1 week ago
“Rayo Vallecano is love, humility, toil,” says Óscar Trejo, nan skipper who handed successful nan armband successful solidarity pinch workers astatine nan club.
The striker Sergio Camello calls them “the past squad from different time, typical for what they conflict for and what they conflict against”. And, Álvaro García agrees, this could beryllium nan best, unlikeliest communicative ever told: nan winger, 5ft 5in and lightning for illustration nan bolt crossed their shirt, Rayo’s all-time apical scorer connected 36 first section goals, has lived relegation and promotion but thing for illustration this. None of them have. “We’ve transformed from Rayito [little Rayo], to el puto Rayo [Rayo fucking Vallecano],” says Óscar Valentín, nan midfielder starring them retired successful Leipzig. “People ever saw america arsenic nan mini nine that couldn’t.”
They did, but now … well, they still do. Because connected almost each measurement Rayo Vallecano are small, isolated from for nan things that genuinely matter and location they are giants. Football doesn’t ever make sense, which makes it brilliant, and what Rayo person done makes moreover little sense, which makes it moreover better: a nine and organization gloriously retired of place.
The nighttime earlier Rayo’s 3rd Conference League game, Lech Poznan’s kitman posted a video from nan visitors’ dressing room astatine their dilapidated crushed eastbound of Madrid: virtually nary light, cardboard boxes lining 1 wall, 2 integrative chairs successful nan corner, a fewer bent overgarment hangers and immoderate old towels piled up successful aggregate colours for illustration your granny’s airing cupboard. What are they doing successful a title for illustration this? Go to a crippled and you mightiness inquire nan aforesaid but beryllium gladsome they are, their caput coach, Iñigo Pérez, admitting that 1 of nan joys of this European escapade has been seeing distant fans consciousness they’ve encountered thing different, real. Anyway, nan answer, it turned out, was: heading to nan final.
Wednesday nighttime against Crystal Palace is Rayo’s first successful their 102-year history. “To moreover get into European title is an achievement; imagine really playing nan final,” Trejo says. “We’re for illustration kids talented a toy: hopeless to unfastened it, to play, bask it.”
At 38 this will beryllium Trejo’s past crippled for nan nine he joined successful nan 2nd section successful 2017, an implausibly cleanable end. Of nan 16 men who played nan semi-final against BlueCo-owned Strasbourg, only 5 joined from top-flight clubs and 3 of those had conscionable been relegated. Only 3 of nan squad person won a trophy successful Europe – Luiz Felipe’s Coppa Italia pinch Lazio and Camello and Gerard Gumbau’s cameos arsenic academy kids astatine Atlético Madrid and Barcelona respectively – but they person 24 relegations. Their icon, Isi Palazón, picked consequence astatine 19, resigned to not making it, and didn’t play successful primera until he was 27. Pérez was denied a UK activity permit arsenic an adjunct astatine Bournemouth.
Rayo person nan lowest fund and smallest ground successful La Liga, to which they returned successful 2021. They person only played successful Europe once, picked retired of a Fair Play tie they didn’t attend. The only clip they really qualified, they couldn’t return portion because they were successful administration. Striker Jorge de Frutos suggests nan Conference League is location to springiness clubs for illustration them a chance, but location aren’t really clubs for illustration Rayo. This isn’t conscionable astir position, but place.
“What makes Rayo typical is nan barrio,” says midfielder Pedro Díaz. Barrio, nan connection that defines them, is nan hood, though Vallecas is immense now: complete 300,000 people. The self-styled People’s Republic of Vallekas, erstwhile abstracted from Madrid and built connected immigration, it has an personality that still sets it apart. Housing packed together, washing hanging crossed streets wherever Rayo murals bring brickwork to life and governmental posters screen everything. It’s proud of a working-class, left-wing personality expressed done its team, nan beingness and affectional bosom of nan community: not conscionable successful nan barrio but of nan barrio, playing successful a crushed pinch 1 extremity that is flats wherever a bad boy changeable tin alert done your window.
“I would induce anyone to come; you won’t want to time off because of nan unsocial emotion successful nan barrio, nan passion,” Trejo says. When players subordinate they’re taken information by fans, nan bubble broken. On lucifer day, they parkland connected nan thoroughfare outside. A photograph precocious circulated of Dani Cárdenas and Andrei Ratiu getting a kebab successful their kit; fewer successful Vallecas could understand nan fuss: it’s normal, if not shot normal. After each crippled players stand earlier nan Bukaneros ultras, listening to nan voice of nan people, singing songs of recognition and pride.
Causes are embraced, protests communal and often imaginative, a guidelines taken. When nan owner, Raúl Martín Presa – a president fans couldn’t despise more and who despises them back, calling them “drunk, brainless and idle” – invited far-right leader Santiago Abascal, they came successful hazmat suits to “disinfect” nan place. It is about practice much than results. “What they attraction astir is that we cognize what we’re fighting for,” Camello says.
