Story for the grandchildren

I space a lot my writings about football because I know that most of them are not interested, but a new European Cup for my lifelong team is well worth a column.

On the day of the Final, two interviews about it were published with me 

and the 

, connoisseurs of my colors.

And since no one asked me for anything similar in Spain, maybe the Madridistas here would like to know what I said and what I thought.

What most surprised those journalists, Italian and German, was my confession that I wasn't nervous before the last game, because Madrid had won their last seven finals and it was okay if they missed this one.

We could afford it without too much loss and you don't always win in life.

But, I added, above all else, there was the following factor: in this edition of the Champions League (it's hard for me to write that tacky name), Madrid had given us six exciting, vibrant matches, ones that create fans, regardless of the team that is be.

Qualifiers that seemed lost and that, in a few minutes —preferably the last ones—, had been won with an unexpected whirlwind of play and a sudden cowering of the rivals who thought they already had everything in their favor.

They weren't just any rivals.

but three of the most powerful and unpleasant clubs of our time, forged on the basis of corrupt millionaires from countries outside the best football tradition: Paris St-Germain, owned by a sheikh or an emir;

Chelsea, until recently owned by a Russian oligarch friend of Putin the Invader;

and Manchester City, built with the help of a checkbook by another sheikh or another emir.

These bottomless fortunes have been distorting football for years, and it is not ruled out that they end up appropriating all the European clubs that for more than a century belonged to the members and the people.

Well, today's people don't care.

Manchester City was the equivalent of Espanyol in Barcelona.

Chelsea, until recently owned by a Russian oligarch friend of Putin the Invader;

and Manchester City, built with the help of a checkbook by another sheikh or another emir.

These bottomless fortunes have been distorting football for years, and it is not ruled out that they end up appropriating all the European clubs that for more than a century belonged to the members and the people.

Well, today's people don't care.

Manchester City was the equivalent of Espanyol in Barcelona.

Chelsea, until recently owned by a Russian oligarch friend of Putin the Invader;

and Manchester City, built with the help of a checkbook by another sheikh or another emir.

These bottomless fortunes have been distorting football for years, and it is not ruled out that they end up appropriating all the European clubs that for more than a century belonged to the members and the people.

Well, today's people don't care.

Manchester City was the equivalent of Espanyol in Barcelona.

They would be happy if they could field De Bruyne, Gundogan, Grealish, Foden and others and they were trained by a category coach like Guardiola, and on top of that they were capable of thrashing Barça.

PSG had triumphed shortly before they put petrodollars in their veins, and now the three supposed best footballers in the world, Mbappé, Messi and Neymar, are in their ranks.

The same goes for Chelsea.

Madrid has never been poor or clean of turbidity, its president owns one of the largest construction companies.

But at the moment it does not receive economic injections from Qataris, Russians or Saudis —not blatantly at least—, belonging to non-democratic countries, without freedom of expression and that mistreat and subjugate their women.

In this sense, and only in this sense, Madrid, in those agonizing qualifiers,

it represented the old sentimental values ​​of football, the old European nobility against the totalitarian, Russian or Arab fortunes.

That, against all odds, he overtook the ostentatious nouveau riche one after another was so admirable that if he lost the Final against Liverpool, a rather likeable club, there was no room for disappointment or reproach.

Endless gratitude would have prevailed for those six “old school” games, back when the game was truly a passion.

As if this were not enough, Madrid this year was made up of very veteran veterans (Modric, Benzema, Carvajal, Kroos, Marcelo at times) and inexperienced rookies (Vinicius, Asensio, Rodrygo, Valverde, Camavinga, even Nacho), and he has not resorted to his two stars

, Hazard and Bale.

It is not understood how the former withstood the devilish pace and speed of their opponents;

how the latter instantly inherited the spirit of Di Stéfano, of whom perhaps, when they arrived, they had not even heard of;

how the third parties have dedicated themselves to the contemplative life without batting an eye, and even so Madrid is European Champion for the fourteenth time.

A statue should be erected for Benzema in Chamartín, as well as for Modric and Courtois and of course Ancelotti, and, if a sculptural group is chosen, the rest should appear in it.

Ancelotti is an educated, serene and discreet man who, with the invaluable contribution of Zidane in previous years, has managed to erase the poisonous and conceited memory of Mourinho, so bad and so unworthy of Madrid.

I don't think there is a more meritorious, inexplicable and preternatural edition of this championship, in which a team of "old" and novices were successively drawn to the most powerful and difficult opponents on the continent, and eliminated them, one after another, with effervescence and outburst, when the accurate bookmakers (it suits them, for the amounts they move and pocket) did not give a penny for him, not even in the Final.

The Madrid has infinity of defects, but it possesses a virtue that causes stupor: it cannot be killed except by emptying the magazine, refilling it again and emptying it again.

What happened in Madrid-Manchester City I had to put it on five times to understand it, and even so I have not succeeded.

It was the 89th minute and Madrid needed not one goal, but two, to reach extra time.

In 90 I had already reached it,

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