James Rodriguez's mother has no regrets about taking to Twitter

Pilar Rubio, James Rodríguez’s mother, gave an interview to Colombian station BluRadio in an attempt to clear the air following the controversy she caused during El Clásico when she took to Twitter to announce “my son isn’t the priority for Zidane at the moment because Casemiro gives [the team] balance”. While many interpreted the tweet as the words of an soccer mom, bitter about her son not making it into the starting line-up, the South American stated she has no regrets about what she said (despite having since deleted the offending message from her account): “Don’t think of me as James’ mother. I’ve been a Real Madrid fan for a long time”, she noted.

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Casemiro offers balance: “I don’t regret what I said. People who know about football, the majority of them men, are easily offended. I have to be honest. Casemiro gives Madrid balance at the moment. He’s the only player in the squad who can play that role well. At time [of the November Clásico] I said the line-up was suicidal and Madrid went on to lose 0-4”.

“That’s why I stated that you can’t compare Casemiro with Isco and James in my second tweet, because neither of them is a holding midfielder. They’re completely different players, they’re attacking midfielders. James has never lacked fight, but his innate qualities are not those of a defensive midfielder. You can’t ask Casemiro dribble past players, he’s better at keeping things tight in the middle of the park. However, you could ask Luka Modric, Real Madrid’s most versatile player, or ever Toni Kroos to play that role, they both sit somewhere in the middle of defensive and attacking.

James’ future: “I’m not going to say anything in relation to that. I’ve always kept quiet about his signings. That’s a decision for Florentino Pérez, my son and his agent to make. He needs to keep being himself and give his all for the shirt”.