Vicente del Bosque has revealed that Nicolas Anelka stopped turning up for Real Madrid’s training sessions because the team didn’t celebrate his goals.
Anelka spent one season at Los Blancos under Del Bosque before leaving for Paris Saint-Germain in 2000.
“Anelka was a player that cost us a lot of money,” Del Bosque told the YouTube channel ‘Idolos’.
“Real Madrid wasted 5 million euros on him and he was signed as a star.
“He came into the dressing room one day and told us that we weren’t happy for his success, that we weren’t celebrating his goals. He didn’t come to training for a day or two and the club fined him.”
Anelka was one of many big-name players in Del Bosque’s squad during Florentino Perez’s first Galactico era.
“They trained completely normally, without messing about,” Del Bosque said.
“We weren’t the kind of people to bother players. We were quite careful and tolerant, but we always asked questions of them. We had to be tolerant but demanding at the same time.”