It’s unbearable to look back! Canales: It broke me down when I was playing for Real Madrid. I often turned off the lights and cried alone.

October 10th: Canales joined Real Madrid in the summer of 2010 and was regarded as one of the most promising new stars in Spanish football. The Spanish midfielder arrived in the same year that Mourinho took over at Real Madrid, a period that was in desperate need of wins and impatient to develop young players. Canales failed to succeed at Real Madrid and eventually chose to leave. Now, he recalled his experience at Real Madrid on the show "WeAreBrave".

■About joining Real Madrid

Canales said: "I had not renewed my contract with Racing Santander at that time, and it was a very difficult time. I was 18 years old and my contract was about to expire. I wanted to stay, but the club did not offer to renew the contract, although they said verbally that I was very important. I called them and asked them, 'Are you really not going to renew the contract?', and even bought it myself. Insurance, because there may be no contract to sign at any time. In January, I only had 6 months left on my contract, and suddenly I received offers from Chelsea, Manchester City, Barcelona and Real Madrid. It was only after that that Santander called me and wanted to renew my contract, but they told me that they wanted to renew my contract just to sell me."

■About Real Madrid’s pre-season

“I finally chose Real Madrid because they were the only team willing to let me stay at Racing Santander for another season. I knew that I was not ready to enter the first team, and other clubs were not willing to wait for me. The same year I signed for Real Madrid, Ozil and Di Maria also joined. That summer Mourinho took office, he let me I performed well in the preseason with the team, and in the first game he left Ozil and Di Maria on the bench, while I started. Still, I wanted to return to Santander because I wanted to play, but my father persuaded me to stay."

■ Talking about the difference between young players now and back then

"I was not as good as I was now. of young people are well prepared, and the gap is too big. Today's young players can play for 90 minutes as soon as they come up, but at that time I was out of breath after 55 minutes and lacked the psychological maturity and ability to withstand pressure. But I learned a lot from that experience, and I was lucky. ”

■On the difficult time at Real Madrid

“I used to go out to eat burgers after games, but now I don’t do that even on holidays. At the time I thought I had done nothing wrong, but those were another time. I was impatient and knew it would be a difficult time, and it was. In the afternoon I often sit on the sofa alone with the lights off and cry. It was a really painful and devastating time. "

"I told my parents that I didn't want to stay at Real Madrid. Because I knew I wasn't going to play. I have very few memories of that period, most of which I have erased from my mind because they were unpleasant. I was so anxious at Real Madrid that I would eat pizza at tea time without even realizing what I was doing. "

■About the torture of injuries

"There was a time when I even thought about retiring. That was when I was injured in the U21 European Cup. I was only 21 years old at the time, but I had already seriously injured my knee twice and kept straining my hamstring. Every time you get injured you have to change the way you play. Others say that I am a glass person, which is indeed true. After my third knee injury I could barely play football again. I didn’t even go on our honeymoon, my mother-in-law went with my wife because I was still recovering. "