With 71 goals, three titles and some wonderful performances, the striker has carved his name into the history of Europe’s premier club competition - and he could still return



“In his mind there is only the goal; it’s the essence of football”



- Thierry Henry

Dream debut and early success

A Champions League double and Manchester United glory

RAUL | Goals, goals, goals





Team Games

League

Cup Europe

Other

Real Madrid

741 228 18 66 11 Schalke

48 12 1 5 0 Spain

102 0 0 0 44 Total

891 240 19 71 55

Top scorer and third title in five years

A half century

“I think he is the greatest player to have ever played the game. He walks on the turf and astounds. It is utterly amazing.”

- Luis Figo

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By Ben HaywardHe is the champion of the Champions. Raul Gonzalez Blanco’s story will forever be linked with that of Europe’s premier club competition. He is the tournament’s top scorer and record appearance holder, he has lifted the famous trophy on no less than three occasions and played his part in of some the most exciting games in the history of the championship.He is, as team-mate Christoph Metzelder described him recently, “Mr. Champions League.” So even though the forward’s hopes of a fourth final appearance evaporated at Old Trafford last night and he is set to miss out on next season’s competition due to Schalke’s lowly league position, this is no adios: Raul will be back.Since breaking onto the scene as a precocious 17-year-old, Raul has perhaps achieved more than he should have: he is not especially quick, doesn’t have a powerful shot, is not a big aerial presence, nor is he blessed with wonderful technical ability. But in his head he is quicker than anyone else, allowing him to react faster than his opponents, attract the ball like a magnet, fool rival defenders and move to exactly where he needs to be. “Raul is the best in everything,” former team-mate Santiago Solari once commented, “without being the best at anything.”And he scores goals, lots of goals, all types of goals: brilliant goals, simple goals, team goals, individual goals. Tap-ins and tapestries, a little bit of everything – like tapas. But they all count and they have made him the Champions League’s leading scorer with 71 goals in 144 appearances, which is no mean feat for a player often described by Madrid haters and even some blinkered Real fans as el que no hace nada nunca – he who never does anything.But there’s also mental toughness and cerebro – and there’s preparation, too. Dedication, dedication, dedication; Raul emerged as a teenager at Madrid and his immediate brilliance forced Emilio Butragueno – one of Spain’s greatest ever players – into an early retirement. And over the years – as age, injuries and the sheer number of matches he has been forced to play have taken their toll – Raul has managed to stay ahead of the game, using many techniques to keep fit, in shape and sharp; he was one of the first players to take ice baths and also slept in an hypoxic chamber during his final years at Madrid in order to stay fitter and sharper than the rest.“He’s a person that a lot of people should look up to because he is very dedicated to what he does and what he believes in,” David Beckham said upon leaving Madrid. Such dedication and commitment have brought not only big results for Raul, but also big rewards. And many of these have come in the Champions League.Raul made his first Champions League appearance in a 1-0 defeat away to Ajax, but his home debut was spectacular: a hat-trick in a 6-1 thrashing of Ferencvaros. He also scored a leveller in Hungary, bagged the first in a 2-0 success at home to Grasshoppers and netted the only goal of the game in a memorable quarter-final win at Juventus. The Italians won the second match 2-0, however, to knock out Madrid and the club failed to qualify for the Champions League the following season.But they were back – along with Raul – in 1997, and how! Raul scored just twice in the group stages, but was a key component in the side which went on to win their first European Cup since 1966. Raul played 90 minutes in the final and was replaced right at the end by Jose Emilio Amavisca. He then scored twice in the group stages the following season, but it was a disappointing campaign for Real, who were knocked out in the quarter-finals by Dynamo Kiev.The next campaign was spectacular, though, for both the striker and the club as Madrid went on to win the trophy again. In it, Raul helped his side avenge their elimination at the hands of Dynamo in the previous season by