Image source, Getty Images

• Published13 September 2024

In a new documentary on his YouTube channel, Real Madrid star Jude Bellingham has revealed that manager Carlo Ancelotti once jokingly threatened to replace him with his younger brother Jobe.

The comment came after the younger Bellingham sibling scored a brace for his new club Sunderland last August in a 2-1 win against Rotherham.

"I’ll never forget, as we’re coming out, Ancelotti goes to me, ‘we’ve bought the wrong one’," says Bellingham.

The 21-year-old claims that the Italian manager told him that he was planning to bring his younger sibling in to play in his position.

"Finally, he just gave me a little smile and my heart dropped. I’m like, 'no pressure for today'," Bellingham remembers.

The pressure clearly didn’t get to the elder sibling either way, because he bagged a brace of his own in a 3-1 win against Almeria.

The first episode of Bellingham’s new documentary series dropped on the player’s YouTube channel on Thursday.

It charts his high-profile £88.5m move from Borussia Dortmund to Madrid, as well as the stand-out season that followed, which Bellingham ended as the club’s top goalscorer as they won La Liga, the Spanish Super Cup and the Champions League.

Favourite memories of Madrid – Zidane’s volley and Madrid derby

On his way to Madrid to officially sign for the club, Bellingham’s younger brother Jobe gives him a quick quiz about the La Liga giants.

Asked for his favourite moment from Madrid in the Champions League, he says, "looking back before my time, I’d say Zidane’s volley," referring to the Frenchman’s goal against Bayer Leverkusen in the 2002 final of the competition.

In terms of more recent memories, the England international cites the 2014 Champions League final, "when (Sergio) Ramos equalised with the header late and then they won 4-1 in extra time".

World Cup was moment he thought ‘this is it’

Sat on a private jet following her eldest son’s official unveiling at Madrid, Bellingham’s mother Denise says: "He looked across at me and he was teary and I thought, 'he gets it'."

She says there have been a couple of moments where the youngster, who was playing for Birmingham City three years before his move to Madrid, has grasped how far he’s come.

"One was when he went to the World Cup and he said, 'I sat on the plane and I thought this is it'," she describes.

Bellingham was England’s star player during the 2022 Qatar World Cup and scored on his major tournament debut in a 6-2 win over Iran.

‘Surreal’ to train alongside players he’s ‘used on Fifa’

As he arrives for his first training session with the team during the documentary, the young man from Birmingham describes it as "surreal" to be to training alongside "players that I’ve used on Fifa".

He adds: "Playing with those guys just takes your whole game to another level. It makes you understand the game better, it makes you feel like you belong."

He 'used to make daisy chains' when dad took him training

Having achieved so much at such a young age, viewers may be surprised to learn that Bellingham wasn’t always so interested in football.

During the documentary, the Champions League winner says: "Football first grabbed me when I was about seven."

He describes how his dad Mark - who scored more than 700 goals in non-league football during his own playing career - used to take his young son along to coaching sessions.

"It just didn’t really appeal to me," says Bellingham. "During the games when kids were playing I was just trying to make little daisy chains for my mum."

He says he remembers his dad looking at him thinking 'god, what a waste of space this kid is'.