Resting on its laurels, this is how Spain played the penultimate game of the Nations League. The team that months ago shed its emotional and sporting burdens, seduced with its game, beat mercilessly and understood that almost no one is capable of beating it did not appear in Pasarón.. Because not even a storm has weakened these players, World champions and heading towards the Paris Olympic Games, but Italy and some unforgivable mistakes have.. [Narrative and statistics (2-3)]

Spain, with the score in favor at half-time, gave the Italians an advantage by returning to the field with ten. Thank goodness it came apart just when I had my homework done.. It was a warning that writing history is not easy and there is still a way to go to be an Olympian.. He took the field with the need to secure a point to be in the Final Four and had all three in his hand in the 12th minute. Athenea del Castillo appeared at the top of the area to break Boattin and put the team ahead in the 12th minute. In the 25th minute, and without having to score again, Switzerland completed its victory against Sweden and made the Spanish team the first to reach the Final Four of the Nations League.

From that moment on, everything became cloudy.. Spain dominated, but the Italians readjusted themselves to cover the holes they left on the sides and, from there, sneak around the Cata Coll area.. The prize would come after the break due to a series of extraordinary errors.

“Aitana told us late”

The first was to go out with 10 players. Neither Athenea, replaced by Lucía García, nor Aitana Bonmatí returned to the field.. But her replacement, Esther, jumped onto the pitch a minute after the Greek referee whistled for the restart.. In the first 30 seconds, the tie came. Caruso saw the gap between Irene Paredes and Ona Batlle and looked for Giacinti. The versions of what happened are contradictory.. “Aitana notified us late and it took us that long to activate Esther,” explained Montse Tomé.

“He said the changes almost at the beginning of the talk and we knew that we were left on the bench,” explained Athenea.. It is not the first controversy that the coach has had to face.. In the duel against Switzerland he had to repeat the call because the changes were uploaded late to the UEFA platform.

The fact is that that error and the tying goal by the Italians messed up the duel and Spain did not know how to resolve it.. Aleixandri had a header and, without time to regret it, the comeback came. From an error in the release of the ball by Irene Paredes, without rhythm after weeks injured but starting, Cambiaghi's goal was born. The slope got even steeper at 1-3, after a shot by Linari at the far post.

Final Four in February

Spain was decomposing and Italy had lost respect for it. With pride they sought to remake themselves. Galician Tere Abelleira hit the crossbar with a right hand. She wanted to avoid leaving her house defeated and between the two centers she assisted Esther so that she could cover up the defeat a little.. That's what Cata Coll did with a save from a dry shot by Galli that would have been humiliating.

Spain's fortune is that it had a place in the Final Four served on a plate by the Swedes. Otherwise Tuesday's duel at La Rosaleda would have been a final. It is a wake-up call for what is to come from February 21 to 28. Spain will have to win two duels if it wants to be in Paris.

One of their rivals will be France, also qualified, and on the last day Germany and Denmark will compete for a place in group 3 and group 1 is even more open, with the Netherlands, England and Belgium.

«Like Bryan there are little ones, he is 100% street, he always has been». In the Pichón neighborhood of Málaga, football is everything. Or almost everything. Adjacent to the ring road that surrounds the city and bordering three industrial estates and a cemetery, Tiro de Pichón belongs to the Cruz de Humilladero district, one of the poorest areas of the capital, where the gross salary barely exceeds 20,000 euros.. Today, at the Santiago Bernabéu, he will have the opportunity to be noticed.

Bryan's love for football was born where it is born to those destined to treat the ball better than anyone else: on the street. Because the Granada striker is not a star molded in a great academy, he did not grow between high and low blocks, between mornings at the gym and afternoons of tactics. His learning was different and that is why he is such a special footballer.. «He has street football etched in his way of playing. El Pichón is a neighborhood where street children play, it is difficult to train them because they are not disciplined, but when they become soccer players it is noticeable,” Pepe Zamora, who coached Zaragoza at CD Tiro de Pichón, explains to EL MUNDO.

