that figure would affect losses in the accounts.
The two forwards do not count for Ancelotti. They have barely played two games as starters each and have fallen out of the coach’s plans when Benzema is absent. Mariano, 28, who came out at half-time in the Clasico, is now in the lead, but he does not hold a sufficient position for the coach to consider him a starter against Barça. The entity has been looking for a way out for several summers, but runs into the player’s refusal, who last August refused to go to Rayo Vallecano despite the agreement already closed between both clubs.
AND 24-year-old Jovic’s situation has deteriorated to the point that he was Ancelotti’s dismissal in Mallorca. As with Hazard, the departure of the Serbian nine has an important economic aspect to take into account. The signing of him cost 60 million in 2019 and There are still €30 million to be amortized so that the club can balance the accounts if it decides to transfer it. The solution may lie in a loan (he was already on loan at Eintracht for the second half of last season) that allows him to be revalued. The ‘Operation Exit’ is already underway.