June 2nd, 2009 
Lovely Real Madrid have reached an agreement to sign Manuel Pellegrini as their new coach replace Juande Ramos for €4 million (£3.4m) and the deal will be made official on Tuesday, according to Villarreal’s general manager.
According to the statement, on Madrid website, confirmed: “Real Madrid and Manuel Pellegrini have reached a deal for the Chilean coach to be the first team head coach during the forthcoming season. Pellegrini, will be present to the media by the new club president Florentino Perez at 1000 GMT on Tuesday.” He signed a two-year contract extension with Villarreal in December 2007. But Real have moved quickly at the end of the 2008-09 campaign to secure his services after a disappointing campaign.
Real lost out to Barcelona in the title race and were knocked of the Champions League by Liverpool by an aggregate scoreline of 5-0 in the last 16. The move coincides with the appointment of new president, Florentino Perez, who arrives at the Santiago Bernabeu for a second time with former FIFA World Player of the year Zinedine Zidane as an advisor to Perez. Perez has already indicated that AC Milan’s Brazilian playmaker Kaka is the number one player target for the nine-time European champions.
Real have also been strongly linked to Manchester United forward Cristiano Ronaldo, Liverpool’s midfielder Xabi Alonso and Bayern Munich’s winger Franck Ribery. Pellegrini’s switch from the ‘Yellow Submarine’ is seen as a major step to bring some much-needed stability to the Spanish giants, after bitter rivals Barcelona won the Copa del Rey, La Liga and the Champions League.
Florentino Perez
“We want to return Madrid to the place where they should be,” said Perez at a ceremony at the Bernabeu on Monday. Madrid’s new board of directors also confirmed various other positions had been filled, including Jorge Valdano as director general and presidential aide, Miguel Pardeza as sporting director. It’s an honour and a tremendous responsibility,” added Perez. We know what we are getting into and what is expected of us. We are going to work with all our strength. We must recover as soon as possible the dreams, the stability and the time that have been lost.”
The 62 year-old businessman takes over from Vicente Boluda, who has been in the post since Ramon Calderon stepped down in January in the wake of allegations of voting irregularities at the club’s last general assembly in December.
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