The Galactico's Era at Real Madrid saw some of the greatest players to play for the team like Zinedine Zidane, David Beckham, Ronaldo Nazario and many others, but it all started with the transfer of Luis Figo to Real Madrid from their arch rivals, Barcelona.
Barcelona had many star players during that time, but Luis Figo wasn't just any great player for Barca fans. He was THE GREATEST player for the fans, he was loved the most by Barca Fans.
Figo had won two consecutive Laliga titles, and two Copa Del Rey titles among other titles for Barcelona. He had even dyed his hair Red and Blue to show his love for Barca and to mock Real Madrid.
But then in the year 2000, everything changed forever.
In the year 2000, Real Madrid had presidential elections and the then president Lorenzo Sanz was expected to win the election again as he had done some great work with Real Madrid, as they won the UEFA Champions League twice in last three years. People were pretty happy with his work and he was expected to win the election again.
The other candidate in the election was Florentino Perez, who we now know, is a genius and a great mastermind. He knew his chances of winning the election were minimal.
Florentino Perez went to Figo's agent, Jose Viea, and proposed him an interesting offer. If Perez won the election, Luis Figo will have to join Real Madrid, and if Perez lost, Figo would get 1 million euros.
Figo and Viea saw this opportunity as getting money for nothing as everyone believed that Sanz would win the election, and thus, they signed the contract and agreed to this offer.
Moreover, there were presidential elections in Barcelona as well. Joan Gaspart eventually won the election. Luis Figo wanted a new contract with Barcelona with an increased salary, but he was told to wait until the elections. So Figo saw this opportunity as to put pressure on Barcelona about the contract. But it backfired.
Perez went on to campaign and told everyone that he had already signed Luis Figo. It was all over the news. Sanz called it a way for Perez to get more attention in the election and even mocked him by saying, Perez might now even claim he signed the model Claudia Schiffer.
Luis Figo denied all the rumours and told the media it was just a game by Perez to win the elections and there was no such pre-contract.
But against all the odds, Perez won the election. Now, Luis Figo had two options, either to go to Real Madrid or to pay the penalty which was 30 million euros.
Luis Figo didn't want to go to Real Madrid, so he asked and requested the Barca President to pay the penalty, but Gaspart was reluctant in paying that much amount just to keep an existing player.
And thus, Luis Figo signed for Real Madrid, with a record fee (then) of 62 million euros. In 5 years with Real Madrid, he won Champions League once and Laliga twice.
But he was never forgiven by the Barca fans. During Real Madrid's trips to Camp Nou, the stadium was always fuming and people used to throw many things at Figo including things like Bottle of whiskey and a pig's face. A banner also quoted "We hate you now for we loved you then"
Real Madrid then went on to buy several other biggest names of football which marked the Galactico's Era.
We as Real Madrid fans are blessed to have a genius, a mastermind like Perez, because he can go to any extent for the betterment of the club.
Real Madrid have had some of the greatest moments under Perez. Galactico's Era, The 100 point Laliga winning squad, the UCL three-peat, and even now, after the departure of our greatest player, Cristiano Ronaldo, we won Laliga just after one season, and right now are the most dominant team in Spain.
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