The player who had been on the pitch for every league game since 2017 watched his team lose 1-0 to Iago Aspas and CeltaWeird things happened this weekend. The circle closed at the Bernabéu with a 0-0 draw that wasn’t just better than it sounds, but better than almost anything all season. Xavi Hernández, the Barcelona coach who declared “our history says you have to win and play well; a 1-0 in the 90th minute is no use”, went to Girona and oversaw a third 1-0 victory in a row, completing a run from pre-history to go five points clear and become winter champions. Real Madrid, who turned the plan upside down by playing well and not winning, didn’t score...
Having lost a club legend in ‘Mauri’ two days previous, Athletic’s 4-0 demolition of Real Sociedad felt like a fitting tributeEleven villagers were enough to bring down a giant, so it goes. On the day the 1958 World Cup final was played in Solna, another game took place 2,200 miles south, which wasn’t where they wanted it but that made it better in the end.Athletic Club de Bilbao – Atlético then, by dictatorial decree – had requested the final of the Copa del Generalísimo be held in a neutral city, but the Generalísimo wasn’t going anywhere which meant that nor were they. At best, they were told, Spain’s showpiece game could be moved to the Metropolitano so they said let’s...
The manager made headlines for switching to ‘fan mode’ after winning the Copa del Rey having endured all the lean times“If you’ll allow me,” Imanol Alguacil said, as if there was anything they wouldn’t allow him any more. He was one of them after all, the communion about to be made very loud and very clear. He had also just done what no one had done for 34 years and only two men had done before; what no man had done, in fact. It was after midnight on Saturday and Alguacil had just led Real Sociedad to their first major trophy since 1987, back before even he was at the club, and the fourth in their history, securing victory in...
Real Sociedad and Athletic Bilbao’s delayed Copa del Rey final will be an historic occasion – even without any fans to witness itThey have waited a long time for this, just not for it to be like this. Saturday night’s Copa del Rey final between Real Sociedad and Athletic Club, the Basque derby staged almost 1,000km south in Seville, should have been played 12 months ago. Instead, it was postponed by the pandemic and a decision that defines these two historic representatives of a unique place, a country: together, they refused to play without their people. But it’s not that, or not only that.It’s not just that this match, the match, will take place a season late and, with supporters...
An icy flight across Spain was in vain for Madrid as they were held in Pamplona while Atlêtico’s games in hand rack upAthletic Club Bilbao parked the bus but couldn’t land the plane. The driver arrived early and waited outside Barajas Terminal Four on Friday evening while thousands of feet above him the pilot bringing the team to Madrid to play Atlético circled the city before giving up and going home. At around the same time Real Madrid’s players were sitting in another plane on the runway, watching snow fall and time pass. To the south, Rayo Vallecano’s footballers got off the coach and helped push stranded cars along the road, or tried to. “Do you think we should be...