On August 27, 2012, Luka Modric was unveiled to the Real Madrid fans after making the transfer that was always his destination.
It was clear from his performances for Tottenham and Croatia that Modric had the opportunity to turn out to be an elite club, one that was able to compete for Europe's greatest awards.
He played for his country when they fell in the qualification for Euro 2008 before he first played a key role in the Premier League era in elevating Spurs to Champions League opportunities.
Twenty -six years old and at the height of his powers, time was good. Daniel Levy had fought with tooth and nail to keep him, so that the importance of Chelsea brushed up to eventually let the midfielder go abroad for a fee of £ 30 million.
The Tottenham chairman spoke about the hope that the move would cause a “long and productive partnership” with the La Liga Giants. Whether that feeling was mutual in the Spanish capital, Florentino Perez and Jose Mourinho had their husband.
“I pushed hard for Real Madrid to sign Modric because he had everything we needed for the team – technology, vision and good reading of the game, quality in making decisions, speed of thinking, he can play the ball for a long or short, score from outside the area, he managed to press, he is intelligent with his positioning and had intensity.
Everything looked for Madrid to dominate for years to come.
Mourinho had beaten Barcelona from their perch and in a certain style. Madrid won the title 2011-12 with a record 100 points and 121 scored goals. They were perhaps the most brutal efficient counter -attacking side in the history of the game.
An exhausted Pep Guardiola fled to New York to take a sabbatical. Barcelona had lost the coach who had defined an era.
Spain won Euro 2012, an unprecedented third major tournament in a row, with a team with the Quintet Iker Casillas by Los Blancos, Raul Albiol, Sergio Ramos, Alvaro Arbeloa and Xabi Alonso.
Madrid was a team full of winners and the elusive Decima – a 10th Champions League and first since 2002 – was now the primary target. Mourinho had already won it with two different clubs.
No player was sold of great importance, while Modric arrived together with Michael Essien and Diego Lopez to strengthen the team. Promising stars Alvaro Morata and Nacho Fernandez were promoted from La Fabrica to the first team setup.
Everything started to plan. Modric was signed between the two legs of the Spanish Super Cup against Barcelona. He made his debut from the bank in the Bernabeu to help see that Madrid sees a road goals (2-1 in the night; 4-4 on aggregated) about their big rivals.
The 2012-13 campaign started with silverware, but the Super Cup would be the only trophy they would lift that season. It was a campaign that Antonio Conte later called “a Mourinho season” – one that we saw repeated in Chelsea and Manchester United.
Fractious, frustrating, full of fighting and paranoia and inevitably resulting in little success on the field. In other words, a nightmare environment for every new signing to board.
The men of Mourinho had only taken four points from their opening of four games. Barcelona benefited and built an inviolable lead.
Apparently enhanced by the appointment of Guardiola's right hand Tito Vilanova, the Catalan club only dropped two points after 19 games, after he had defeated each side in the division except Madrid, with whom they had signed 2-2 at home.
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Modric hardly seen in that disastrous expensive start. After a draw with Valencia and defeated Getafe, he made his first start in their first competition gain of the season 3-0 at home at Granada and was introduced during the break while Madrid lags behind in a final 1-0 defeat against Sevilla.
The Croatian started to integrate aside when Madrid got their season back on the right track and 22 points of the next 24 available. The only competition they could not win in that run was in Camp Nou, where they fought for a respectable draw, although Modric was left as an unused replacement.
At that time he was usually played as the number 10 in Mourinho's favorite 4-2-3-1 formation, but he failed to have expected such a role in the regular target contributions.
In the previous season, Mesut Ozil registered a ridiculous count of 28 assists and seven goals. That kind of flashy impact is demanded in a club that is famous for its galacticos.
By Christmas, Modric had only gathered one goal and one assist and was on the edge of Mourinho's preference XI.
Madrid went a shocking 18 points behind the League leaders Barca and the debt had to be found somewhere.
