As people waited in Cardiff on Saturday night for Zinedine Zidane to arrive at the post-match press conference to explain how easy it is to win European Cups, Florentino Perez was giving a radio interview anticipating another Champions League victory. “Now we move on to the next one, Real Madrid is like that,” he said.
Since they ended their 12-year wait for the tenth European Cup in 2014, Madrid have won the competition a further two times, a run of victories which marks them out as the dominant side of the era.
The long twelve years when their methods were ridiculed have been forgotten. The failed experiment with Jose Mourinho has been erased thanks to the three Champions League which came along once he left.
Juventus had gone into the game with many feeling they had the qualities that could trouble Madrid, especially after what they had done to Barcelona.
But Real Madrid are now like that, as Perez said, they are a winning machine, looking always towards the next victory, driven by a man who is always looking for the next goal. When the galactico model failed, people criticised the model. It turned out they just had the wrong galactico.
“I’ll go as far as I’m allowed to go,” Ronaldo said after the game and nobody would ever question how far that is.
He has rewritten football’s laws by making his ego as effective as all the talk of unity and team spirit. His desire for advancement remains the same and from this necessity, he is as creative as he can be.
His ruthlessness took care of Juve here on Saturday night, but he needs others around him to make him play, but also not to stifle him.
Zidane’s gift may simply be that he is so assured of himself and his place in the game that he feels no need to do anything except encourage the ruthless instincts of his most important player.
Toni Kroos and Luka Modric were hugely influential in undermining Juventus, but without that restless and relentless determination of Ronaldo to keep scoring goals, Max Allegri’s side might have believed they were still in the game for longer.
Instead, after a bright opening, they were behind and then, as they tried to come to terms with being behind again after the interval, Ronaldo scored his second and the European Cup was won again.
Zidane had retained the trophy, a remarkable achievement and late on Saturday night, reporters were asking him if he would stay at Real Madrid for life, something he dismissed as preposterous.
He had done, they pointed out, what many other coaches had failed to do and now he had to deal with people hailing his greatness,
“Behind all of this, what I can tell you. I don’t want to say that I’m very good. Before I was scandalously bad as a coach and now I’m supposed to be the best.”
Ronaldo might have put it differently. “The numbers don’t lie,” he said, when asked what he had to say to those, including Real Madrid fans, who had criticised him during the year.
His numbers have always told the truth and they continue to be astonishing as he destroyed whatever hope Juventus had.
“We have had an extraordinary season,” Max Allegri said, stressing how important it was to get to finals, something he had brought before the game as he tried to get his side to forget their long run of defeats.
It might be harder after what happened here on Saturday. Allergi’s point was a valid one, but Madrid have done it a different way. They last lost a European Cup final in 1981 and when they reached a final after their long wait, they won it.
They have advantages Juventus don’t possess, despite the Italian club’s fame and wealth, and they have Ronaldo who shows no interest in stopping.
“My age is just a number,”he said. “I feel like a young boy.” It is one number he believes does lie.
He had arrived in the press room to collect the man of the match award which was presented by Sir Alex Ferguson.
Allegri had spoken positively despite many wanting to know why Juventus had failed. ‘Football gives you a chance to try again next year,” he said. That is true, but next year Real Madrid and Ronaldo will still be waiting.
