Thank God

By: Corey | July 30th, 2009

Where Heinze Found Himself During Games, On The Ground, Rolling Around In Over Exaggerated Pain To Win An Imaginary Foul Because He Screwed Up Clearing The Ball Properly ARGHHHHH!

Finally, the bane of my existence has left Real Madrid. Gabriel Heinze has been sold to Olympique Marseille, for a still undisclosed fee on a three year contract. The news comes from Marseille’s own site which broke the news not to long ago. Heinze returns to France where he previously played with rivals PSG, which seems like a strange move in terms of allegiances, but surely Heinze is interested in the project that Didier Deschamps is building there. He leaves Real having played 44 games over two seasons, chipping in with three goals and winning a league in his first season, but also driving fans man for his consistently bad defending at center or left back. I would like to let him leave on a high note, but I really never liked this guys style, so I dont mind seeing him go, well until I reconsider below.

To me this is further proof of Pellegrini’s very strong eye for talent. He has instantly weeded out the bad players from the squad including Javi Garcia, Saviola, Heinze and soon to be Huntelaar and probably Van der Vaart. He still has not cast that eye of Suaron over Fernando Gago, but theres still a month left in the market. Valdano, Pardeza and co. continue to do there work in cleaning up the squad, which is still at an astonishing 29 players not counting 7 (well really 6 since Adan is a first teamer now) Castilla players who are with the first team, as when Arbeloa came in, Heinze’s departure did not clear up any space. They have their hands full if they are to keep cleaning up the squad, but its looking likely that they will be able to trim two if not three in the near future.

We all know Heinze was not the best defender to ever grace the Real Madrid shirt. Rolling around on the ground after the slightest contact to win fouls that were rarely given ring a bell? How about committing stupid fouls on rash tackles that gave away decisive free kicks, like against Liverpool at home last year. Sloppy marking that almost always lead to a chance on goal, or maybe a poor clearance that goes straight to David Pizarro to drive home two years ago in Rome. The best part of Heinze was how he got even more aggressive and rough when he was in his own penalty box, often giving away needless penalties or coming damn near close. Whats not to like? I was never anywhere close to being a fan of his. But I lost something to do with this transfer, something thats more important then you think. I lost a player I could scapegoat, sometimes unfairly, over defensive woes. I lost a straw dummy if you will to poke fun at, and that dummy is going to have to be replaced. Who will that be? We will have to wait until the season is over and someone scores a header off a free kick and then two minutes later scores an own goal. Heinze xoxo.

Gabi Heinze, dont let the door hit your ass on the way out.