This past weekend a new edition of the El Corte Inglés de Galotxa Trophy began, which has been played uninterruptedly since 1976. More than forty towns from different Valencian regions, with more than five hundred pelotaris, including women, keep alive a modality that can legitimately boast of being a pioneer in the concept of club leagues, in the fact of consolidating the transition from the concept of play to that of regulated, competitive sport. The history of that recovery is linked to the diary that you hold in your hands or that you can view on any device. And it didn’t all start in the year 76. About twenty years earlier there was a serious attempt to start a club league. And an old bicycle, the vision of the future of a fan of this sport and the determined support of a correspondent for this newspaper had a lot to do with it. It is a beautiful story of a romantic willing to rescue from oblivion and from the clutches of love for soccer, the old sport of the ball in its natural space of public streets. The ball died inexorably in the Valencian towns before the general indifference and the creation of soccer clubs that captured the identity feeling of each town against another town. The ball had lost the battle many years before. It had ceased to be the sport of the streets. And that man, close to forty, went in search of players willing to create clubs and toured towns in his region and others with an old Orbea and rescued the commitment of his town, Godelleta, Alborache, Turís, Montserrat, Alfarp, from Montroi… He met with the disappointment of others but half a dozen were enough. He drew up a game regulation that is kept in an old chest of drawers and when everything was ready, the Federation of that time, which was that of Mr. Marín, “Marinet” who was a footballer for the first Valencia FC, telephoned the Godelleta City Council the day before from the beginning, noting that that tournament could not be played due to a bureaucratic problem. How to solve the problem? That man thought of the protection of the correspondent for this newspaper in Picassent, the well-remembered Amadeo Lerma. He took his bike that Saturday afternoon and went in search of hope. Amadeo Lerma told him: “Let’s play and I’ll post the results and classifications…” That dreamy man recovered his breath, so much so that, despite puncturing the rear wheel of his bicycle on the way home, he did not hesitate to continue to the finish line. . More than 25 kilometers. That decision to go ahead despite certain threats and to trust in the power of the written press made the miracle possible. «All the games were played and in the end Picassent won… That lasted three years. The last one, in 1959, was won by Alcàsser and Marín himself presented the champions’ trophy and participated in a good snack…» affirms the dreamer. And this newspaper prominently published, with a photo included, the chronicle of the final in that August of 1959.
That bicycle that traveled paths of hope dodging bureaucracies had an owner: José Soldado Latorre. My father.
