A shock for the ages provided the happiest night in the life of what, right now, might be the saddest city in Spain
“Javi Antón is crying,” said Vicente Parras, and he wasn’t the only one. The manager of Club Deportivo Alcoyano looked across the pitch at El Callao with its whitewashed walls, “Morale” splashed alongside the little blue door in the corner and saw his players still on the grass long after the final whistle. Some of them held white shirts, most of them held phones. “They’re all out there calling home,” he said: endless messages and dozens of conversations starting the way his had a few minutes before. Parras’s son couldn’t come to the game; no one could. “I just wanted to make sure he had seen it,” he admitted.
Not all of them had. José Juan Figueiras’s wife and his daughter were in tears when he called overwhelmed by it all, but his five-year-old son was in bed, asleep. It was late and he had school tomorrow; he’d have to find out what had happened in the morning, just what his dad had done, why everyone was suddenly talking about him. What had happened was this: tiny Alcoyano, the club that had not been in the first division for 70 years and were now in the semi-professional third tier with its 102 teams and 10 groups, had just beaten the biggest of them all, knocking Real Madrid out of the Copa del Rey. With 10 men, no fans and in extra-time.
Alcoyano hold on!
An upset for the ages as Real Madrid go crashing out of the Copa del Rey pic.twitter.com/glLLdRyetF
ALCOYANO GO 2-1 UP ON REAL MADRID!
The Segunda B side are down to 10-men and just a few extra time minutes away from knocking Zidane's side out of the Copa del Rey! pic.twitter.com/MXYgrhLi1a