Football in the week without football

Football.

My week was quiet, with no games to comment on on the FIFA date.

“A week without football”, I said to myself, before finding myself face to face with a jumble of matches in which football once again demonstrated its capacity for seduction, crossing countries, ages, genders… Seeing crowds accompanying teams of all stripes, one wonders: How many ties between parents, children and friends has the passion for football strengthened over time?

And how many ties will he have broken by leaving control to low passions?

But here he continues, full of energy, renewing illusions, animating debates, being divisive at worst, creating community at best.

We are talking about a game and, as such, about an activity that is outside of reality.

Boys.

I was invited to Maspalomas by José Ramón de la Morena to attend the Liga Promises, an international tournament under 12 that since 1996 has been organized by the El Larguero Foundation.

I love looking into the future seeing kids who are showing themselves on television for the first time.

They have an adult seriousness, because pressure weighs heavily on pleasure and spontaneity.

Some are imposed by the size of the body, others by the size of the talent, and it is a separate spectacle to see how the intelligence of each one tries to unbalance with the weapons that nature gave him.

In some cases, the professional they are going to be already appears.

Everyone controls and passes with great precision in speed, some carry the factory feint, few dribble and none are encouraged to release inspiration.

Madrid (1) and Barça (0) reached the final.

In the end they cried winners and losers.

TV audience: one million.

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All articles by Jorge Valdano

Homeland.

In America and Africa, the qualifications for the next World Cup culminated, in matches where entire countries were reduced to eleven guys who, with patriotic sweat, took charge of national pride.

The merciless football knocked Italy out of the World Cup, with a whole history of competitiveness in tow made of calculation, cunning and great footballers.

Since they were victims of Macedonia, the culprits had to be found.

Some geniuses attributed the elimination to Italy playing too well.

Fortunately, this has an easy solution: that in the next tie they select the worst players.

Chile's Golden Generation was also left without a World Cup, but that is nothing more than the latest evidence of the passage of time.

Finally, with the sense of honor that characterizes the fans,

The record.

Barça and Madrid in women's football met in the quarterfinals of the Champions League and made history at the Nou Camp, breaking the attendance record, with 91,553 spectators.

As these days there is nothing like a record to underline a phenomenon, this statistical leap puts women's football in another dimension.

More Barça fans than Madrid, normal;

more young people than older people, good data for the future;

and, above all, more women than men, which opens up a new space for women, not only on the pitch, but also in the stands.

A game that had the prognosis defined by the superiority of Barça, today the best team in Europe.

But competitive, because the Madrid players are beginning to know what they represent and they played, despite the 5-2 draw, without complexes and with pride.

That's where it starts.

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