Casemiro and Varane: 'Madrid sold Man Utd finished players'

Carlo Garganese

• 10 Mar 2024 14:56 GMT
• 3 min read

France legend Thierry Henry has hailed Real Madrid for their ability in knowing WHEN to sell their stars.

Madrid have been the dominant team in the Champions League over the competition’s history but particularly over the last decade.

Henry believes that one of the recipes of their success has been their ability to move stars on at the right times.

READ MORE: Champions League top scorers 2023/24

The ex-Arsenal and Barcelona namechecked Casemiro and Raphael Varane as two players who Madrid sold just before they declined as top-level players.

What did Henry say?

“If you look at it, if [Kylian] Mbappe goes there, they’re going to have a team that can be dominating Europe and dominating their league for maybe six to seven years because they’ll all be young,” Henry said on CBS Sports.

“The one thing they do ever so well is they know when to get rid of players. I am not talking about the players that are logical to get rid of. I am talking about it was time for [Cristiano] Ronaldo.

READ MORE: Premier League top scorers 2023/24

“It was time for Casemiro. It was time for [Mesut] Ozil. It was time for Varane, which was more, I think, of a knee issue, if I understand well.

“But if you think about those three – [Luka] Modric, [Toni] Kroos and Casemiro – they sold the youngest one. Why would you sell the youngest one?

“Well, they noticed that those two can help Valverde, Tchouameni, [Eduardo] Camavinga and they do that ever-so-well and you have to give them credit because when you get rid of the players that I mentioned before, they were outstanding players at that time for your team.”

Varane joined Man Utd in 2021 and Casemiro in 2022 from Real Madrid for a combined fee of well over €100 million.

Despite this huge outlay, both players have fallen well short of matching their brilliant performances from Real Madrid at their current clubs.

Varane has been plagued by injuries while Casemiro has declined badly this term after a decent first season.

As a result both players are set to leave this summer. Varane’s contract expires at the end of the campaign and will depart on a free transfer. Casemiro has been put up for sale and could move to Saudi Arabia.