To Make Kaka Your Heart, Give Him The Room To Breathe

A price tag weighing 56 million pounds is around your neck. Expectations grow further still given that you and the wider public believe that Jesus powers you. The modest personality and boyish looks are however not enough to counter the first two when things are looking unrosy. Ricardo Kaka is a ship, however well stocked, is still well and truly beached.

If Old Trafford is the Theatre of Dreams, then the Bernabau should be the Arena of Demand. Madrid demands victory, demands trophies and demands success, yet it is Barcelona which remains more commanding on the pitch. As for Real's commander Pellegrini, though it remains hard to assert just who is in power, he continues his struggling of piecing together the world's most expensive jigsaw.

Perhaps Kaka is his most prized piece. A pacey midfield playmaker that should be in his prime. Injuries aside, and even given his adequate goal return, Brazil's prodigal son looks a shadow of the man he was at Milan. With so many other big names, he is afforded little room, in which to play in, or find his form.

Of course Kaka should never have been bought under a premise that he would deliver goals. Nor should he have been purchased as a left sided midfield, hemmed in by the touchline on one side, only able to direct himself one way. Messi, Ronaldo, Robben and Ribery, are all expert inside forwards, cutting in onto their stronger side in order to reek havoc but not Kaka.

However Kaka, as with Milan and still with Brazil, is best collecting the ball centrally from deep, surging forward, picking gaps with which to play the ball or run in to. Until Real accept and accommadate this, they will never see the best of their most talented all-round attacker.

In the words of a renowned journalist, Kaka is a fusion of two footballing cultures, bringing together South American flair, with a European directness...Real have yet to see either side of him...yet.