Florentino Perez is the president of Real Madrid, which has won the most titles. Under his two-stage mandate, the football section has won 37 titles, including seven European Cups. That equates to nearly 30% of all those added to the white club's trophy cases throughout its history.

But this season, that number will not grow. The white president's deep unease about the season's developments has several anchors, but one important one is ending it without any celebration. In the offices of Valdebebas, they understand that the squad is more than enough to not end the season without a single trophy.

Since he took office in June 2000, this is the fifth season in which the football team ends the campaign empty-handed. Two were in his first term, and three since 2009, when he decided to return to the presidency. Each trophyless season has had important consequences.

2004-05: Galactic collapse

The Galactico project had entered a crisis the previous season. Queiroz's arrival to modernize Del Bosque's winning model was a fiasco. Only the Spanish Super Cup was won, and the Portuguese knew he was doomed months before the season ended. After the European fall in Monaco.

For 2004-05, they bet on Camacho and the star signing of Owen. The coach lasted three league matches, and the season was a calamity. Garcia Remon and Luxemburgo passed through the bench. Madrid neither won titles nor came close to doing so.

2005-06: The resignation

Wanderlei Luxemburgo, signed during the Christmas of 2004, lasted until the same dates the following year. He was the coach who closed out a trophyless season and the one who started another that ended the same way. The end of that path without trophies came with Lopez Caro on the bench.

Promoted from Castilla by Florentino, he was the coach who lived through the president's abrupt resignation at the end of February 2006. The galacticide had been consummated.

2009-10: Bitter return

The Calderon era arrived, and Madrid achieved something that will at least go two decades without being repeated: winning two straight league titles. But a great scandal caused the president's fall and led to elections being called.

Florentino came out of the shadows, ran, and swept. He took over a team that, after the two league titles, had only won the Spanish Super Cup, and with the tremendous wound of Barcelona's 2-6 win at the Bernabeu.

With his return came three world-impact signings: Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka, and Benzema. As well as three European Championship winners with Spain: Xabi Alonso, Arbeloa, and Albiol. The chosen coach was Manuel Pellegrini.

The extraordinary bet had no reward. The season ended empty-handed, with Pellegrini doomed since October when they lost 4-0 in the Copa del Rey to a third-division team (Alcorcon), and with Guardiola's Barcelona marking an era.

The answer to winning again was found in Milan: the signing of Jose Mourinho, the Champions League-winning coach and Barcelona's executioner in the semifinals.

It was not just a coaching change. Because 2009-10 was also the season of the club's farewell to two White House emblems: Raul and Guti.

2020-21: Farewell to Zidane and Sergio Ramos

After the trophyless season of Florentino's return came an entire decade in which Madrid never went empty-handed. Mourinho won the 2011 Copa del Rey, beating Barcelona in a tremendous final in the midst of a terrible battle of Clasicos. It was the beginning of an era in which Madrid was European champion four times, three of them in a row. It was something not seen since the 1970s (Ajax and Bayern).

That glorious era wobbled in 2018-19. After Zidane's first exit, Madrid only won the Club World Cup. They did so with Solari, Lopetegui's successor, as coach. In March 2019, ZZ was back. His work meant that the following season, Madrid was both league and Supercup champions.

The pandemic arrived, the full season with empty stadiums, and Madrid ended without titles. They fought for the league until the last matchday, but Atletico did not fail in Valladolid. In the Champions League, they fell in the semifinals (Chelsea), and in the Copa del Rey, they were eliminated in the quarterfinals at home (3-4 against Real Sociedad).

But there was a poison running through the team: Sergio Ramos' entrenched contract renewal. So much so that on June 17, in the middle of the European Championship from which he had been left out, the Madrid captain announced he was leaving the club. Earlier, on May 31, Zidane had announced that he was once again leaving as Madrid's coach. And he gave a reason: the club's lack of trust in his leadership.

2025-26: And now?

Ancelotti returned. Madrid won two league titles (2022 and 2024) and the Champions League of those seasons. But last season, only the European Super Cup and the Club World Cup arrived at Valdebebas. Small potatoes.

The Italian fell. Xabi Alonso was signed, but they never truly believed in him. Arbeloa arrived, and barring a miracle of miracles in the league, the 2025-26 season will end with nothing to celebrate in Madrid.

Until now, only Luxemburgo has survived a trophyless season in the Florentino era. It was for a short time. The trust in his 2.0 project, after he took over the team in December, lasted only 14 league matches. Now Madrid is considering scenarios for its bench because it does not seem that Arbeloa will get the second brief chance given to the Brazilian.

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