Real Madrid completed this Monday the transfer to Everton of the Colombian international James Rodriguez, who signed a two-year contract plus an optional one with the English club, in which he will meet again with the coach Carlo Ancelotti“A coach who knows him very well,” according to the player.
“I am very, very happy to be in this great club, a club with so much history,” said the footballer on the website of his new team after putting end of his time at Real Madrid, which, in turn, showed James “his gratitude and affection for all this time he has been part” of the club, in addition to wishing him “good luck in this new stage of his professional career,” he said in a statement.
Close to Atlético de Madrid last summer, when Real Madrid finally retained him, the last season has shown that his departure this summer was more than likely, with nothing more fourteen games in this whole course, in which it has contributed one goal and two assists, but in which his role has been more than punctual.
His departure is already a fact. At the age of 29 – he was born on July 12, 1991 in Cucuta (Colombia) – he undertakes another adventure in his professional career, the fifth since he left the Envigado from his country that boy who at the age of 15 made his debut in the Colombian First Division and who in 2008 left for Argentina to play in the Banfield.
There he won a League, played 50 games, scored 10 goals and his talent unleashed the interest of European football, attracted by an emerging young man who had won the first league title in the club’s history with his teammates, who managed to enjoy it until on July 6, 2010, when the Port paid 7.5 million euros.
Admirer of Carlos ‘Pibe’ Valderrama, he made the leap to the old continent, to the most attractive and millionaire football, with only 19 years old, with a whole career still to be built, but with offensive qualities as promising as they were undeniable, with a extraordinary precision in your left hand and an undoubted future in his boots.
In Porto he gained experience. First he went through that repetitive period of adaptation in the young talents who make the leap from America to Europe at such a young age. Andre Villas-Boas, then coach of the Portuguese team, led it calmly. It was not until the twelfth official match that he made his debut with the team.
There he stayed for three campaigns for a total of 108 official games, 32 goals and eight trophies: three Portuguese Leagues (2010-11, 2011-12 and 2012-13), four Super Cups from that country (2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013) and a Europa League (2010-11). Its growth was undeniable. His next transfer was 45 million to Monaco.
One year he only played in the principality, with 38 games and 10 goals, in Ligue 1, because he astonished the whole planet in the Brazil World Cup 2014 as the leader of the Colombian national team, as a player who scored differences and goals. One was chosen the best of the year, to Uruguay in the round of 16. Was the best gunner, in addition, the tournament of tournaments. And there were Leo Messi and Neymar.
Madrid paid 75 million for him
An undoubted milestone for the footballer, immediately recruited by Real Madrid, who paid 75 million euros for him to add him to his squad in 2014 under the command of Carlo Ancelotti, first, with the one he most shined with; by Rafael Benítez, later, and later by Zinedine Zidane, when the prominence that he had with the Italian declined.
In 2014-15, his first year at the club, he played 46 games, scored 17 goals and gave 18 assists; In 2015-16, he already played 32, with eight goals; and in 2016-17 his participation was 33 duels, with eleven goals, although only 20 of them started, with which he changed teams in the summer of 2017, loaned two years to Bayern Munich.
67 games and 15 goals were his numbers in the German club, in which he raised two Leagues, one Cup and two German Super Cups; five of the 23 titles James has won at club level, nine of them -including two Champions Leagues- with Real Madrid, to which he returned a year ago and from which he is now leaving in search of other challenges.
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