With the Blancos poised to get rid of €31.5 million flop Danilo, Goal looks back at other players who failed dismally at the Santiago Bernabeu
Real Madrid have never been afraid to splash the cash. This, after all, is a club responsible for half of the eight most expensive transfers of all time.
However, the capital club haven't always spent their money wisely. Indeed, for every Cristiano Ronaldo or Sergio Ramos, there's a Kaka or Jonathan Woodgate.
Below, Goal runs through the worst transfers that Real have ever made…
Getty ImagesNICOLAS ANELKA | From Arsenal | €34.5m | 2009
Real took a massive gamble when they signed a talented but temperamental French striker who had already earned himself the nickname ' Le Sulk ' in the English press. It did not pay off. Nicolas Anelka lasted just one season in Spain – but it was an eventful campaign.
His first goal came in the Clasico, while he netted twice in the Champions League semi-finals against Bayern Munich. However, there were just seven goals altogether, not least due to the fact that the forward was suspended for 45 days at one point for refusing to train, with Anelka accusing his Spanish employers of treating him "like a dog".
"Something does not turn around properly in his head," Real president Lorenzo Sanz countered, shortly before selling his to PSG.
AdvertisementGetty ImagesELVIR BALJIC | From Fenerbahce | €26m | 1999
Real have John Toshack to blame for the waste of money that was Elvir Baljic, as it was the Welshman had been impressed by the Bosnian during his time working in Turkey and, consequently, persuaded Real president to pay a shockingly large fee for the forward.
Baljic's hopes of making an impact in Spain were hardly helped by a knee injury shortly after his arrival but even when fit, he did not look like he belonged at the highest level and he was loaned back to Fenerbahce after just one season, and one goal, in La Liga. He later mused: "It doesn't hurt me to see media listing me among Real's biggest flops; I don't see myself that way." Unfortunately, Real's fans do.
Getty ImagesANTONIO CASSANO | From Roma | €5m | 2006
The fee may have been small but Antonio Cassano was a colossal waste of money. His goal return was dismal (just one in seven appearances), his attitude dreadful and his diet even worse.
"In Madrid, I had a friend who was a hotel waiter," the enigmatic Italian later revealed. "His job was to bring me three or four pastries after I had sex. He would bring the pastries up the stairs, I would escort the woman to him and we would make an exchange: he would take the girl and I would take the pastries. Sex and then food, a perfect night."
Getty ImagesDANILO | From Porto | €31.5m | 2015
Danilo has openly admitted that it is difficult to deal with the amount of scrutiny players are subjected to by the media in Madrid. "An error, no matter how small, goes viral," he lamented. "A mistake becomes very great even if it is small. But, of course, when you do something good, it is also very great."
Unfortunately, the Brazilian has rarely done anything good since joining from Porto two years ago – he played every minute of every defeat Real suffered during the 2015-16 campaign – and is now set to be sold, with both Chelsea and Juventus inexplicably interested in signing Dani Carvajal's understudy.