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Müller and Santana, goodbye to an area predator and a tennis legend

Several people say their last goodbye to tennis player Manolo Santana in the burning chapel installed in the Caja Mágica in Madrid. EFE / Chema Moya / Archive

Madrid, Dec 30 (EFE) .- The year 2021 culminated with the death of great sports figures, in many of their specialties, among which two stood out above the rest: the myth of German football Gerd Müller and the Spanish tennis player Manolo Santana, who popularized a sport that in the sixties of the last century was almost exclusively for the elite in the country.
But apart from Müller and Santana, great figures such as coaches Vicente Cantatore, Carlos Timoteo Griguol, Dusan Ivkovic, former footballers such as Jimmy Greaves, Roger Hurt, Luis del Sol, Justo Tejada, Tarcisio Burgnich, Pachín, cyclists such as Mercedes also said goodbye. Ateca and José Pérez Francés, motorcyclists like Dean Berta Viñales, athletes like Yuri Sedij, footballers and journalists like Carlos Matallanas or boxers like Manolo Calvo. These are their stories:
MÜLLER, THE GREATEST AREA PREDATOR IN HISTORY
After a long fight against Alzheimer’s, at the age of 75 and in the month of August, Gerd Müller, legend of German football and Bayern Munich, faded. The least Germanic striker due to his height (176 centimeters) marked an era in the late sixties and seventies of the last century. Always placed in the place just inside the area, it was one of the great predators of the area. The year 1972 was his most prolific year. He accumulated 85 goals in a calendar year and was only surpassed by Lionel Messi, who scored 91 in 2012.
His list of titles is tremendous: four Bundesligas, four German Cups, three European Cups, a Recopa, an Intercontinental Cup, the Belgian European Championship (1972), the World Cup in Germany (1974), two Golden Boots (1972). and 1974), a Ballon d’Or (1970), a Ballon d’Or (1972), two Ballons de Bronze (1969 and 1973) and seven Bundesliga top scorer trophies. He accumulated a total of 491 goals throughout his career. Soccer lost one of the best scorers in history.
SANTANA, LEGEND AND PIONEER OF SPANISH TENNIS
At the age of 83, the flame of one of the great pioneers of Spanish sport went out. Manolo Santana, a key figure in the sport of Spain in gray times, was a model for future generations who looked at the mirror of the Madrid athlete, who achieved his great feats in the sixties of the last century when tennis was a residual sport in Spain .
Santana was a ball boy at a tennis club in its early days. The partners themselves financed the career of a boy who pointed out ways and who won two Roland Garros (1961 and 1964), a United States Open (1965) and a Wimbledon (1966). Those titles paved the way for other great tennis players who later followed their path: Andrés Gimeno, Manuel Orantes, Sergi Bruguera, Juan Carlos Ferrero, Carlos Moyá, Albert Costa and, above all, Rafael Nadal, who said goodbye to his great teacher: “Thank you for what you did for our country and for marking the path of so many. You have always been a reference, a friend and a person close to all.”
LUIS DEL SOL, MYTH OF REAL MADRID, JUVENTUS AND BETIS
Luis del Sol Cascajares was called the “seven lungs” for his incredible ability to run tirelessly across the field and occupy more space than anyone else. He left Seville at the age of 86, after leaving a great legacy in the world of football marked by his time with his three soul teams: Real Madrid, Juventus and Betis, where he began his career in 1953 and where he ended in 1973.
Star of the Verdiblanco team between 1953 and 1959, he was signed by Real Madrid to arrive in time to win the last European Cup of the first series of the initial five together with Alfredo Di Stéfano, Paco Gento and Ferenc Puskas. He won the best, the fifth, in that historic final against Eintracht Frankfurt (7-3) and in 1962, for financial reasons, he went to Juventus, which paid 35 million pesetas with which the Sports City was built. In Italy he won a League and a Cup and returned to Betis to retire in 1973.
PACHÍN, THE OFF-ROAD DEFENSE OF THE GREAT REAL MADRID
A very athletic defender with incredible strength, Enrique Pérez Díaz Pachín arrived at Real Madrid just in time to win the last European Cup of the first series of five. In 1959, he became a fixture of the white defense. It would last little more than a decade and before saying goodbye he won another European Cup, the 1966 one, the one they called the “yeyé”. He added seven Leagues and one Intercontinental to his record. On February 10, one of the best defenders in the history of Real Madrid left.
JUSTO TEJADA, EXTREME HISTORIC OF BARCELONA AND REAL MADRID
Like Pachín, also in February, Justo Tejada said goodbye, who during the 1950s showed his skills on the right wing of Barcelona with the five cups. Together with Ladislao Kubala, he was a pillar of the two Leagues, two Cups and two Fair Cups that the Barça club won, which, after losing the final of the 1961 European Cup, dispensed with their services. He left for Real Madrid in the decline of Di Stéfano, but had time to play another final of the European Cup, that of 1962: Benfica, once again, left one of the most skilled players of their time without a title.
CARLOS TIMOTEO GRIGUOL, ARGENTINE FOOTBALL MASTER
