«In football everything ends up being forgiven and the human side prevails»

–How do you feel about being 75 years old, a respectable age if there ever was one?

-The important thing is health and I feel very good. Physically I feel perfect and even I am surprised to be 75 years old. I almost don’t believe it…

-Always with football in vein.

-I’m not going to watch much Third Division football due to family issues. But I see everything about the UD. When they play at home I go to the stadium and watch the away team on TV. He never abandoned football.

-Do you still feel like a coach even though you stopped practicing a long time ago?

-That stays inside you. The bug is always there. And with friends who have been players and coaches, even belonging to UD, we debate things. For example, I had the opportunity to speak with Deivid, Luis Helguera or Vicente Gómez recently, when I attended several UD training sessions. I loved that invitation and I enjoyed the experience very much, knowing that the sessions are behind closed doors. The team trained at an enormous pace and now I understand that Pimienta has a serious problem when he has to decide who he puts. If I could, I would line up the 25 members of the squad based on his level of involvement and commitment.

-The team is in the doldrums due to its latest results but its permanence is not in danger. In your opinion, is what you have valued?

-We have to be enjoying this UD because in the summer we couldn’t think that we were going to be like this, with 37 points. It has given us a lot of joy, although now we have a dip in sports and results. But because of work and fighting, nothing can be said to the boys. In the last meeting many things were done well. Now comes Sevilla, who has been pressing and will go all out. We have to take this game forward to reach those 40 points of definitive stability. This week of rest has been good for us. I even told Xavi García Pimienta this when I was in Barranco Seco and he told me that he thought the same thing because that was going to relax everyone a little and help break the dynamic. Beating Sevilla everything changes. But overall, I take my hat off to the current campaign.

-Do you think Pimienta is going to continue? It is the star topic now in the UD…

-I have never talked about those things with him and I have not even dared to ask him because they are personal topics. Every time he sees me he is very happy, as is his second coach, and they treat me wonderfully. That’s as far as I’m going. Luis Helguera is probably already working to prepare for what may happen because Pimienta has said that he will not communicate it until the end of the season. I don’t know if the club can wait until June without having something in the pipeline. Football is like that. People come and go.

-Would you like him to stay?

-Of course. She has a tremendous personality and character. He knows what he has and he knows what he does. It would be a great benefit for UD if he stayed with us.

-About this UD, what catches your attention the most?

-He has made the decision to play in one way and he has not changed. Sometimes I don’t even agree that so many passes are made in the defensive zone, but that is the game that has been acquired. A kick isn’t given when sometimes it should be. And with this style he has achieved 37 points and won many games away from home, something that did not happen in other stages in First Division. Always measuring up. Everyone talks about this courage when planning matches and with many players who had not previously played in the First Division. That has great merit. We have not always had the luck we deserve, but even then that approach has not changed.

-Do you still feel at home at UD?

-When I need to talk or ask the president something, he always answers me. I try not to bother him too much. One of the times I went to Barranco Seco he saw me and gave me a hug. I talk about the president as well as all the people at the club and that they make me feel very loved. Whenever I have needed something from the club, I have had it. Recently I was able to go see a Real Madrid-Athletic Bilbao match at the Bernabéu and I knocked on the door of UD to see if they could give me tickets, although later it was Arencibia, the president of the federation here, who helped me. and to whom I thank everything.

-His love affair with the fans is permanent and protected by time.

-For me it is a pride that that happens. And every day beautiful things happen to me in that sense. The last one, on Wednesday afternoon, they want me to give a shirt signed by the UD players to a man who has his house painted yellow and blue. A total fan. I am always available to whatever you want from me. Every time I go to the stadium, it sometimes takes me an hour to get from the Fan Zone to the entrance gate of the stadium. They stop me, parents tell the children what was done in my time and that makes me proud. That rise marked all of Gran Canaria and that continues to be felt.

-Look back and he owes a lot to the ball.

-The ball has been everything for me. Although I spent 37 years working in the Canarian Health Service, I always combined it with football. At the player level, due to two serious injuries, I was not able to reach the place I would have liked. But, at the coaching level, I fulfilled my dreams. Directing UD, having great success with this team, even directing outside the Canary Islands like when I arrived at Córdoba, a stage in which I led the team from below until they fired me because they wanted to impose their lineups on me. If I look back I remember all the teams.

-That Messenger, in the mid-nineties, that you raised to the top has just sunk with another descent to Third.

-It hurt me a lot. There are many hardships in our regional football. Before it was unthinkable that this would happen to an entire Messenger.

-The flourishing regional football that you knew, that Vecindario that you took to Second, no longer exists. What happened?

-It’s the economy. Companies are no longer in the business of supporting clubs, even though this now reduces taxes. But, for whatever reason, they don’t want to, perhaps because the situation is not as buoyant as before or, also, because they fear that if they find a place, others will come asking for the same thing. Now the kids in the Second Division earn 200 euros or less. I recently spoke with a trainer friend who works in the regional category and he told me that he was alone, without a delegate or physical trainer or masseuse. He only had twelve players and one had to pay a ticket out of his pocket to go play in Tenerife. And he hasn’t been paid for seven months. He has not left out of commitment to the footballers who have stayed. I felt very sorry but I encouraged him to continue for the footballers.

-He was never one to win medals, but he made Juan Carlos Valerón debut at UD and gave the alternative in the professional category to David García, in Second B with Vecindario. Both of them already know what they have meant in the history of the club.

-It only made it easier for them to debut because that’s how they earned it. Then they continued their evolution and have been what they have been. David García continues playing and even scores goals with Tamaraceite. He played 474 games at UD, more than anyone else. Valerón has been an eminence. They both earned what they did and I’m very happy for them.

-They say that the players continue to treat him as if he were the coach…

-I am in several WhatsApp groups, both with the Messenger, which I directed 30 years ago, and with the UD veterans. And I maintain many contacts with players I coached.

-Is that the best thing that football offers, above promotions and distinctions?

-Yeah. It is a pride that, even having had differences with a player, later everything is forgiven and the human side prevails. I now have a great relationship with a player whom I once removed from employment and salary due to disciplinary issues.

-That photo of him on his shoulders in Elche…

– (Huffs) The thing is that this promotion was not from the UD, it was from all of Gran Canaria. We had to achieve it, it was forbidden to fail. In that game in Elche we did everything perfectly. What that meant cannot be summarized in words.

-Without VAR and without social networks…

-Now everything has changed. Now more attacks are simulated than before and despite the fact that there are cameras everywhere. There is no arbitration criterion. That’s why I enjoy watching English football. They give each other firewood but without simulations, without stories. England is an example. We must learn from them in many things because it is a shame that we are losing our championship because of this.

-Which coach do you feel reflected in now? Javier Aguirre, from Mallorca, recently commented that he does not see himself in the current union because of his manual because of his way of understanding the profession. Does the same thing happen to you?

-There are coaches that I really like. Valverde has always been a discreet man, who directs his teams, and very well, if he puts on a show in the stands. Arrasate, from Osasuna, or Imanol, from Real, have also done very important things from simplicity, honesty, elegance in respect for the game.

-May you have many more.

-At the moment, no one can take 75 from me…