lashing home a brilliant drive from 25 yards to secure a 2-1 win in Ukraine. Further goals arrived in the wins home and away to Rosenborg, and a 4-2 success against Bayern Munich at the Bernabeu.But the best was yet to come: two memorable strikes against Manchester United which sum up the striker’s game to a tee. The first saw Raul pick up the ball some 40 yards from goal on a quick counterattack, advance into the area, sidestep Mikael Silvestre and curl an inch-perfect left-footed drive into the corner, while the second was all about his movement – and all about Fernando Redondo. In one of Old Trafford’s most famous goals scored by a visiting team, the Argentine beat Henning Berg with a stunning backheel flick in the corner and squared for Raul – in the right place at the right time – to tap home. “Real buy these big players like Figo, Zidane and Ronaldo, but I think the best player in the world is Raul," United manager Sir Alex Ferguson said some years later. And he has experienced it at first hand.Raul then rounded off a glorious campaign as he scored the third in his side’s 3-0 final win over Valencia, racing clear from his own half and keeping his cool to round Santiago Canizares and slot the ball in from an angle and wide of the backtracking Miroslav Djukic. Cool, calm, and collected.Having scored 10 to become the top Champions League scorer that season, Raul repeated the feat with seven more in the next campaign, including three in two games against Leeds United and a double in the 3-0 quarter-final second leg win over Galatasaray.Real exited in the semi-finals to Bayern, but claimed the trophy for the third time in five years the following season, in the height of the Galactico era. This time Raul scored six, including a fine double against Panathinaikos and a brilliant left-footed drive to end the hopes of fierce rivals Barcelona in the semi-final second leg at Camp Nou. And in the final, which Madrid won 2-1, Raul showed his quick thinking as he raced onto a long Roberto Carlos throw-in and beat Bayer Leverkusen keeper Hans-Jorg Butt to open the scoring with an opportunistic finish. It was another highlight.Raul was on target nine times as Madrid advanced to the semi-finals the following year. Many of those goals were spectacular, notably the brace he scored in the 3-1 win against Manchester United, when he lashed a low shot into the corner from 25 yards and added a second with a great turn and clinical finish, and one of his two in the 3-1 victory over AC Milan – when he fooled two defenders and thumped an unstoppable right-footed effort into the roof of the net from outside the box. “Raul is a Ferrari,” Fernando Hierro, his predecessor as captain of Real and Spain, famously commented.Subsequent seasons were less impressive as Madrid failed to progress to the latter stages, but the goals continued to flow for Raul and he became the first player to reach 50 Champions League goals when he netted in a 2–1 group stage win over Olympiacos in 2005. However, the striker perhaps didn’t enjoy the recognition he merited due to his unassuming personality and scandal-free public life. “I think he is the greatest player to have ever played the game. He walks on the turf and astounds. It is utterly amazing,” said former Real team-mate Luis Figo, while Italy forward Francesco Totti believes Raul deserved to claim football’s top individual gong. “It’s a scandal that Raul has never won the Golden Ball,” he complained.There were at least two goals per season until he left Madrid last summer and he is the tournament’s top scorer once again following a renaissance season with Schalke. His five goals – including key strikes home and away against Inter in the quarter-finals and an important last-16 goal at Valencia – have seen him overtake Filippo Inzaghi at the top of the Champions League all-time list once more.Schalke – currently in 10th place in the Bundesliga – cannot now qualify for next season’s Champions League and with Raul – who is almost 34 – set to stay in Gelsenkirchen, the 4-1 defeat at Old Trafford may have been the last for the Spanish striker in the Champions League. But Raul will look at veterans like Alessandro del Piero [36], Inzaghi [37] and Ryan Giggs [almost 38] and think: "why can’t I carry on?" After all, this is a man who has surprised football fans and commentators alike for more than half of his life – and you wouldn’t bet against it – be it with Schalke again or another high-profile club in Greece, Turkey or even Italy. So perhaps it’s not adios, Raul – but hasta la vista for the Champions League’s greatest ever player.