That of Jorge López Marco (Madrid, 1978), Tote for the world of football, is a precise example that talent cannot do everything.
The midfielder had plenty of it but he showed it by dropper, insufficient to meet expectations, always so dangerous.
However, he played, among others, for
Real Madrid and Valladolid, which this Wednesday (9:30 pm, Movistar LaLiga) meet on the fourth day of the Santander League.
Tote began to promise very early,
joining the Madrid quarry in 1996, which, as with Raúl, took advantage of the closure of the rojiblancas inferiors
("I've been athletic since I was a child," he
confessed in AS in 2010).
His progression fueled the trust placed in him, top
scorer of Third in a Madrid C in which a certain Iker Casillas stopped.
Naturally, he also stood out for Castilla in 1998-99 until he appeared with the first team: under
Toshack
and whistling José Luis Prados, he
made his debut at Anoeta (3-2) on May 8, 1999,
a date after the one that nothing was the same again ...
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Toshack himself pointed out the exit, albeit provisionally, for 1999-00.
Then a
dance of cessions began, of comings and goings,
which did not work.
At
Benfica he
did not make ten appearances and in 2000-01, back in Madrid, the same thing happened.
With two courses almost lost there was, in Valladolid, a script twist.
Pepe Moré
gave him 36 games in which he scored
9 goals and gave 2 assists, more than interesting records to play in the 12th place
that year.
Pucela was the ideal place for Tote's inspiration, his dribbling being widely commented and, especially, some rabonas that in white would turn against him.
In 2003, in Huelva, with 13 minutes in his boots that season, he failed with that resource a propitious opportunity to give the League to Madrid.
"When I do this kind of thing, I don't care about the game or what you play. I do it because I feel like it. I had tried with Valladolid and it was a goal. I would do that rabona a thousand times," he said
in a talk with AS to respond to criticism.
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The truth is that the hope of a great leap in Valladolid was then reduced to a little jump immediately,
its growth cut short by having only six games in Madrid in that 2002-03 incident of the Nuevo Colombino.
And that in the Copa del Rey he responded, with 5 goals and 3 assists in four games.
Finally, at the Bernabéu they threw in the towel and Tote joined Betis,
where he was left halfway again.
Nor did things turn out for him in the few months that he tried his luck at
Malaga.
From Valladolid, to the controversial ascent in the Hercules
So many missteps led him
in 2005 to the origin of what was perhaps his best football, Valladolid,
although for this he had to be measured in Second.
Tote took advantage of his stage in the category to savor a sweet revenge.
He saw the faces with Madrid B in Valdebebas
("I do not care because Madrid does not matter to me. It has been a long time since I left and the only thing left for me was the affectionate treatment of the people," he said in the previous one) and
scored in the 2-3 win for his team.
At the end of his career there was some justice towards his enormous quality, badly mixed with his character and lack of regularity.
From 2006 to 2012 he settled in the Hercules, of which he was captain and with which he returned to First.
That promotion in 2010, however, would later be tarnished by being surrounded by
suspicions of rigging.
"I do not like to be called a gangster; I did nothing wrong,"
Tote would defend himself in 2010 in AS.
Eight years after hanging up his boots, Madrid-Valladolid, a duel between his birthplace and his first home away from home, remains a special date for him.