Jude Bellingham makes pitch-perfect start to epic adventure at Real Madrid
Mark Bellingham’s not crying, honest. There was a moment during Jude Bellingham’s presentation at Real Madrid, not long after he had stood up and offered his first, brief words in Spanish, when the cameras showed his father’s face and there was the tiniest hint of a tear, which well there might be.
His son, though, was not so sure. “I don’t know if it was just sweat, to be fair: he doesn’t cry often,” the 19-yearold said, another smile creeping across his face on a morning when there were many of them. “I’m going to have to watch it back closely and maybe give him some banter.”
If he does watch it back, he will see that his first performance as a Real Madrid player was flawless; the impact on everyone here immediate. And if his dad was crying, well, why not? That’s his son up there holding the No 5 shirt once worn by Zinedine Zidane, enjoying what he called the most important day of his life. “It means a lot to them because it means a lot to me,” Bellingham said. Denise and Mark had seen the whole thing through, too, this the culmination of their work as well as his. There had also been discussions with England teammates trying to convince him to play in the Premier League, with Gareth Southgate, Carlo Ancelotti and even briefly with Zidane, he revealed, but now it was done.
It had all started 15 months ago. “I had always been aware of interest from England, so that was pretty normal,” Bellingham said. “But it was a bit of a surprise when Dad sat me down and told me about Madrid. I got goosebumps, my heart was close to stopping. It’s just something you don’t expect, to be able to play for a team like this. So when it actually manifests itself, it’s an amazing feeling.”
When you actually turn up, even more so. Asked what had most struck him on his first day, Bellingham replied: “The room I signed the contract in has all 14 of the [European Cup] trophies. They’re staring at you and you can’t wait to get your hands on one.
“Lots of teams are interested in you,” he continued. “I don’t think about money: never have, never will. I play for pure love. I loved the feeling I got from the club, I told them almost straight away and I wanted it to happen quickly. It’s not the case that other teams are bad, it’s just that Real Madrid are the greatest. You grow up, watch games, and that’s what appealed to me. It has a great history and you want to be a player who adds to that. When they pitched the vision of the team, I was all in. It’s not just the fact that it’s Real Madrid – although that is enough – but the ideas they have, the respect they treated my family with. It was seamless. It’s so exciting.”
Not that the decision went unchal