The first thing Hassan Hakimi told the Real Madrid when he noticed his son Achraf Being still a youngest is that I couldn’t take him to train. He was a street vendor and every 15 days he had to go down to Morocco, his country of origin, to get products to sell at the Majadahonda market. The club, interested in the abilities of the young son of the Hakimis, put a taxi at his disposal that could take him from Getafe, where he lived in a humble neighborhood, to Valdebebas, so that he could go to the training sessions that his father did not attend. I could accompany you.
This town in the south of Madrid was where Achraf and his two brothers were born and grew up, and where he kicked the ball for the first time. Both he and his older brother Nabil began playing at Colonia Ofigevi -now Ciudad de Getafe-, until a scout from the white club saw the skills of the now Paris Saint-Germain player and wanted to take him away. “They gave us 100 balls and 200 bibs for him”Miguel Ángel García, then secretary of the club and responsible for the transfer of the player, told ABC.
He is not the first kid from Ofigevi to win a big team, but he is the one who has reached the highest level to become one of the stars of the World Cup in Qatar and the person responsible, paradoxically, for the elimination of Spain. Because although he was able to play with the rojigualda, he opted for the Moroccan team, which this Wednesday will play the semifinals of a World Championship for the first time.
“You could see him when he was little,” Miguel Ángel proudly says. “He was tall for his age and a very good player. He and six more played ». But he does not only have good words for Achraf as a player, since despite being at the top and living surrounded by luxury in Paris with his wife, the actress Hiba Abouk, with whom he has two children, Achraf does not forget his origins and continues linked to the city where he grew up.
“He comes whenever he can, when circumstances allow him to.” The person speaking is ‘Chamu’, current president of the City of Getafe. Despite the fact that he barely spent one season in the team, the relationship has been maintained since he passed through there 15 years ago. His brother continues to play in the first team of the Madrid league and there are some of his best friends who he goes to see whenever he travels to Madrid.
“He is aware that nothing is missing, even being in the middle of the World Cup,” he says from the club headquarters, where a sort of exhibitor presides over the main room with the shirts that Hakimi has given them from each team that he has dressed and that the smaller players do not hesitate to be proud.
The jerseys of each team that Achraf Hakimi has played for preside over the Ciudad de Getafe room.
There is that of Real Madrid, where he was catapulted as a child from the City of Getafe; that of Borussia Dortmund, where he was loaned for two seasons; that of Inter Milan, to which he was transferred to the surprise of the first ones who formed him – “I don’t know how Madrid let him escape”, admits Miguel Ángel García incredulously -, that of Paris Saint Germain, where he currently plays and that of the Moroccan team, which the team supports without hesitation in their confrontation against France. “It’s clear,” they admit with a laugh.
Your more caring side
“Shy and very close to his people” defines ‘Chamu’. And it is that, in addition to being directly linked to what was his first team, to which he provides sports equipment, during the pandemic he showed his most supportive side with those who were his neighbors by organizing a ‘Fortnite’ charity tournament to raise funds that, in collaboration with the Getafe City Council, they were destined to the purchase of food and hygiene products for the families that were experiencing the most needs.
It was 2020 and despite the fact that he was in Germany at the time, he had the help of other footballers such as Courtois, Paco Alcácer or Reguilón and the youtubers and instagramers Ampeter, Hamza Zaidi and Toniemcee to help those who needed it most. “He was a lovely boy and still is. You can count on him for everything.” Those who knew him as a child and those who deal with him now agree on this. They also agree on the goals they will celebrate this Wednesday.