At that time it was that Daily Marca, established in Madrid, led their notorious 'worst signing of the season' poll. Modric was at the top of the list – for the Alex number of Barcelona, no less – after receiving 32% of the votes.
“This is Real Madrid. I understand that there is great pressure for new signing sessions to succeed here,” Modric responded in the Croatian press.
“I don't apologize, I am not that kind of person, but it is very challenging to adapt to life in a big club like Madrid. I have had a few good versions, if not in every game, but I believe I can prove that I have something to offer.”
Apparently Modric did that. Was he underperforming or just misunderstood? It would be an understatement to say that time has justified the reducing playmaker in the Bernabeu.
He has won four championships and was the balloon d'Or and their excellent player on many a European evening, well into the age of thirty.
Modric has never been a number 10. He is not an Ieding. He is on average five assists and two goals per season in his shimmering decade in La Liga – figures, for what it is worth, which are more comparable to Andres Iniesta and Xavi Hernandez.
Yet it was time to become clear in the Spanish capital.
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Read: six Real Madrid players torn apart by the Spanish press: Bale, Hazard, Owen …
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The grim difference between what Modric is and has not been demonstrated in the semi -final of the Champions League in that debut season to forget.
Used in the number 10 role in the first stage in Dortmund, Madrid was driven out 4-1. Their midfield could not handle the intensity of Jurgen Klopp's side, and Robert Lewandowski scored all four. Borussia Dortmund may have scored even more.
Madrid had completely missed in that first stage, but it returned when Mourinho made a tactical adjustment in the Bernabeu. Modric went deeper to partner Xabi Alonso at the basis of midfield and the boss the game.
He completed 70 steps, more than twice as much as he had in the first stage and most player on the field at a distance. Madrid won 2-0, one goal away from a victory of a road goals and a famous Remontada.
That was the midfielder that we got used to in the past decade. He never looked back.
Then Carlo Ancelotti came, Ozil and Kaka went. Another year later, Toni Kroos and Casemiro arrived.
Madrid adapted to the 4-2-3-1 and more in the direction of a 4-3-3, a system that has enabled him to dominate games in a role somewhere between a deep playmaker and a trequartista. Just like Xavi and Iniesta.
“I said at the start of the season that he would not be at his best until the end of February,” Croatia boss Igor Stimac told Marca in February 2013.
“It was to be expected when you consider that he had to come into top fodel, which he would not have done without a preseason.”
His club level manager was much less concerned about how he went.
“He adapted very calmly to life in Real Madrid,” Mourinho told Sportske in 2021.
“Despite all the daily requirements, the pressure of the public is a very balanced person and he is certainly of himself. He learned what Real Madrid is about very quickly, and understands the enormous size of the club and what their goals are.”
The feeling is mutual.
“I can only speak well about Mourinho,” Modric told Marca together after their year. “He is a fantastic coach, it was a pleasure to work with him.
“He taught me how to play more aggressively. He always tries to get more than the best out of each player. If you give 100%, he asks for 110%. If you don't play as well as possible, someone will take your place.”
This was a season in which the Portuguese coach fights left, right and center. He had dropped club captain Iker Casillas and reportedly dropped out with important dressing room figures Sergio Ramos and Cristiano Ronaldo and left at the end of that trophy campaign, returning to Chelsea after burning his bridges in the Bernabeu.
Yet Mourinho has nothing but good words for Modric, a player who has endured the worst year of his Madrid career under his care and the scapegoat in the Madrid -Pers was made. He tried and did not succeed in bringing him to Chelsea in 2014.
“If anyone can write history in what they do, they are immortal. Luka Modric has won the Ballon d'or, he is more than similar,” Gutste Mourinho.
“Luka, in Spain, he plays for Real Madrid and is a player who respects everyone,” he told Talksport during Euro 2020.
“I'm so happy that I was the one who brought him to Madrid.”
By Nestor Watach