“I punished him every 10 minutes”

«I caught him when I was 12 years old, in the first year he started playing 11-a-side soccer. When it arrived at my nursery, I took it without hesitation. It gave me a wonderful impression. He was skinny, tiny… He played that you wouldn't see. “He had a lot of self-confidence and he left the elders very easily,” recalls Zamora, who also admits that he had to punish him more than once. “He was a difficult kid,” he admits with a laugh. «I punished him every ten minutes. He was very naughty. Generally good, but he always messed up something,” says the coach, who lived in the same neighborhood as the little teenager. “It is a conflictive neighborhood,” he acknowledges.

Bryan's football career changed in the youth category and in part thanks to Zamora. El Tiro de Pichón wanted to form a team of senior players to compete in the Honor Division and Zaragoza, who was a first-year player, was not selected.. «I loved him a lot, so I advised him to go to a Nacional club (a lower division), which was going to be more important.. And it went well”. After five seasons, Bryan left Tiro de Pichón and signed for Conejito de Málaga, from where he was able to try his luck in several First and Second Division team quarries.. “He had a very good year and tried out for Valladolid and Betis, until Granada called him and signed him.”

Zaragoza, during a match with Granada. 14 million clause

The rest is history. Zaragoza was loaned for a year to CD Ejido 2012 in the Third Division and upon returning he made his debut with Granada's first team in the Cup, in November 2021. Two years later and after a 21-22 season playing in the reserve team, he has been the hero of the last promotion, scoring three goals in the last three rounds of the Second Division, giving away three key victories for promotion.

This season, his debut in the First Division has not stopped him and at 22 years old he already has five goals in the League and a call-up to the national team, with which he made his debut in the first match of the qualifying phase for the Euro Cup against Scotland.. Curiously, close to home, in Seville.

In May, Granada rushed to renew his contract because the clause was only 2 million euros, but the current one does not seem too expensive for what the footballer is showing: removing him from Los Cármenes would cost 14 million euros, a figure that It has already caught the interest of half of Europe.

Someone once told me the following: “No one has ever played tennis like Nadal and no one will ever play like that again.”. What's more, I shouldn't do it, because you can't play like that. I don't know what you mean. Nadal's drive is very special…No, it's not true.. When he trains, Rafael hits him very well. What happens is that when he plays he gets scared and tends to go up because he knows that this way he gives the ball a little more spin.. And no one ever hit the forehand like Steffi Graf, who always hit it late, and yet won I don't know how many Grand Slams.. Everyone has a way of hitting the ball, there are many people who hit it in a complicated way and more or less do it well.

The “when he plays he gets scared” is probably one of the most disruptive statements that Toni Nadal has made about his nephew's tennis.. Scared Nadal seems like a tennis oxymoron, but the guy and former coach has reasons to say it. He has reasons, but that doesn't take away the impact of what he says one bit.. So does this mean that Nadal played a good part of his career scared?

Toni Nadal unlocks his mobile phone and searches his WhatsApp messages for a video. In it you can see points from the final of the 2003 Aix-en-Provence challenger, which pitted Nadal against the Argentine Mariano Puerta.

«It's just that you pick up a habit, and when you pick up the habit…. I teach this many times to the kids here at the academy.. Did you see where the drive ended? And the serve was better…. Sixteen years. At sixteen years old he hit it pretty well.

That final in the French challenger was won by Puerta 3-6, 7-6 (8-6) and 6-4, the Argentine's only victory over Nadal, although it does not count for the official ATP face-to-face, which shows a 4-0 in favor of Nadal. Among those matches, the 2005 Roland Garros final, the
Rafa's first big success.

The more Toni Nadal talks, the more amazing what he says is. The “when he was sixteen he hit it quite well” sounds like he later hit the drive worse, his most powerful weapon, precisely that shot that drove tennis crazy, because it was something never seen before.. And yes, that's what it says. “Rafael enters the circuit very soon…” he slips as a justification.

