The Pride of Vallekas

He runs at you with the ball. He looks at you. Determination in his eyes, seriousness in his look. A tinge of fear slowly sends shivers down your spine, as you stand back and hold your ground. In that one second, it's on. There can only be one winner and one loser. No surrenders, no take backs, no half-hearts. No change of mind. All in. In that one second, it's war. A player named Guerra started in the lower categories of local club Vélez with his twin brother Emilio, progressing from teams ranging from the benjamín to the cadete till the age of 15 . He would play for Málaga in the cadete and juvenil teams till 1999, where Manel Casanova, the head of La Academia at the Rosaleda club, engineered his move to Espanyol to the juvenil team in the División de Honor for the 1999-00 season. Over there, position coach 'Tintín' Márquez changed his position to that of striker; before then, he had played as a midfielder, in the center or on the wings. He subsequently g...

After spending his whole life at UDA Gramenet and a season at Europa, Guillem Ramón moved to Terrassa in the summer of 2014. It was just another Catalan player transferring between two clubs in the Catalan regional leagues - nothing extraordinary. But it was consequential. In March 2015, in a match against Sabadell, the full back suffered a complete meniscal rupture, and his season was over. So was his contract - and a big chunk of the 2015-16 season as well. He ended up signing for Cerdanyola, without pay (as he was recuperating), and the doctors said that January would be his return time. However, he debuted in November. In hindsight, it was a mistake. After two games, in a training session, on November 25th he got injured again - this time in the quadriceps in the same leg. After two months of recuperation, and still no guarantee of pay, Guillem left for new pastures in February 2016. A trial at Coplestonians FC followed; so did an opportunity at Needham Market FC, in the se...