Spanish Inquisition: Why Florentino Perez Has Become Even More Of A Real Madrid Saviour

This season Real Madrid have jumped from one branch of crisis to another. From making a mockery of themselves by going on a wild Cristiano Ronaldo chase to getting rid of the coach who had taken them to their second successive league triumph to the disgraceful resignation of the president because of vote-rigging allegations to their worst defeat in a clasico, things have gone from bad to worse to the ridiculously ugly for the biggest club in the word.

For everyone associated with Real Madrid, it's been a disastrous and heart-breaking season; for everyone except Florentino Perez that is.

As Madrid have sunk from one level of depression to another, the voices calling for the return of the former Real Madrid president have only grown louder. In February 2006 when the former Spanish politician resigned after failing to guide his Galacticos monster to any silverware since the end of the 2002-2003 season, the Madrid supporters heaved a huge sigh of relief and the world started picking over the carcass. After almost six years of lavish spending, lofty hopes and erratic transfers, Perez's policy was caught out and the then soon-to-turn 59-year-old was labelled a failure - only for him to become a saviour three years later.

Even before erstwhile president Ramon Calderon's vote-rigging scam came into the open, there were rumors that the current president of ACS was preparing for his Second Coming. Calderon might have won two league titles in a row but while the first conquest was done in what the Spanish would call a typically boring Italian way employing the blueprint  of hardline coach Fabio Capello, the second one was achieved without much elegant football. Calderon had promised to sign Kaka, Cesc Fabregas and Arjen Robben when he became president of the most impatient club in the world. Kaka never came, Fabregas will never come and Robben came one year late and went straight to the medic's room.

Calderon tried to sign Cristiano Ronado too but couldn't. And if the Palancia-born is to be believed, then he has finally managed to sign the Portuguese international but that is going to help only one man: Florentino Perez.

Perez has hardly said anything about his presidential candidature; he has not even spoken in public about this matter. His first public appearance was in a charity match in Morocco with former Madrid player Zinedine Zidane. Soon he was allegedly having dinner with AC Milan coach Carlo Ancelotti - Madrid's supposed next coach - and was holding talks with Milan vice-president Adriano Galliani over the signing of Kaka - Madrid's next Galatico. All the time there has been no quote from the man who built the biggest monster since Frankenstein.

But then again, Perez needn't have said anything: the Madrid media lapdancers have done his job. Everyone in Madrid proclaims Perez as the saviour, forgetting that it was he in the first place who was responsible for bringing Calderon into the White House. Calderon was a director at the club when Perez was in office and had Perez been slightly more astute and more pragmatic and less destructively romantic, then he could have extended the Galacticos era and no one would have heard of Calderon.

The 6-2 drubbing by arch-rivals FC Barcelona on Saturday in this season's second clasico is only going to make Perez even more of a Messiah. The 3-0 humiliation to Barcelona at the Bernabeu on November 19, 2005 was one of the worst clasicos for Madrid, the 6-2 hammering on Saturday was their worst ever. Under Perez Madrid might have been erratic in the second half of the Galacticos era but still they had the big names. At the start of this season the world's best striker David Villa snubbed them and so did Santi Cazorla.

When Perez was in charge, Madrid had the best strikeforce in the world with Luis Figo, Zinedine Zidane, Raul, Ronaldo and David Beckham; now FC Barcelona have the best strikeforce in the world with Thierry Henry, Samuel Eto'o, Lionel Messi, Xavi and Andres Iniesta.

The belief in the Spanish capital is that everything that has gone wrong this season wouldn't have gone wrong had Florentino Perez been in charge; that with his grace, political correctness and friends in the government and the media, he would have not let Madrid become a subject of ridicule in the footballing world. With Florentino Perez comes hope and assurance of big-name signings. Every ill Madrid have suffered this season would be cured by Perez.

Never mind his impatience or the signings of the Thomas Gravesens and the Pablo Garcias alongside the Figos and the Zidanes; never mind four directors of football in under six years; never mind more than £250 million spent on transfers; never mind the dressing room disharmony; never mind the lack of defensive cover in the team; all that matters now is that only Florentino Perez can rescue the institutional crisis that is Real Madrid.

Subhankar Mondal, Goal.com