Kaka and Ronaldo: Will Real Madrid's Spending Pay Off?

The biggest news following the football world has been Real Madrid’s summer signings.

On June 8th the club officially announced on their website that Kaka had become a member of the team. The transfer fee cost Real Madrid $97m.

Yesterday, June 11th, Manchester United announced on their official website that the club has accepted a $131m transfer fee from Real Madrid for the rights to Cristiano Ronaldo.

Ronaldo still needs to agree to a contract but it is expected that he will be an official player around the end of the month. With these signings, Real Madrid stands a good shot at earning some hardware this upcoming season.

Even if they stop signing, which rumors would say otherwise, the addition of Kaka and Ronaldo to an already talented team with Arjen Robben, Sergio Ramos, Gabriel Heinze, Wesley Sneijder, Rafael Van Der Vaart, Iker Casillas, Klass Jan Huntelaar, Ruud Van Nistelroy, and Raul makes Real a serious competitor.

Even if Real Madrid loses some of their current players, they will still have an extremely deep and talented club. However the question remains will they win and what?

Since 2000 Real Madrid has won La Liga title four times, and the Champions League twice. In the past they have had some of the best come together. Players like Beckham, Ronaldo, Figo, and Zidane came together and found some success but never won both the Champions League and league title in the same year.

A team consisting of the last two golden ball winners alone would have a good chance, throw in the other great players already there, you have a powerhouse. This team should win both the Champions League and La Liga title. 

It is hard to imagine that a team with 31 league titles will not win La Liga, but the Champions League is a whole different story.

It would not surprise me if Real Madrid under performed on the big stage and found them self struggling to go deep in the tournament. In 05-06 Juventus with Trez, Zlatan, Buffon, Cannavaro, Zambrotta, Viera, Del Piero, Nedved, and Camoranesi were unable to advance past the quarterfinals.

Inter, AC Milan, and Bayern Munich had extremely talented players but it could be said they all underperformed this past year. AC Milan was expected to compete for the Scudetto but they ended up ten points behind in third place.

Moretti and Mourinho boasted about European glory but came up short against Manchester United not finding the back of the net once in the two games.

Finally, Bayern Munich, with Ribery, Klose, Toni, Podolski and Schweinsteiger were embarassed against Barca and finished one point shy in the Bundesliga behind Wolfsburg.

If football tells us anything, it is that it takes more than great players to win championships, it takes great teams.