Carlos Timoteo Griguol left at the age of 86 with the honor of having been one of the great coaches of Argentine soccer. “El Viejo”, as he was known in the world of football, was a footballer before becoming a coach (1957-1969 in Atlanta and Rosario Central) and went on to win a Copa América with Argentina in 1959. Later, already on the bench, he won three First Division titles with Rosario Central and Ferro Carril Oeste and an Inter-American Cup at River Plate. He finished his career in Gimnasia Esgrima La Plata in 2004 as one of the most influential coaches in his country.
VICENTE CANTATORE, MYTH OF BANQUILLO DEL VALLADOLID
Although in Spain he also trained Sevilla, Tenerife, Betis and Sporting, the Chilean nationalized Argentine coach Vicente Cantatore made a place for himself in history at Real Valladolid. Footballer in the 50s, he became known on the benches with the successes of Cobreola de Chile, from where he made the jump in 1985 to Real Valladolid to mark a before and after in the history of the Spanish club, which achieved three meritorious positions in the League: tenth, eighth and sixth in addition to saving the team in 1996 and qualifying for UEFA in 1996. He also lost the 1989 Cup final to Real Madrid. Without him, “the lord” of the benches, Valladolid would not have been the same.
JIMMY GREAVES, TOP SCORER IN TOTTENHAM HISTORY
At age 81, on September 19, Jimmy Greaves, Tottenham’s top scorer in history with 266 goals in 379 games, faded forever. In addition, he was the top scorer for the English team with 44 goals in 57 games. He was part of the team that won the World Cup in England in 1966, although he only played group stage matches. Later, he was injured and disappeared from the line-ups, a thorn that stayed stuck in him forever.
ROGER HUNT, LIVERPOOL GOALER
A contemporary of Jimmy Graves, Roger Hunt is the top scorer in Liverpool’s history, scoring 244 goals between 1958 and 1969. In those seasons, he won two Leagues and an FA Cup and also won the 1966 World Cup in England. However, Hunt was the protagonist with three goals in six games and by appearing in the photo of Geoff Hurst’s famous goal against Germany in the final.
YURI SEDIJ, AN UNREACHABLE RECORD AFTER 35 YEARS
At the age of 66, the hammer thrower Yuri Sedij died, two-time Olympic champion at the Olympic Games in Montreal 1976 and in Moscow 1980. Born in Ukraine, he competed with the Soviet Union to leave an unattainable mark, for the time being, in the history of athletics: In 1986, with his 86.74-meter throw at the Stuttgart European Championship, he entered the history books. A heart attack got the better of him.
DUSAN IVKOVIC, LEGEND OF THE EUROLEAGUE
Dusan Ivkovic is one of the most successful basketball coaches in his 38-year career. He won titles almost everywhere he was. Both domestic, in the former Yugoslavia, Greece and Russia, and international. He raised two Euroleague (Olympiacos), two Koracs (Partizan and PAOK), a Recopa (AEK Athens) and a ULEB (Dynamo Moscow). He also directed the Yugoslavia team, with which he won three continental golds and one silver, one silver at the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games and promoted the careers of names such as Petrovic, Kukoc, Radja, Divac or Vrankovic. He left Belgrade at the age of 77.
JEAN-PIERRE ADAMS, CHIEF OF “THE BLACK GUARD”
After almost 40 years in a coma after an error in the dose of an anesthesia in a knee operation, Jean-Pierre Adams, a Senegalese centralized French national, died who together with Trésor formed a very strong pair of fearsome centrals that France enjoyed and that the The press nicknamed him “La Garde Noiré” (“The Black Guard). Some knee problems forced him to undergo surgery in 1982. His last words were addressed to his wife:” Everything is going well, I’m in top shape. Think of me and come back for me in eight days, and don’t forget a pair of crutches! “
JOSÉ PÉREZ FRANCÉS, REFERENCE OF THE SPANISH CYCLING OF THE 60
Although he did not get any flashy titles, José Pérez Francés was always an entertainer of the great events in which he participated. A benchmark of Spanish cycling in the 60s, he brushed against glory with a third place in the 1963 Tour de France and with three other podiums in the 1962 (second), 1964 (third) and 1968 (second) Laps. He died at the age of 84 in Barcelona on September 30
MERCEDES ATECA, PIONEER OF SPANISH CYCLING
The first woman to participate in international races outside the country, Mercedes Ateca passed away in Laredo at the age of 73 after becoming a standard bearer who paved the way for many Spanish athletes. Originally from Udalla, in Ampuero (Cantabria), she won the first Spanish cycling championship in 1979 and repeated in 1980 and 1981. Before that, she participated in the Road Cycling World Championship in Cologne in 1978 and managed to take a step that never before gave a woman before. It was the mirror in which many looked after themselves.
BURGNICH, THE PLAYER WHO SCORED PELÉ IN THE FINAL 1970
Tarcisio Burgnich was a defender who marked an era in the Italian team and who had the misfortune to meet at the 1970 World Cup in Mexico with the great Brazil of Gerson, Pelé, Rivelino, Jairzinho and Tostao. In the final, Burgnich had the thankless task of scoring Pele, who led the victory (4-1) to the despair of the transalpine team. Nicknamed “La Roca”, he played 12 seasons at Inter and is remembered as a player who treated strikers harshly but loyally. Burgnich won the 1968 European Championship, participated in the World Cups in England 1966 and Germany 1974 and also won 2 European Cups, 4 Leagues, 2 Intercontinental Cups. He died at the age of 82 in the San Camino asylum in the city of Forte dei Marmi in the province of Lucca.
Juan Jose Lahuerta

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