Once the world's most expensive footballer, the Welshman like the Brazilian who came before him, has not been on the pitch often enough for Real
Gareth Bale arrived at Real Madrid in 2013, the same summer Kaka departed. Bale – like Kaka in 2009 – became the world’s most expensive footballer when he joined.
The two hold something else in common; both signings were ordered right from the very top – personal projects of the club president Florentino Perez, a man who’s always had a taste for Galacticos above all else.
Perez was the last one to realise that Kaka would never hit his AC Milan heights at the Santiago Bernabeu when all around him the evidence was being borne out.