Zidane relates everything about leaving Real: The club didn't offer me support

He wrote a letter to the Spanish newspaper AS that explained everything about the matter.

Dear Madrile,

For 20 years, from the first day I stepped into Madrid City and dressed in the white lantern, you gave me your love. I always felt there was something very special between us. I had the honor of being a player and coach of the most important club in history, but above all, I'm just another Real Madrid player. For all of this, I wanted to write you this letter to say goodbye and to clarify my decision to leave.

When in March 2019 I agreed to return to Real Madrid's bench after a pause of about eight months, that was because President Florentino Pérez asked, of course, but also because you asked me every day. When I met one of you on the street, I felt the support and desire to see myself again with the team. Because I share “values Los Blancos”, this club belonging to its members, its fans, the whole world. These values I've tried to transmit myself to everything I've done, I've tried to be an example. The passage of 20 years in Madrid was the most beautiful thing that happened to me in my life and I know I owe it exclusively to Florentino Pérez, who trusted me in 2001, who fought for me, to make me come when there were people against him. I say it from my heart, I will always be grateful to the president for that. Forever.

Now I've decided to leave, and I want to explain the reasons. I'm going, but I'm not tired of training. In May 2018 I left because after two and a half years with so many victories, so many trophies I felt the team needed a new discurs to stay on top. Things are different today. I'm leaving because I don't think the club gives me the trust I need anymore, it doesn't offer me support to build something on the medium- to-term plan. I know football and I know the demands of a club like Madrid, I know when you don't have to go. But here one very important thing has been forgotten, all that I've built every day, what I've contributed to relations with players, with 150 people working with and around the team. I'm a born winner and I was here to win trophies, but besides that there are human beings, emotions, life and the feeling that these things aren't appreciated, that it's not meant to preserve the dynamics of a great club. Even, somehow, I was offended.

I want to respect what we did together. I would like to have my relationship with the club and the president in recent months been a little different than that of other trainers. He was not seeking privileges, of course not, but a little more memory. Today a coach's life on the bench of a great club is two seasons, no more. Longer lasting human relations are essential, more important than money, more important than fame, more important than anything. You should take care of them. So it really hurts when I read in the press, after a loss that they would expel me if I didn't win the next fight. This hurt me and the entire team because these messages deliberately run the media, created negative moods on staff, created doubts and misunderstandings. Good thing I had some great guys dying with me. When things got worse, they saved me with great victories. Because they believed in me and they knew I believed in them. Of course I'm not the best coach in the world, but I'm capable of giving the strength and confidence everyone needs in their work, be they a player, a member of the training staff or any employees. I know exactly what a team needs. Over these twenty years in Madrid I've learned that you, fans, want to win, of course we do, but above all you want us to give everything, the coach, the staff, the workers, and of course the footballers. And I can assure you that we have given 100% of ourselves to the club.

I also use this letter to send a message to reporters. I've had hundreds of press conferences and unfortunately we've talked very little about football and I know that you love football, that this sport unites us. However, without claiming to criticize or teach them, I would like the questions not always directed towards controversy, that we would have talked more often about the ball, and above all about the players, who are and will always be an important part of the game. Let's not forget football, let's take care of football.

Dear madridists, I will always be one of you.

In front of Madrid!