Striker stuns San Mamés with remarkable penalty but a late collapse means the unthinkable looms for La Liga stalwartsIt was just a penalty, some might say, but it wasn’t. It was two, for a start. And two like that in a moment like this.Your club – and it is your club – is in the bottom three, the abyss opening: a first ever relegation, an end that feels like it really could be The End, changing everything for everyone. A club unlike any other, they’ve sacked their manager mid-season for the first time in over a decade, an interim board applying the clause that allows them to act only when “indispensable”, so bad have things become. The new man, Gaizka...
Two historic, special clubs battled Madrid and Barça at grounds that embrace traditions rather than turn their backs on itIt’s exactly 100km from Anoeta to San Mamés as the car drives, passing Ipurúa halfway, sitting pretty in the Ego valley. Visible from the road, there was no one at the stadium this time – Eibar were down to Madrid to play Atlético – but there were thousands at each end of the AP8, striped shirts everywhere, flags hanging from bars where old photos hang from walls and they were making a lot of noise, packing Pozas Street in Bilbao, and spilling into the sunshine on Zorroaga Way, San Sebastián. Maybe even more noise than ever before. There’s something special about...
Athletic’s stalwart defender scored his first goal after more than 300 games and that was far from the only unusual occurrence in Spain in week sixThe door opened and there they were, waiting for him: all of Athletic Bilbao’s players and all the staff, the president too, like a secret birthday party.When Mikel Balenziaga appeared, they started cheering and clapping, piling in to slap him on the back and head. Then they burst into song, bouncing about. If no one shouted “Surprise!” it was because they weren’t the surprise; he was. Ten years Balenziaga has been playing, more than 300 games, and he had never scored. On Saturday, he did – and it was a beauty, too, bursting through to...