The move to Real Madrid is touted for many a star. It is the pinnacle of football for many players, even if they are already plying their trade at one of the world’s best. Real Madrid’s history, riches and glamour appeals to footballers almost universally. They are show business on grass.

Premier League players have moved to Real Madrid with varying degrees of success. Some have been disastrous like Jonathan Woodgate, others have become one of the sport’s all-time greats like some guy called Cristiano Ronaldo. Their respective periods in Spain might just be a reflection of their abilities rather than great contrasts in fortune, but it shows that the move to the Santiago Bernabeu is what so many players crave.

Others will have turned it down (probably) and some will have tried to get the Spaniards interested in them to little success. The way the cookie crumbles and all that.

The latest to be linked and flirted with by Real Madrid is Eden Hazard. Could it happen? What fee would Chelsea demand?

Well, none of it matters, because it would be a terrible mistake for the Belgian anyway.

Here are three reasons why Hazard would be mad to leave Chelsea for Real Madrid...

Stay where you’re loved

Look at how Gareth Bale started off in Madrid. Look at how Eden Hazard is idolised in the blue segment of West London.

They are incomparable.

Hazard will, whatever happens in the remainder of his career, go down as one of Chelsea’s greatest ever. He evidently enjoys the team being built around his talents and, although it may seem an unambitious decision at this point, he would be like a fish out of water in that respect in Madrid. He would be simply another star, another big name with more expectation than admiration.

Does he really want to have to prove himself again?

Get cosy on the bench

Spending big money on a player does not mean they start at Real Madrid. Just ask James Rodriguez.

Hazard, even from the days when he broke through as a teenager, has been a stalwart in the sides he has played for. The heart of Lille’s side, the magician of Chelsea and iconic in an exceptional cohort of Belgian talent, the diminutive, mazy dribbling forward only knows being number one.

Again, it’s a case of Hazard losing what he has when he could just as easily be warming the bench. Karim Benzema, Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale will not be displaced easily.

Unfinished business?

Chelsea are far from at the top level of European football. When Eden Hazard arrived it was because they had won the Champions League, the Blues had been competing in the latter stages of the tournament on a regular basis for the best part of a decade, too.

Now Chelsea are coming off of a down season, a season of vast underachievement and turmoil. Hazard was at the centre of it all, but next season will be the year he – at his peak – has an opportunity to carry Chelsea late into the elite competition that brought him to Stamford Bridge in the first place.

A couple of league titles is nice, but it is European silverware that will determine Hazard’s standing.