04/02/2021 11:10
Clarín.com
sports
Updated 04/02/2021 11:11
There is a stoic fan dressed in red and white and standing still in the middle of a blue and white flagged crowd that jumps and sings on the platform to the rhythm of LA Mona Jiménez.
"Little by little, I fell in love with you ...".
Only a pandemic could be able to interrupt the ritual
.
The fans had agreed.
Also the leaders, who signed the request and insisted that the final is played with the public or not.
So what should happen on April 18, 2020 was postponed and will end up happening this Saturday, April 3, 2021 at 4:30 p.m.
A new function of the Basque derby, of the mythical clash between Athletic Bilbao and Real Sociedad and nothing less than the final of the Copa del Rey.
As there will be no spectators in the stands, the celebration was ahead of the previous one.
And it generated strong controversies since the flags made by each other broke the protocols that govern in Spain and most of Europe in the face of a new escalation of coronavirus infections.
That passion is inevitably linked to what football generates in these latitudes.
Although the differences between a classic between two historical teams from Argentina and the intimate history of the Basque derby will quickly appear.
Madness in San Sebastián: the fans of the Real Sociedad made a massive flag in support of their players.
Photo: DPA
There are shared hugs
, there is hospitality, there is respect between the footballers and an identity that unites them above the colors of each team.
The cornerstone in this soccer symbiosis occurred in 1976. After the death of the dictator Francisco Franco, the aim was to normalize democracy and certain values that had been outraged.
In Euskadi (Basque Country) wearing the
ikurriña
(official flag) was a crime.
Until soccer broke the mold.
“We have authorized all regional flags except the Basque one because it is not a regional flag, it is a separatist flag.
Before allowing that flag to be displayed, they will pass over my corpse ”, warned Manuel Fraga Iribarne, Minister of the Interior and vice president of a government in which the Francoist heritage still predominates in the derby.
Athletic Bilbao fans said goodbye to the team that left for Seville for the final on Saturday.
Photo EFE
Josean De la Hoz, a Real Sociedad player between 1972 and 1978, who was called
Trotski
in the dressing room
, remembers those days as “a time of transition in which the people were fighting for their demands”.
And sentence: "We were also the people and we had to do something."
The idea was simple as well as blunt.
But first you had to get an ikurriña.
And since they couldn't be bought, De la Hoz had to turn to his family.
"My brother asked me to do one, but he didn't tell me why," explained the sister of the former realist player in a documentary on
Euskal Irrati Telebista
(EiTB), the Basque regional television.
On December 5, captains Inaxio Kortarrabia (from Real) and José Ángel Iribar (from Athletic) entered the Atocha playing field holding the flag.
And that classic was forever impregnated like the derby of the ikurriña.
In an interview with the newspaper El País in 2016, De la Hoz warns that there was a key obstacle to overcome before the emblematic act.
You had to bring the flag to the field.
"I put it in the hole of the spare wheel that was fitted in the back, in the trunk."
The blue Fiat 128 managed to overcome the usual police controls that were carried out in the areas surrounding the stadium.
They stopped him, they searched the car but they didn't find the flag.
On January 19, 1977, a month after that match, the ikurriña was raised in the Plaza de la Constitución in San Sebastián.
Soccer had already done its thing.
This Saturday will be a final that will serve to revalue Basque football that had its splendor in the 80s. And it will also be the first duel between Athletic and Real in a Cup final, at least with their current names.
On March 20, 1910, the Biscayan team won a cup final 1-0, but Real Sociedad at that time was playing under the name of Vasconia Sporting.
The derby couldn't wait any longer.
A year later, the Covid-19 pandemic keeps stadiums empty in Spain and almost all over the world, that is why the Sevillian stadium of La Cartuja, which in normal times would have filled its 60,000 seats, will look empty.
In the same scenario, two weeks later, on April 17, Athletic Bilbao will play the cup final corresponding to the current season, against Messi's Barcelona and also without an audience.
Thus the challenge is even more interesting for Athletic, the second team with the most Cups in Spain, with 23 trophies, only behind the 30 that Barcelona has.
Although the last conquest in the Copa del Rey was in 1984 precisely against Barça (1-0).
History makes a nod to Athletic, which gives Real Sociedad a 15-game lead in the derby.
And also the present puts it as a favorite.
The Bilbao team comes with the experience of having played seven finals since 2009, three in the Cup, one in the Europa League and three in the Super Cup.
Of them, he lost the first five, four against Barça and one against Atlético de Madrid;
and he won the last two, both in the Super Cup and against Barcelona.
The last conquest was in January and with a brilliant sprint in which he prevailed against Real Madrid and Barça in four days.
Athletic's coach,
Marcelino García Toral
, is the current Cup champion, after winning his last final with Valencia in the 2018/2019 season.
Since donning his new team diver in January, he has only lost two of the 12 games he has coached.
"There is no favorite, we are there on our own merits and after making great qualifying rounds," they clarify.
For Real Sociedad it will be their first Cup final since 1988 when they lost to Barcelona 1-0.
"Here everyone transmits enthusiasm, from the coach to the props, and that is good," said midfielder
David Silva
.
"Athletic is in a good moment, but we will have our options if we are correct," said the former Manchester City player and figure of the San Sebastian team that reaches the final in a low moment of results after losing three, drawing two and only having won two of his last seven games, in addition to being eliminated from the Europa League by Manchester United.