Ander Herrera: Why midfielder is playing for free at Real Zaragoza

Ander Herrera’s most recent competitive game was in front of a raucous La Bombonera crowd playing for Boca Juniors in the Copa Libertadores.

His next will be in the Spanish third division in front of roughly 6,500 fans against a regional side, Gimnastic de Tarragona.

But Herrera says his return to Real Zaragoza on a free transfer from Boca is just as important as any move he has made in his career.

“This is probably the last dream that I wanted to make come true,” the Spaniard tells BBC Sport.

“To come back home, to the place where I grew up, that gave me the opportunity to be professional – not only in football, also as a human being.

“And I still have the passion, I still have the desire. I still have that love for football and to do it at home is the best way to end up in my career.

“In Spain, we say closing the circle.”

The midfielder has returned to his boyhood club after 15 years away – including two spells at Athletic Club and stints at Manchester United, Paris St-Germain and Boca.

The 37-year-old has won the Europa League, FA Cup and multiple league titles, played under Jose Mourinho, Thomas Tuchel and Marcelo Bielsa, and shared dressing rooms with Lionel Messi, Neymar and Wayne Rooney.

However, success has been in short supply in recent years for Zaragoza, who beat Arsenal in the 1995 Cup Winners’ Cup final.

They were relegated from La Liga in 2012-13 – two years after Herrera had left for Bilbao – and after 13 seasons of declining finishes in the second division, fell into the notoriously difficult third tier of Spanish football.

“It has been so sad, of course, for all us Zaragozistas,” says Herrera, who watched the club’s decline from afar.

“Real Zaragoza belong to Europe, they belong to compete for trophies, to be fighting with the biggest clubs in Spain and in Europe.

“I want to put my quality, my experience and my passion to try to help my team to come back where I think we belong.

“But since the first day I came, I don’t want to talk too much about the past. We have been talking too much about what we have done wrong.

“It’s always killing our minds why that happened, always thinking about negative things. Let’s stop crying about what happened in the past.

“Let’s build on the future. Let’s come every day to training with a smile.”