Fernando Roig: "I don't understand football, I'm a manager"

The La Cerámica stadium stands iconic in the center of Vila-real.

The streets empty due to confinement only enhance its yellow armor and its representative value for a population of just over 50,000 inhabitants.

The architect of the miracle that this modest club close to its centenary is part of the football elite is Fernando Roig Alfonso (Pueblo Nuevo, Valencia, 73 years old).

For 23 years he has been its owner and president.

Vicente del Bosque began his football career in Castellón, then in the Second Division, seven kilometers from Vila-real, who also played in the silver division.

When he shakes hands with Fernando Roig in the cozy and comfortable box of the stadium, his past becomes present.

Forest.

I have very good memories of this whole area.

I will never forget the fishermen when they went fishing at five in the morning and gave voices that woke up the whole neighborhood.

He lived in El Grao.

It's been so long that you may not even remember, but I played two alternate years at Castellón, on loan from Madrid.

I was 20 years old ...

Fernando Roig.

You reached the final of the Cup against Athletic (1973).

That was an event for the province.

I would be in my twenties, but I was already following soccer.

My father was a subscriber for Valencia, Levante and Castellón.

He was very football fanatic.

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DB

As a connoisseur of the soccer history of the province, I have always wondered how you came to take charge of Villarreal.

In a couple of years, he will be 25 as owner and president.

Nobody currently has been in Spanish football for so long in office from that double responsibility.

FR

We got into that home football tradition.

We arrived in May 1997 and on May 24, 1998 we went up to Primera in Compostela.

We thought we had invented football and we went down the following year.

In the first round we made 24 points.

We thought that in the second we could do another 24 and we would save ourselves, but we added only 12 and went down.

On matchday 14, we beat Barcelona at the Camp Nou (1-3) and at the end of that match we were tied at 19 points with them.

DB

How did the idea of ​​buying a club come up?

FR

It came over me.

Here was a president who had put up with it a lot, Pascual Font de Mora.

The children wanted to sell it and we got involved.

When I took the step, I already had in mind what I wanted to do.

Nothing was improvised.

Man, going up to First the first year was a bit of a coincidence, we were lucky.

We had a plan to move up in two or three years.

In Vila-real there was a lot of fans.

The stadium was very small.

It is this very we are in now.

We have been reforming it every summer for many years.

Now they fit 25,000.

We are not talking about the quarry to speak.

We have come to play with eleven nationals.

We want to grow from below

DB

When buying a club it is always a temptation to sign great players.

You have done it, but you also take care of the quarry.

Palermo, Riquelme, Senna came ... but you never neglected what was below.

FR

And Craioveanu, Sorín, Forlán, who was the Golden Boot with us, Santi Cazorla, Senna, with whom the national team began to be what it later became.

When we arrived the team had no where to train.

He was on loan to the field from a factory, or he did it right here.

My obsession was having my own training ground.

We did it the following year.

Then we built the first Sports City, now a second.

We have fought a lot, a lot, for the quarry.

It's true.

DB

I have in my head an image of the last time Villarreal was relegated to Second.

You were still on the grass with the logical pain and your brother Juan came over and gave you a hug.

A few days later you said that you had to lower the budget, but that the quarry was not going to reduce anything.

FR It

was what we had to do.

I like to watch grassroots football.

We sold players, we balanced the budget and the quarry did not touch anything.

It was a double decline because it dragged the subsidiary and we are still trying to get it up from Second B. The important thing, being in whatever category, is to train players for the first team.

DB

Soccer is so unique that maybe what you envision in your company and it turns out well, in soccer, it does not turn out as well.

FR

The difference is that at Pamesa I am the owner, the executive and the command, but at Villarreal I am an executive who does not consider himself the owner.

The owners are them, the 18,000, the 30,000 yellow fans.

I have to be a good manager.

I count on everyone's feelings.

What we have to do is execute it well and have an economic balance.

When we went down, I sold things from my estate to capitalize it here and remove what was in debt.

Today Villarreal is a healthy club that has no debts and has a high budget for what the city is.

We are the seventh LaLiga budget [117 million].

DB

You have also had the virtue of surrounding yourself with few, but good people.

FR

Before, José Manuel Llaneza was the CEO and now he is vice president.

Now my son Fernando is the CEO and the one who makes the decisions.

I don't understand football, but I really like it.

The final decision is made by the one who makes it and the others support it.

DB

Did you have a model club that you would like to be like?

FR

We wanted to grow up and down and get to where we are today.

We have signed big players, but every time we sign less and we get more.

We are not talking about the quarry to speak.

Of the eleven that come out each game there are five, six or seven that are ours.

