Sometimes the newspaper library hurts. And there are days when it hurts a lot. Too much. Few more heartbreaking pages than those of the newspapers of March 12, 2004, printed forever with the rage and tears caused by the worst terrorist attack in history suffered in Spain and Europe. On Thursday, March 11, 19 years ago, ten of the thirteen bombs planted by jihadist terrorists exploded in four trains of the Madrid Cercanías network, specifically at the Atocha, Santa Eugenia, and El Pozo stations, and next to Calle Téllez. . In total, 192 dead and more than 2,000 wounded. That same day, just a few hours after the massacre, the players of four Spanish soccer clubs had to dress in shorts and go out on the field to play their respective first legs of the round of 16 of the UEFA Cup (predecessor tournament of the Euroleague): Gençlerbirligi-Valencia, Newcastle-Mallorca, Celtic-Barcelona and Villarreal-Roma. Only Villarreal played at home. The expeditions of the other three teams had spent the night in their destination countries and, as soon as they got up, they began to receive the terrible news from Spain and were aware of it throughout the day. Social networks and smartphones did not yet exist. And the Internet was in full and vertiginous phase of hatching, but the data still did not circulate in abundance or at a constant and instantaneous speed, so they suffered that special anguish that remote information causes. “Barça didn’t want to play,” the full-page headline of ‘El Mundo Deportivo’ in its March 12 edition. And he recounts what happened in the Glasgow hotel where the Catalan team was concentrated, with a special role of Joan Laporta, then in his first stage as Barça president and present there that fateful day: «At half past nine in the morning, the manager Xavier Faus and the first team delegate and press officer, Carles Naval and Josep Miquel Terés, met as usual before each European match with the UEFA delegate, the Belgian Robert Sterckx, and the Celtic officials. Faus, on behalf of the board, officially called for the suspension of the match. The meeting was postponed for half an hour: neither Sterckx nor those of the Celtic representatives were aware of the magnitude of the tragedy. At ten, the Scottish club positioned itself in favor of the suspension, although, yes, it demanded that the final decision be made as soon as possible, since all the tickets were sold and Celtic fans come from all over Scotland. Its general secretary, Peter Lawell, issued a statement on television condemning the attack and assuring that they accepted the suspension. The two clubs had already reached an agreement in principle to postpone the duel until next Thursday and Sterckx contacted the head of UEFA competitions. Postponement denied “Meanwhile, the Barça players had breakfast knowing what had happened in Spain thanks to ‘Sky News’ (British television channel), which from nine in the morning reported uninterruptedly on everything that happened. Laporta took the reins of the matter and spoke by telephone with the presidents of Valencia, Jaime Ortí, the president and the general director of Villarreal, Fernando Roig and José Manuel Llaneza, and a director of Mallorca. The four agreed: the UEFA round of 16 matchday had to be suspended. Laporta also spoke with the president of the RFEF, Ángel María Villar, and the LFP, Pedro Tomás, and asked them to put pressure on UEFA. The Federation requested the suspension in writing, but the highest continental body finally decided that the first legs of the round of 16 would be played normally, with a minute of silence before kick-off and black bracelets on the players. The Federation accepted the resolution and Barça too, although making it very clear, once again, that, if it had been for the Barça club, “the match would not have been played,” concludes the information published by the Barcelona sports newspaper. Knowing the decision, Laporta stated: “We will follow UEFA’s position and we will play because we understand that the Spanish federative authorities share UEFA’s decision. UEFA believes that these criminal attacks do not have to condition the normal course of events, and we understand that. And I repeat, once again, that we stand in solidarity with the families of the victims and that we share their pain. At night (9:00 p.m.), at the Celtic Park stadium, 60,000 throats sang with incomparable emotion the well-known and moving hymn “You’ll never walk alone”, dedicated that day to the victims of the attack and your loved ones. Víctor Valdés, Reiziger, Puyol, Oleguer, Gabri, Cocu, Xavi, Motta, Luis García, Saviola and Ronaldinho played, plus substitutes Gerard, Quaresma and Overmars. Barça lost 1-0, could not come back in the second leg (0-0) and was eliminated. However, the result was the least of that 11M. Because, as Frank Rijkaard, the Barca coach, said: “There are more important things than football.” In the same line as his coach, various components of the squad manifested. Starting with the captain, Carles Puyol: “We had our minds in Madrid and we shouldn’t have played.” The Dutchman Cocu was also blunt: “I would have preferred not to play, it was disrespectful to do so.” Finally, Xavi Hernández revealed that “the team was affected all day and we would have liked to win to dedicate the victory to the victims of Madrid.” «Amoral vermin» Villarreal, the only one of the four Spanish clubs that won that day, was able to dedicate the victory (2-0) and the two goals to those killed and injured on 11M. José Mari sent a kiss to heaven after scoring the second goal. Five minutes earlier, his partner up front, Brazilian Anderson, had also cast an emotional look up after opening the scoring. Reina, Belletti, Coloccini, Álvarez, Javi Venta, Battaglia, Josico, Riquelme and Roger, plus the substitutes Martí and Víctor were the 13 