The Sestao River begins the transfer chapter in style

Sestao River does not want to rush when it comes to building its squad for next year. “We want to take firm steps,” Carlos Lasheras, the team’s sports director, told this newspaper. So far, they had only announced six casualties and seven renewals. It is not yet known what will happen to the rest of the players that made up the squad that last season was on the verge of being promoted to the First RFEF. Even so, the new technical director revealed to EL CORREO that he wanted most of them to continue, so everything suggests that there will be more players to continue.

Those who still have their future up in the air are Javier Rabanillo, Daiki Niwa, Gaizka Martínez, Markel Etxeberria, Aritz Huete and Ibrahima Dieng. As EL CORREO has learned, some of them are very close to stamping the definitive signature. However, the sestaotarras decided to start with the transfer chapter last Tuesday, when the first new faces were announced. These are Andoni Ugarte, from Calahorra of the First RFEF, and Urtzi Urcelay, one of the top assistants in the Second RFEF last season with Gernika. Both have raised great expectations among green and black fans.

The two know the atmosphere in Las Llanas perfectly, as they have played there on several occasions. Andoni Ugarte is a central defender trained in the Real Sociedad categories, where he reached his second team, playing in the UEFA Youth League and completing a total of five seasons in Segunda B. In the summer of 2018, he changed the txuriurdin subsidiary for Oviedo Vestusta, who also played in the bronze category. There he was an important piece for three other courses. Therefore, all this makes him add almost 200 games in the extinct Second B.

The last experience of the defender from Oñati has been in the Calahorra of First RFEF. There he has played a total of twenty stakes, half of them starting and the other half coming off the bench. Now, at 27 years old, he lands in Las Llanas and the club indicates that he stands out for “his size and security of him in the center of the rear.” The second signing of the Sestao River has been that of Urtzi Urcelay. This 27-year-old midfielder “with an offensive vocation, very technical and with a great vision of the game”, as his new team defines him, was in the Athletic youth academy for eleven years. There he reached his second team, where he barely participated.

That is why that same campaign he signed for Zamudio, playing fifteen matches in Segunda B. The next year he tried his luck outside the Basque Country with Langreo and was fundamental in the asturians’ rise to the third national level. It was then that he decided to return home with Sodupe and then at Gernika, where he has spent the last three seasons, showing a high level in all of them. In fact, this last course has shone with its own light in the Second RFEF. He has been the outfield player with the most minutes on the squad, playing 32 games, all of them as a starter, scoring three goals and giving 14 assists. A number of goal passes that few will have surpassed in this category.