Translated: Rafael Nadal was very young and opted for something conservative for fear of losing. The pragmatic nephew prevailed over the uncle and lyrical coach.

That first Roland Garros final, the one Nadal beat Puerta, did he win it playing much further back than the one in Aix-en-Provence? Yes, yes… Because he felt the responsibility? If you watch the whole match of the French challenger, you will see Rafael hitting him well. The whole game. Because I was an exaggerator of hitting the ball very well, making the complete movement, for a matter of aesthetics and common sense and logic.. If I pull that way, the arm goes there! But their trademark is different! Of course, of course! It's different because then he starts playing with older people regularly and…. fuck! Starts hitting him a little late. And start lifting the ball with more spin, to give yourself more time…. and win! And since it's going very well, he continues. And since he's doing very well, I don't tell him anything.. I tell him: “No, no, keep going, keep going.” Was your goal for Nadal to hit the ball with the complete movement, with that elegance, then a mistake? Well, I don't know, that's how it went well for him and that it's reality. You see the sixteen-year-old Nadal and you say: “Damn, how this guy hits it, looking for the drive, going to look for it forward, playing above the line.” Do we agree that that type of more conservative game that he adopted generated more wear and tear? Yes, of course. And then that affected his physique. I just don't know.. I don't know. Wouldn't it be logical to think so? David Ferrer suffered a lot and his physique was not affected. He hit flatter than your nephew David Ferrer… Rafael's physical problem comes from his foot problem, which is lifelong.

The conversation had reached a dead end.. If the style of playing four meters behind the baseline, which is what Nadal developed in the first years of his career, caused him more wear and tear, then it clearly affected his physique.. In any case, the foot injury was not the cause, but the consequence. The logical thing would be to think that the physical problem did not come from the problem in the foot, but that the problem in the foot came from the physical problem in all its dimensions: that of a young man who demanded from his body what none of his rivals perhaps never asked him, and that he was successful with that bet, although he spent five years in dry dock.

The situation had reached a limit that is difficult to imagine in June 2022. A photo landed on the mobile phone of Feliciano López and other players: that of Nadal's foot.

The reaction was one of disbelief bordering on horror.. How can Rafael Nadal play (and win!) in those conditions? It was a photo of the left foot, that foot affected by Müller-Weiss syndrome, which causes the bone to lose life.. It is a necrosis of the bone, the bone dies. Those who saw the photo were scared by the state of the instep.

The creative style of Las Palmas was more powerful than the seasoned football of José Bordalás, who saw the chain of eight league games without defeat broken at the Gran Canaria Stadium. Getafe, victim of a certain disconnection in the last part of the first half, could do nothing against a rival that is placed eighth in the table, just four points from the European places. A stomp by the Paraguayan on Enzo Loiodice, punished in the first instance with a yellow card for a grab, was reviewed on the monitor by Busquets Ferrer, who ended up opting for a direct red..

“There can be all kinds of opinions. After eight days away from the Coliseum, his team has not yet achieved a victory. This weakness contrasts with the solvency of Francisco Javier García Pimienta's team, already with four wins after seven games in their stadium.

The Greenwood Menace

The matter could have become even more complicated for Getafe at the start, when Óscar Rodríguez saw a red card rectified by the VAR. This scare did not confuse the azulones, capable of holding down the young yellow talents, with Alberto Moleiro or Kirian Rodríguez at the helm.

“Everything went against us, because in the first half nothing had happened and we had even had the best scoring situations,” analyzed Bordalás, in reference to the tactical control and approaches of Mason Greenwood, once again the most inspired of his team. stroke.

However, the situation turned 180º two minutes before the break thanks to the genius of Kirian, author of a superb cross from the right wing, with hardly any space, which Julián Araújo, more attentive than the centre-backs, headed into the net from the second stick.

Competitive nature

After passing through the locker room, Getafe wanted to change course by bringing on José Latasa instead of Djené, but almost immediately they found themselves outnumbered by the aforementioned red card to Alderete. Despite the adversity, Borja Mayoral was able to tie after a blatant error by Coco when the ball was released. A sample of the competitive nature of the Madrid team, also capable of generating concern in set-piece actions.

