Raúl (footballer)

Raúl González Blanco (; born 27 June 1977), known as Raúl, is a Spanish football manager and former player who played as a forward. He is the current manager of Real Madrid Castilla, the reserve team of La Liga club Real Madrid. Raúl is regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, and one of the greatest Spanish players to play for the team.

Raúl was born in the San Cristóbal de los Ángeles neighborhood of Madrid where he played for the local youth team before moving to the Atlético Madrid youth team. He later moved to Real Madrid's youth academy and played at various youth levels. In 1994, he signed his first professional contract with the fourth division team Real Madrid C, and then was swiftly promoted to the first team.

He spent 16 years of his career playing for Real Madrid and is the club's third all-time top goalscorer with 323 goals and has the most appearances in the history of the club, with 741. With ''Los Blancos'', Raúl won six La Liga titles, three UEFA Champions League titles, scoring in two finals, four Supercopa de España titles, one UEFA Super Cup and two Intercontinental Cups. In 2003, he was appointed captain of the team, after Fernando Hierro's departure from the club and retained the position until he left the club in 2010. He then signed for Schalke 04, where he won a DFB-Pokal and DFL-Supercup, before playing for Qatari club Al Sadd and New York Cosmos.

Raúl is the sixth-highest goalscorer in the history of La Liga with 228 goals. He is also the highest Spanish scorer in European leagues, with 256 goals, scoring 228 goals in La Liga and 28 goals in the Bundesliga. He also has the third-most appearances in the history of La Liga, 550 matches. He is the fifth highest goalscorer in Champions League history with 71 goals, and has played the fifth most games. He has also played 1,000 matches in his career, one of only 45 players to have done so.

Although he did not win any major competitions while playing for the Spain national team, he scored a then-record 44 goals in 102 appearances for ''la Roja'', appearing in three FIFA World Cups and two European championships. Raúl captained the side from 2002 to his international retirement in 2006.

Raúl was named the top international goalscorer in the world by International Federation of Football History & Statistics in 1999, and ranked second in the 2001 Ballon d'Or and third in the 2001 FIFA World Player of the Year. In 2004, he was named in the FIFA 100 list of the world's greatest living players, and was included in the UEFA list of the 50-best European players of the 1954–2004 period. He was part of the European Team of the Year of European Sports Media in 1997, 1999 and 2000. Raúl won two Pichichi trophies (1999 and 2001), the top goalscorer award of the UEFA Champions League (2000 and 2001), five Don Balón Awards (1997, 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2002) and one Best Player Award at the Intercontinental Cup in 1998. Provided by Wikipedia