Paquito players who, forced to put on the yellow shirt that sad night. Villarreal and Roma had officially asked UEFA to suspend the match, but the European body chaired by the Swedish Lennart Johansson refused to do so, which caused great discomfort in both clubs. After learning that he had to play, José Manuel Llaneza, CEO of the yellow club, unloaded his anger on the terrorists. «You don’t have to play the game of those vermin. They are amoral people. We must continue no matter how much it weighs us down and hurts us. The damage is already done”. Fabio Capello, Roma’s coach, was also blunt: “This is not done by people, but by injured animals that have no respect for people. They have no mind, they are crazy. Villarreal went to the next round after losing (2-1) in the return match in Italy, then eliminated Celtic in the quarterfinals (1-1 and 2-0) and fell in the semifinals against Valencia (0-0 and 1 -0). Related News standard Yes The trunk of sports Fidel Castro kidnapped Fangio and the Argentine pilot ended up thanking him Ángel Luis Menéndez standard Yes The trunk of sports The fanatic mayor of Vigo who fined a referee for “exciting the public of Balaídos” Ángel Luis Menéndez The first murder bomb exploded shortly after 7:30 in the morning in Madrid’s Atocha station. Twelve hours later (7:30 p.m.), more than 3,000 kilometers from Madrid, the eleven footballers chosen by Rafa Benítez, Valencia’s coach, had to go out to the 19 de Mayo stadium in the Turkish city of Ankara to face Gençlerbirligi. Chronologically, the Levante was the first of the Spanish clubs that had to play and, like the other three, had contacted UEFA requesting the postponement of the match. “It is a very sad day for Spain because of this horrible massacre, after this the rest of the issues are not important,” said Jaime Ortí, then president of Valencia. “Things are totally beyond you and at this time any activity is the least appetizing,” he added. UEFA ignored all requests – individual and joint – from the Spanish teams. A spokesman for the highest continental soccer body limited himself to giving the following cold manual response: “We are aware of the situation, we will continue to monitor events and we are in contact with the clubs, but, for the moment, the matches will continue, as expected. planned». And indeed they continued. Palop, Garrido, Ayala, Navarro, Carboni, Albelda, Sissoko; Angulo, Juan Sánchez, Xisco, and Oliveira, mixed with the eleven Turkish players and all in a row, appeared on the pitch carrying a banner with the slogan “We share the pain of Spain.” Rufete, Vicente, and Canobbio, substitutes that afternoon, also came out to play during a game they will never forget. “Defeat in tears” Valencia lost 1-0, but came back from behind at Mestalla (2-0). In the quarterfinals they eliminated Girondins (1-2 and 2-1) and in the semifinals, Villarreal (0-0 and 1-0). They beat Olympique de Marseille in the final (2-0) and were proclaimed champions of the UEFA Cup, which together with the League title made 2003-04 the best season in the entity’s history. No minute of silence On the sad March 11, 2004, UEFA not only refused to postpone matches, but it did not even decree that a minute’s silence be observed in all the first legs of the round of 16 of the UEFA Cup that They were disputed that Thursday. There was a respectful memory of the dozens of victims of the attack in Madrid in the stadiums where Spanish teams played and in Benfica-Inter (0-0), at the request of the Portuguese club. The Lisbon coach was José Antonio Camacho, who was very affected and received numerous expressions of affection from the Portuguese fans. In the Girondins-Bruges (3-1) only two local players, the Spaniards Celades and Riera, wore a black armband. Celades regretted that a minute of silence had not been observed. “It has been very hard for me to play today. I can’t be happy because there are more important things than football and I have lived in Madrid for three years (he played for Real Madrid from 2000 to 2003 and then in the 2004-05 season). It has been a good night of football, but not a good day for the Spaniards», he stated. The worst unemployed sportingly on that unfortunate Thursday was Real Mallorca, who fell thrashed in Newcastle (4-1). Under the orders of Luis Aragonés and with their soul and mind set on Madrid, they had no choice but to play Leo Franco, Cortés, Lussenhoff, Niño, Edu Moya, Nagore, Campano, Colsa, Nené, Correa, Eto’o , and the substitutes Marcos and Finidi. In the second leg, the English superiority (0-3) and the Balearic elimination were confirmed. Emotionally, Newcastle made themselves available to Mallorca and supported them in their request to postpone the game. As published by ‘El Mundo Deportivo’, “the English lordship was evident around noon when, through its website, it informed all its fans that it was going to observe a minute’s silence before the match. Both clubs wore black armbands as a sign of mourning. The official note from Newcastle states, verbatim, that ‘this club considers it appropriate to present its most sincere condolences to the Spanish people after the terrible tragedy that occurred this morning in Madrid. The club, the team and their fans share the deep feelings of pain that the citizens of Spain are suffering.’ Newcastle fans also wanted to express their pain, because in the stands of St. James Park some banners could be seen calling for the end of terrorism and in favor of peace». “Defeat between tears”, headlined the Balearic newspaper ‘Última Hora’. And in the last paragraph of the chronicle what was experienced that night is condensed: «The day UEFA made its lack of sensitivity clear, Mallorca said goodbye to Europe in a bad way. On the day that football should never have been played, Mallorca took a tremendous beating at Newcastle.