Las Palmas, obviously, also generated danger in the vicinity of David Soria, who avoided the 2-0 with a feline intervention after a header from Sergi Cardona. Fatigue was taking its toll on Sandro Ramírez, back in the yellow eleven, but even more so on Getafe, who was able to breathe in the 87th minute when the referee annulled a goal by Moleiro.

The sentence was made to wait until added time, when a pass by Marvin on the right side was completed, with an empty goal by Cristian Herrera.. The first goal for the 32-year-old forward, in front of his fans, more than a decade after leaving the club's lower divisions to play for the Elche reserve team. The youth player's emotion made the party in the stands more emotional. With 21 points, Las Palmas seems closer to permanence every day.

The conclusion does not seem very complicated: a new, but friendly face, to calm the fire of an institutional crisis that has completely changed the Las Rozas Football City. This week the Federation appointed Markel Zubizarreta as the entity's new Director of Women's Football. A necessary decision after the departure of the last boss, Jorge Vilda, sports director and coach thanks to Luis Rubiales, and a choice in line with the new times that are taking place in the hallways of the federation building.. “We had to listen to the footballers and solve this problem,” it is explained from within.

This is how Zubizarreta (Mondragón, 1985) arrived, and in case you're wondering, yes: he is Andoni's son. She landed at Barcelona in 2015, aged just 29, a few months after her father left, and built the best team in the history of the women's section of the Barça team, winner of four Leagues, two Champions Leagues (2021 and 2023 ), four Cups and three Spanish Super Cups. But we're not just talking about titles.

Zubizarreta, a graduate from INEF and a Master in Sports Management, was in charge of management and the first team during his time in Barcelona, and with him Alexia Putellas, Aitana Bonmatí, Patri Guijarro, Mapi León and company became among the best soccer players in Europe, reaching four of the last five continental finals and accumulating three Ballon d'Ors: two Alexia and one Aitana. From that evolution and from that brilliant sporting and personal relationship comes the request of the internationals and the reflection of the Federation. Why is that: a question from the federation directors and a candidate from the players. The RFEF wins, signing an extraordinary worker, with weight in European women's football, with an outstanding resume and close to the hard core of the national dressing room, and the footballers win, who finally find a trustworthy figure after the plans and the internal wars of recent months with Rubiales and Vilda.

Three missing

This is where Zubizarreta's first task will fall: getting Mapi León, Patri Guijarro and Claudia Pina, the three of 'Las 15' who have not yet returned, to declare themselves eligible again.. He has dealt with them since the beginning both on and off the field, and the players' trust in him, they say, is “very high” and he has even helped them with some problems at home.

Zubizarreta left Barça at the end of September, a few days after Vilda's dismissal. His name was the first on the list of candidates and only a few issues needed to be clarified.. His arrival will go beyond the elections to the Federation, because he is understood as a consensus and independent figure at a time when the internationals demanded to have an organizational chart similar to that of the men's team.. A football director, on the one hand, and a coach on the other, as in the case of Albert Luque and Luis De la Fuente.

On the bench, Zubizarreta seems to trust for the moment in Montse Tomé, who despite initial doubts about being Vilda's assistant, seems to have won over the locker room during these first calls.. In Zubizarreta's Barça, yes, no coach lasted more than two years. We will see now. His idea, as this newspaper learned, is to be “disruptive”, improve the relationship with the clubs, deteriorated in recent times due to the constant war with the League, professionalize the Federation's competitions and sign high-level technicians and trainers who Raise the bar on training methods, something that they also demanded in the senior team during that protest movement called “It's over.”

Along with Zubizarreta comes Gonzalo Rodríguez, lawyer and delegate of the Barça first team during recent seasons.. He will be your right hand in management. Ana Álvarez, until now Director of Women's Football, remains in the organizational chart and will dedicate herself to the work of developing women's football in the Federation. New faces and new times for peace.