First time I noticed the name of Real Madrid was not because of its checkered history or its illustrious players list, rather it was a footage of a young striker toeing in a very fine pass piercing the middle of the box with such a speed that camera was late in focusing the strike. Afterwards I started putting up the history of Real Madrid and with that I was introduced to the world of club football.

Before this particular happening, only two clubs were known to me – Napoli because of Maradona and Santos because of Pele. I was a World cup freak. I had read and re-read all the available matter on WC. I used to imagine the bone breaker Ponti from Argentina stopping all those strikes, and the Uruguayan team which one the world cup twice, and then just faded away. There were also the images of all the yellow, blue and striped blues which used to define the way football has to be played. So when I saw the game of football played by Real Madrid, I was amazed whether club matches also had this kind of wizardry!

I started reading about the time when Real won La Liga year after year. A familiar name was there in that team – one of my all time favorite team's captain – Ferenc Puskas. The stocky Hungarian had a wonderful gait when viewed in those old videos. Real was the team to reckon during those days of Hungarian revolution. Then there was Di Stefano, all time greatest at Bernabéu... his each move was a delight to watch!

Further down the line, I started seeing all La Liga matches, dutifully followed all the million dollar transfers and never bought one of those costly jerseys put up in their store! Still almost 12 years down the line, a hard core Real fan!