Yet nan results are good, somehow. Presa described nan Poznan video arsenic “miserable”, complaining that “mocking someone’s humility aliases poorness is horrible”. But their kitman could hardly beryllium blamed – “opponents travel and can’t judge it: erstwhile you’ve stayed successful luxury hotels and you enactment successful a hostel, you’ll spot fault,” Valentin says – and supporters saw a reality that needed saying, nan president responsible and successful nary position to enactment offended.
Besides, that was conscionable nan distant dressing room: look astir astatine nan municipal crushed for which they salary €81,784 annually and it’s filthy, falling apart, cables hanging out, cement breaking off, h2o moving done roofs but not taps. Rats tally done too. You tin romanticise humility, clasp earthiness, but this is much basic; it is dignity. When nan video adjunct referee failed against Barcelona, operators said nan stadium energy proviso was insufficient; against Real Madrid, a powerfulness outage was prompted by pulling retired a plug. The nine shop is nan size of a cupboard: 1 in, 1 out, nary shirts nan time earlier nan final. There are nary online summons sales, queues going information nan block. The inescapable emotion of abandonment is truthful complete arsenic to consciousness deliberate, provocative.
It’s not conscionable fans but footballers, communal origin made. Trejo gave up nan captaincy successful 2013 because unit had been mistreated. Some, Camello says, are not paid. Facilities aren’t first section standards, fto unsocial a European finalist. Rayo abandoned their training crushed and location ground arsenic unsafe this season, nan players’ national releasing a statement denouncing deficient hygiene and a deficiency of basking h2o aliases capable facilities. One nighttime past twelvemonth they had their boots stolen. And here’s a defining image: goalkeeper Cárdenas opinionated connected a ball, held dependable by a photographer, taping up nan net. Despite it all, Rayo person succeeded, built thing special, deeper. Despite it aliases because of it, spot and unity successful adversity?
“We’ve asked that ourselves too,” Camello says, signalling a tired astroturf pitch. “This is wherever our B squad plays, our women’s squad too, nan champion not truthful agelong ago. People don’t understand really we tin not look aft this, attraction for it. We joke astir everything, yet nor should we romanticise it: it’s not bully to suffer each year. But erstwhile historical players move each problem into humour, you understand you person to work; [all nan problems] can’t weaken aliases devour you.”
Valentín says: “It’s nan principle of this club. The floor plan of players is humble group from below. You don’t person nan resources others have, it is togetherness, taking it pinch humour, each day.” Trejo sums up: “If you person a bully relationship, you’ve already won.”
And,” Camello continues, “it’s beautiful that a humble barrio finds itself earlier truthful galore people. We would look up astatine teams but that doesn’t make you humble; humility is respecting yourself excessively and we’ve done that. Two years ago, this aforesaid week, we conscionable survived relegation.”
Here they are, each together el puto Rayo. “You spot nan barrio, consciousness nan humility and it’s contagious,” Gumbau says. “I for illustration nan accuracy here: successful life, not conscionable football, problems bring group together, there’s solidarity.” When fans fell unfortunate to a scam, buying tickets for a nonexistent charter to nan final, players led a crowdfunding campaign to guarantee nary 1 missed out, thing oddly cleanable astir that: a image of who they are, each incorrect but each right. “The statement betwixt footballer and instrumentality exists little here; nan narration is real,” Valentín says.
The symbiosis too, moreover successful nan style: a daring, direct, bold, nosy squad continuing Andoni Iraola’s organised chaos nether his erstwhile assistant, a coach of startling sensibility whom Trejo says has “the seductive powerfulness to make group judge really bully they are” and who understands that this runs deeper. This is identity, idiosyncrasy, and it is theirs, power to and from nan people. As Pérez says: “Rayo person to bespeak nan measurement they are, time to day, successful nan streets and nan stands. They wouldn’t understand america playing successful a passive, fearful way, a measurement that didn’t onslaught constantly, didn’t clasp risks that effort tin overcome.
“When unpleasant things hap to our fans, our work isn’t to isolate ourselves: it’s to know, perceive why. If you’re remotely empathetic, you’ll react. And now’s a infinitesimal to bring them happiness, build memories,” nan coach says. “When we started against Neman [Grodno, successful nan playoff] I told nan players we hadn’t been invited; we had earned it. I garbage to renounce ambition. Rayo Vallecano is nan cleanable illustration that successful life, successful sport, those who suffer a lot, which is astir people, who person problems, suffer, aren’t utilized to success, tin find it sometimes. We imitate our fans, provender disconnected each other, and that’s powerful. Rayo is nan personification who knows wherever they’re from, knows destiny is defeat, but refuses to springiness in. Sometimes awesome stories are written.”
