Citizen Raúl takes to the Bundesliga

Citizen Raúl, like any other in Düsseldorf, shovels the snow from the sidewalk outside his house, a luxurious chalet in the upmarket Oberkassel district. German law obliges people to remove snow to prevent accidents and Raúl finds it quite amusing: "This is a structured, organized country with very polite people," he says.

Raúl likes to train in the Parkstadion in the mornings so he can enjoy the afternoons with his children, a liberty denied him during his 15 years as a Real Madrid icon. Now at Schalke 04, he is free to eat out with his wife, have a siesta or watch his kids play soccer at school. Nobody follows him. "I went out for a walk with him and his family one day," says Sergio Escudero, one of three Spanish players at the club. "I was amazed how people would respectfully ask for a photo with him. In Spain it would have been an avalanche."

"We ask ourselves: 'he's won everything, why does he run like that...?'"

It is the first time the 33-year-old has lived outside Spain and the delight of the working-class followers of Schalke, whose fan base is the Ruhr mining region, at his presence is evident everywhere. Three out of four Schalke fans wear Raúl's number 7 shirt.

Gelsenkirchen, where Schalke plays at the Veltins-Arena, is a phantasmal city without much emotional attachment to the team on its outskirts. Schalke, formed in 1904, is proud of its traditions: the muscle of its sponsor, Russian gas giant Gazprom, and the most passionate support in Germany. And of the beer pipes in the stadium, which supply 50,000 fans with refreshment. Here soccer is, as in the north of England, a religion: Schalke takes some 3,000 away fans to every match.

Raúl is the first player to arrive at training and the last to leave, a habit he formed at Real. The training ground is an inhospitable place, a hollow ringed by piles of rocks and battered by infernal winds. In pre-season, Felix Magath's sessions were almost inhumane. Not even under the granite gaze of Fabio Capello had Raúl undergone such a regime. When Magath was at Bayern Munich, club vice president Karl-Heinz Rummenigge said: "The next time he brings out a medicine ball, I'll sack him."

Indeed, Magath was sacked by Schalke on Wednesday, but it is doubtful it was for his medicine ball routine. The players may not have enjoyed it, but they felt the benefits. Raúl is in excellent shape; 11 league goals, three in Europe and one in the cup. He is also liberated from the trappings of being captain, a job filled by German international goalkeeper Manuel Neuer. For the first time in his career, Raúl's number 7 shirt is worn outside his shorts, a reflection of his relaxed mood.

"Everyone's delighted with him," says Thomas Spiegel, a club employee, who recounts the wide-eyed reaction of midfielder Alexander Baumjohann to the Spaniard's arrival. "A few days ago I had him on the PlayStation and now he's beside me in the locker room."

"The kids look up to him and hang on his every word," says Spiegel. "When he speaks, everybody is quiet and waits for [Christoph] Metzelder to translate. We thought at 33 he may have passed his best physical state. Now we ask ourselves: 'he's won everything, why does he run like that...? We like hard-working players.'"

Raúl has picked up a few words of German - he uses tschüss to say farewell and smiles at its sound. He attends classes with fellow Spaniards Escudero; José Manuel Jurado, a former colleague at the Bernabéu; the Brazilian Edu and the Ghanaian Anthony Annan, a nephew of former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan. These two hours a week are more comedy than anything: "None of us have the faintest idea," says Escudero.

But one phrase citizen Raúl has become very accustomed to hearing since last summer is danke für kommen: Thank you for coming.