The women's team right on Real Madrid's doorstep
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This weekend C.D. Tacón begin their campaign in the second tier with the objective of gaining promotion to the newly-rebranded ‘Iberdrola Primera División Femenina RFEF’. Club President Ana Rossell told AS back in 2014: “Real Madrid will end up having a professional women's team - with players on professional contracts”. Shortly after that interview, after holding a meeting with the club, Madrid's response was negative: “Now isn't the moment” they said. But two years on, small steps are being taken so that Real Madrid, like city neighbours Atlético and Spain's other historic clubs - Barcelona, Athletic Club, Valencia, Rayo, Levante, Espanyol, Real Sociedad, Sporting, Betis... will have the chance to form their own women's team.
At the end of June, C.D. Tacón announced a merger with C.D Canillas - one of Real Madrid's feeder clubs with a strong youth tradition - the sons of Zidane, Ronaldo Nazário, Fabio Cannavaro and José Mourinho all played for Canillas, as did Amancio's grandson. The next step was the agreement made between Ana Rossell's AR10 company and the football management agency run by René Ramos, Sergio Ramos' brother, who is now also representing professional female footballers and who is one of the directors at C.D Tacón.
With René on board, the project was expected to gain support from various players from Real Madrid's first team squad including Ramos and Marcelo.
Of course, Real Madrid have nothing to do with the project but Ana Rossell and René Ramos feel sure that if C.D. Tacón can gain promotion to the First Division, Florentino Pérez will eventually stopping turning his back on women's football and Real Madrid - a club with more financial clout than all of the other Spanish women's clubs put together, will finally create a women's team of their own.
C.D. Tacón have made 11 reinforcements, including Lucía Rodríguez - the first professional to play in the Women's Second Division, Laura del Río, Lola Martín, Mery Ruiz, Lorena Navarro and Valentina Lefort. The team, which kept their all-white strip from the Canillas days, is coached by Marta Tejedor (former coach for the Peru and Chile national teams) and begin their adventure by crossing town to face Atlético Femenino B tomorrow...