Kaka: “Leaving Milan for Real? Here’s how it went”
Brazilian great Ricardo Kaka explains his passage to Spain to play for Real Madrid and the motives behind the decision to abandon the Rossoneri.
June 8th 2009: a date that Milan fans will not easily forget. No trophy raised, but the day of one of the most exciting (and painful) farewells in the club’s history: that of Kaka, who had completed his move to Real Madrid for € 65 million that summer nine years ago. The Brazilian talent was the first purchase of the Florentino Perez-based presidency, a choice that Kaka really wanted to explain in an exhaustive way today that his football career has ended:
“Milan, in that period, had no intention of selling any players – he explained – They did it only if requested publicly: and so it was for Shevchenko, who went to Chelsea. With me it was different: for the first time the club had opened the door to an offer, that of Manchester City“. Kaka continues: “Initially I decided to stay, but when Milan opened to my sale, then I placed a condition: if I would leave the Rossoneri, it would have been to play for Real Madrid, the only club for which I would have left Milan”.
In the summer of 2009, both clubs reached an agreement for his transfer: “At the end of the season negotiations took off: Florentino Perez had called Galliani several times to have me, after Milan had opened its doors to negotiations with City in the month of January. Then Real called my father: I said yes, confident that playing in Madrid was my will”.
A strong desire, that of Kaka, to dress the shirt of Los Blancos, therefore: “My arrival at Real Madrid was great, I was so convinced of my choice that I ended up earning even less than what I earned at Milan, even though at the end I also won less. And even less than I would have done in Manchester. I have always looked at money, but they have never been the basis of my decisions“, concluded the Brazilian ace.
