Real Madrid

Real Madrid landed in Bogotá at 14:15 local time. After resting for one hour at the Sofitel Hotel, the squad trained at El Campín Stadium -with capacity for a crowd of 45,000-, where they will face Independiente Santa Fé on Thursday. The session was followed live at the stadium by more than 5,000 fans, which included the Mayor of Bogotá.

It's been 56 years since the 'Best Club of the 20th Century's' last visit to Colombia, which has created a great sense of anticipation for the upcoming friendly between the Whites and Independiente Santa Fé. "I'd jump onto the pitch right now wearing Raúl's shirt," said Mayor Samuel Moreno, present in the crowd.

The players trained for an hour despite their exhaustion after the nine-hour flight, while the session was shown on the scoreboards at the stadium.

Besides Gago, Drenthe and Marcelo -currently preparing for the Beijing Olympic Games with their national teams-, Schuster decided to leave Cannavaro, Sneijder and Higuaín behind in Madrid due to their injuries. Sergio Ramos, De la Red, Casillas and Metzelder -who recently rejoined the squad after playing in the Euro 2008 final-, have also stayed behind in order to do specific recovery work to catch up with the team's form.

Schuster devised a mild session consisting on jogging, stretching exercises and warm-up work-outs for the players' cold and exhausted muscles due to the long trip and low Colombian temperatures -10º C-. Most of the squad wore long sleeves because of the strong wind, so typical at this time of the year in the South American country.

Ball exercises followed and everyone participated, including coach Schuster. There was a great atmosphere both on the pitch and on the stands, with the crowd cheering and calling out players' names, expecially those of Raúl, Robinho, Van Nistelrooy and Guti.

This was the second session with the squad for Rafael van der Vaart, who is making great strides in his adaptation to the team.

Training concluded with a practice game on half the pitch and some shots on goal, with Codina and Dudek between the posts. The keepers had been previously working out with goalkeeper coach Pedro Jaro. Before going back inside, the Madridistas had their picture taken with the kids from the Real Madrid Social Integration Academy of Colombia. Raúl and Salgado stayed behind a little longer to thank the fans for their spectacular reception.