Varane equals Santamaría

Raphaël Varane continues to write pages in the history of Real Madrid. Today, against Athletic, he will match another mythical center-back, José Emilio Santamaría, as the seventh foreigner with the most games in the history of the white club. The Frenchman will add his 337th match as a Madridista, a career in which he has won, among other titles, four European Cups, the same, curiously, that the Hispanic-Uruguayan (Montevideo, 7-31-29), whose witness he will take in the ranking. A list of foreigners that Benzema has headed since last Saturday. The derby was the French forward's 528th game, thus exceeding the 527 that Roberto Carlos played.

Coinciding with the general improvement of the team and the return of Ramos as a teammate in the rear, Varane has recovered his best performance in recent games, after several errors in recent months (against City, Valencia and Shakhtar) that left him marked. The center-back is indisputable in his national team and in Madrid and is one of the few Zidane players who this season has escaped injury. Only one game was lost, against Huesca, in which Zizou gave him rest.

Varane has difficult to climb positions in the ranking this season, since his next objective is a Modric that continues adding parties. But other colleagues can climb positions. Modric himself can catch up with Di Stéfano, who is fifth. The Croatian is 35 games away from the myth that gives its name to the stadium where Madrid is now playing. Above, the podium, Marcelo is 12 games behind his compatriot Roberto Carlos. And Toni Kroos has 14 games to go to make the top-10 with his compatriot Stielike.