This season we have come to play only with national footballers.

DB

The list of coaches you have had is also very good.

Caparrós, Marcelino, now Emery ... Calleja, with whom something curious happened, left and came back.

FR

No, he did not leave, we threw him out, we threw him out.

We were not on the right track and I made the decision to have him come back.

I was very criticized for bringing him in after I had fired him, but we had a good year and then another good one.

We signed Pellegrini, nobody knew him in Europe and then Real Madrid signed him, which paid the clause [4 million euros].

We have even transferred a coach.

When we went to renew him for the first time we presented him with the new contract and he told us that he only wanted to change two words from the old one.

Where it put dollars we had to put euros, and where it said gross, we had to put net.

We sign.

With him we were runners-up.

They say we are missing a title;

but our title is to be in First.

Vila-real is a city of 50,000 inhabitants

DB

How club do you have something to do, do you have a specific goal in mind?

FR

Improving in football is very difficult.

Everyone tells us that Villarreal needs a title, but our title is to be in the First Division every year.

And this season with our score we are about to ensure it.

What feeds us is being in First Division, which is very, very, very complicated.

If we go to the Champions League, fine;

if we go to the Europa League, fine ...

DB

In 2023 you will celebrate 25 years at the helm of Villarreal ... Now in the history of our football there are only three presidents ahead: Santiago Bernabéu, who was 35 years old and Augusto César Lendoiro and Francisco Rubio, who at Deportivo and Numancia, respectively They reached 25. It seems that it does not give itself the importance it deserves.

We are talking about a city of just over 50,000 inhabitants.

FR

We are very proud to be what we are.

We have built this model stadium and Villarreal has paid for it and the property belongs to the people.

Our mayor is the smartest in Spain.

All this is his and he has not put a penny.

He is very happy and so am I.

DB

Does the Roig project at Villarreal have an expiration date?

Does it take a lot of time?

FR

No, I always say that the week is for Pamesa and that the weekend is for Villarreal.

I'm not going to retire.

We will lower the activity a bit, but here we will continue. I am an adopted son of the city.

We are proud of what we have done.

Even when we went down to Second I never had any problems.

People love me and I think we've done a great job.

Vila-real is well known today thanks to football

Roig Alfonso Foundation

DB

I wanted to comment on an issue that is not strictly sporting, but I think that together we should give visibility to these situations.

I am very sensitive to this because I have a boy, Álvaro, with a disability and they told me that you had a brother with a disability who died a few months ago and that all the brothers turned to him.

FR

Yes, Alfonso Roig Alfonso.

Capicúa.

Of the brothers, he was the only one who was born in the hospital.

The rest of us were born at home.

He had a problem with the umbilical cord, he lacked blood flow to the brain.

He lived with my parents until they died and we created a foundation [Roig Alfonso Foundation] to take care of him that will continue to function forever.

We turned the family farmhouse into a residence for him and other children who had problems.

We put doctors, nurses, educators and a workshop at their disposal so that they could work.

We also collaborate with many centers in the Valencian Community.

We employ more than 700 children and my brother Juan [Mercadona] and I are proud of it.

Every week we went to see him.

He lived well.

He died happy.

"I am totally against a closed Super League"

Villarreal had a magical moment in the spring of 2006. The semi-finals of the Champions League against Arsenal.

Penalty.

Riquelme, a specialist, at launch.

Lehman stopped a German goalkeeper with bad fleas.

Vicente del Bosque reminds Fernando Roig of the situation.

The owner of Villarreal raises his head and fixes his eyes on the goal where that slump happened.

“We all remember that moment as if by scoring the penalty, we had qualified for the final, but the reality is that we should have played extra time.

We had many, many occasions.

We played a great game and we deserved to win.

We would have played the final in Paris against Barça.

It was a culminating moment, like when we were runners-up in the League.

For me it was a title ”.

Today transports us from the League to the Super League of the future.

Del Bosque is not a big fan of the idea.

Fernando Roig, neither.

"I do not see it.

I am totally contrary.

I do not hide.

I believe in a well distributed Champions.

With 32 or 48 clubs.

With groups of six teams instead of four.

Let there be more parties.

Perfect.

But you have to earn the sports right to play it.

It cannot be closed to 16 or 18 clubs.

Or 30. And just leave a little door open like the Euroleague basketball does.

No. You cannot make a practically closed League.

Soccer needs competition.

The domestic leagues must be fully respected.

There we have Atlético fighting for the title.

To Seville, to us, to Real… We all want to grow.

I don't see a closed competition viable.

We are a very good League.

You have to increase competition and create new projects ”.