The Rayo dichotomy: a neighborhood against a president

On Saturday, January 29, one day after Rayo announced the signing of Carlos Santiso for the women's team - a coach who cheered a group rape in a WhatsApp audio because it promotes team spirit -, in the dressing room of B, someone announced that he was leaving the club on “principles”.

Jorge Blanco, 31 years old and physical trainer for women's B, explained to the locker room that he neither could nor wanted to continue sharing an institution with someone who considers that raping a woman unites the team.

“Out of respect for Rayo's values, my principles, those that my parents have instilled in me, I couldn't stay.

Something that should be normal has been valued, ”he says.

Jorge is from Getafe, he did not grow up in Vallecas, but he lives in Vallecas, he shops in Vallecas, his friends are from Vallecas.

Vallecas is a working-class neighborhood in the south of Madrid, with 229,246 registered inhabitants.

With a team closely linked to the neighborhood and the values ​​of the neighborhood.

With a hobby that in February 2017 managed to disrupt the signing of Zozulya for considering him "neo-Nazi".

With a committed social mass and with a very special feeling, as Narcisa Grao Ibañez, 69 years old and Rayo's only female shareholder, sums up: “I don't like football, I like Rayo and being from Rayo.

The first time I entered the stadium I didn't know what an offside was, neither the striker nor the winger, I had no idea of ​​anything.

But I lived my Ray, as long as you don't understand, you live your Ray”.

And Rayo is also a platform, the ADRV, which is dedicated to helping those who have the most problems and which during the pandemic raised 40,000 euros so that the Infanta Leonor Hospital,

Santiago Abascal and Rocío Monasterio pose with the president of Rayo Vallecano, Martín Presa.

@Santi_ABASCAL

And Rayo also Mrs. Lola, a lifelong fan, one of the first and most faithful followers of women's football, who makes tortillas at home to take to the squads.

El Rayo is also a social fabric so united that it has come to organize itself in morning, afternoon, and night shifts when it has been necessary to collect food for the food banks.

So that there would be rice, pasta, cheese and other products for everyone, especially in the long lines during the pandemic.

That is organized for the collection of toys for Three Kings Day.

Or simply, as Narcisa says, sitting on a terrace in the neighborhood, "to help some soup kitchen with difficulties."

And she adds: “They brought me to the neighborhood when I was nine months old.

Vallecas is Vallecas and don't take me out of here.

There is something that is not in all other places: togetherness.

We turn when a person has a problem, we are all workers, some in a better situation than others, but it is a working-class neighborhood.

And as a general rule, many of us are on the left.

We help each one in what he can ”.

More information

"For our daughters, Santiso out of Vallecas"

Vallecas is Vallecas.

The Republic of Vallecas, as Ska-P sang.

And his fans, so sensitive on a social level, so on the left, have lived for ten years with Raúl Martín Presa, the president, who is the antithesis.

How do you live with that?

How can this dichotomy be explained?

Diego Rodríguez answers, a member of the ADRV Platform for ten years, which brings together seven clubs and some 1,200 subscribed members who do all kinds of social work.

“Martín Presa is a person completely removed from the reality of what Vallecas is, anyone who walks through here, who knows a little about the neighborhood environment, sees that it is multicultural and we all live together.

He is a person who does not live together, who has not been in Vallecas on a day-to-day basis in his life,

who comes from a completely different reality [of a person with resources] who does not know what a person who is a member or subscriber of Rayo for 20 years has been able to experience.

She neither knows her nor cares about her”.

And he adds: “Presa tries to mold an image of a supportive club with values, it tries to take advantage of the current that the fans have been working for a long time, and then… Then they sign Zozulya, invite Santiago Abascal [VOX leader] to the field or hire Carlos Santiso and show that he doesn't feel that way”.

What was the most serious for you?

“I have given you these three examples because they are the ones that have had the greatest impact, but if we were to make a list of acts with which the board has attacked what we believe to be the values ​​of the club, it would be endless”.

This newspaper tried to contact Martín Presa but received no response.

A woman places banners outside the Ciudad Deportiva Rayo Vallecano against the coach of the women's team, Carlos Santiso. Rodrigo Jimenez (EFE)

Rodríguez is 28 years old, has been a member since he was eight, and says that the platform was born 12 years ago to bring together the most critical supporters clubs with the Ruiz-Mateos, former owners of the club.

And that, once there was a change of president, they changed their work and focused on social issues: collecting food, toys and instilling the values ​​of Rayismo in the children of the neighborhood.

“If we don't do it, nobody in the club does it,” he says.

Narcisa also regrets that the president ignores them.

And that when she does, she assures her, it's to threaten to take the team elsewhere.

She “she Calls the shareholders' meeting on December 31 so that people don't go.

The signing of Santiso is the latest provocation.

He had the soccer players with contracts as cleaning ladies, he did not register them with social security… ”.

How do you put up with that dichotomy?

Narcisa answers: "Because we live the Ray, otherwise it would be impossible...".

And this is also explained by Antonio Castilla, 62 years old, president of the Federation of Supporters Clubs and Supporters Clubs for the Disabled, who has been fighting for years so that disabled people have comfortable access to the stadium and the club does not charge their companions for the trip to take them and bring them.

Castilla observes how the club's image deteriorates due to its president: “The Santiso thing is just the latest.

Presa does not support the social part of the neighborhood where the team is.

Vallecas is a working-class neighborhood, totally on the left, although there will also be people on the right, but he gets into the club for business.

He is an entrepreneur ".

Castilla uses three categories and a metaphor to explain what lightning and rayism are.

“There are those who go to football because they consider it a spectacle.

Others who get a little more involved and go to the fields since their grandfather took them when they were little.

And then there is another group, the social mass for which it is more than a football match, we are protesting people.

It's like life itself: you can go to the theater with your partner, you're going to see a play that doesn't involve you, but there are people who do, because they're creating that play.

Vallecas is totally supportive.

He puts together the play, he doesn't just go see it.

He collects money, organizes social events… ”.

Those who make the play continue to work despite what they consider "insults" from the owner of the club.

Because, Diego sums it up this way: “Being from Rayo is dreaming of impossible things.

In that difficulty is the motivation to be from Rayo.

We all try to go as one, we are from a small neighborhood with very strong values ​​that makes Rayo what it is.

The sports part is similar to day-to-day life in the Vallecas neighbourhood, most of the people are working class, it is very difficult for us to earn a living, we have to work from a young age to survive and nobody has given anything away”.

Vallecas is Vallecas.

And he hopes that Carlos Santiso leaves the women's team as soon as possible.

It is summed up by Narcisa, Diego and Antonio.

"In 2022 you can't have a coach cheering on gang rape."

According to Martín Presa, in statements to COPE Santiso "he apologized on his knees" and many players have gone to his office "crying" and telling him that "what they are doing to the coach is unfair."

Protest banner against Carlos Santiso at the Ciudad Deportiva Rayo Vallecano during the women's match against Valencia. Rodrigo Jimenez (EFE)

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