pepe

During the 2009–10 season, Pepe returned to claim his place back in the starting line-ups. On 4 October 2009 he scored his first goal in the league, against Sevilla FC at the Estadio Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán, heading home from a Guti free kick in a 1–2 loss. On 12 December, however, during a game at Valencia CF (3–2 win), he landed awkwardly following an aerial challenge, and was stretchered off the pitch in the dying minutes of the first half; scans later showed that he ruptured his right knee's anterior cruciate ligament,^[6] going on to miss the rest of the season and jeopardizing his FIFA World Cup chances.
In 2010–11, Pepe was joined at Real Madrid by countrymen Ricardo Carvalho and manager José Mourinho, pairing up with Carvalho to form one of the most efficient defensive sectors in the league. On 2 October 2010, Diario AS published an article where the player was reportedly open to leave the club on a Bosman transfer:^[7] according to the newspaper, "when he signed for Real Madrid in 2007, he sacrificed a part of his salary to pay for his huge transfer fee. This made him one of the lowest earners at the club, making €1.8 million a year.^[8] Again, he missed several games due to injury (calf)^[9] and, after exhausting negotiations,^[10] finally put pen to paper on a new cont