 | Athletic Club |
| Trophies: 32 | |
Athletic Club de Bilbao is historically Spain's third most successful club behind Real Madrid and FC Barcelona and has a long history. In the late 1800s Bilbao was a leading port at the heart of an important industrial area with iron mines and shipyards nearby and was a driving force of the Spanish economy, which attracted many migrant workers. Among these were miners from the north-east of England and shipyard workers from Southampton and Portsmouth, who brought with them the game of football and founded Bilbao Football Club in the 1890s. Similarly, the sons of Basque industrialists were sent to study civil engineering and commerce in Britain, where they too developed an interest in the new game and on their return began organising matches with the British workers. In 1898 students belonging to the Gymnasium Zamacois founded the Athletic Club, using the English spelling, and in 1901 a meeting was held in the Cafe Garcia which established more formal rules and regulations.
In 1902, a combined Bilbao team, known as Club Vizcaya, participated in the first Copa del Rey , and returned with the trophy after defeating FC Barcelona in the final. This team eventual merged with Athletic Club to become Athletic Club de Bilbao in 1903. There is still some dispute as to whether the founding of the club dates to 1898 or 1903.
In 1903 Basque students also formed Athletic Club de Madrid, which later evolved into Atlético Madrid. The histories of the two clubs are inextricably linked as are the colours they play in, which is another topic of debate. Although their first colours were blue and white stripes, in 1910 both clubs switched to red and white stripes and nobody is completely sure about why this occurred. In the Basque many think that they were changed out of deference to Sunderland and Southampton, cities where the original British founders were from. Others believe that an Athletic member was sent to Britain to buy a batch of blue and white tops but could not find any and returned with red and white ones instead. Whilst in Madrid it's said that red and white striped tops were the cheapest stripes to make because the same colours were used to make bed mattresses, and the left over cloth was easily converted into football shirts. The Madrid club changed colours just before the Basques and so became known as Los Colchoneros - the mattress makers.
Athletic Club are one of the few clubs who have not had the logo of an official sponsor emblazoned on their kit. However, this policy will be changed for the three seasons starting on 2008, where Athletic will play with the logo of the Biscay-based Petronor oil company in exchange for over 2 million Euro.
The club featured prominently in early Copa del Rey competitions. Following the inaugural win by Club Vizcaya, the newly formed Athletic Bilbao won it again in 1903 and in 1904 they were declared winners after their opponents Club Español de Madrid failed to turn up. In 1907 they revived the name Club Vizcaya and won the competition again in 1911. One of the best known early Athletic sides won three times in a row between 1914 and 1916 with Pichichi, a prolific goalscorer, as star of the team. He scored the very first goal in the San Mamés stadium, on August 21 1913 and a hat-trick in the 1915 final, and today the La Liga top-scorer is known as the Pichichi in his honour.
Much like FC Barcelona politics has never been far away from Athletic Club's sense of identity and supporting the club became a legitimate way of expressing Basque nationalism during Franco's dictatorship. Some prominent members of the Basque Nationalist party EAJ-PNV were also Athletic members. Jose Antonio Aguirre, a distinguished player with the club in the 1920s and an EAJ-PNV member, became the first elected Basque President in 1936 just before the outbreak of civil war. Similarly, on 5 December 1975, jus15 days after Franco's death, Athletic's Iribar and Real Sociedad's Kortabarria came on the pitch of the Real v. Athletic carrying the still illegal Basque flag. Goalkeeper Iribar was later a founding member of the independentist coalition Herri Batasuna, ETA's political wing.
As a fan who believes that the best football comes from players who are emotionally linked to a club, I have to admit that Athletic's policy of only signing Basque players appeals to me. Although the practice obviously smacks of Basque nationalism, ironically one of the main beneficiaries of the cantera, or youth team, policy has been Spain. In the early 1920s the Basque Country was a breeding ground of great Spanish players, in part because of the influx of Spanish immigrants drawn by Bilbao's industry, and so when Spain entered a team in the Olympic Games in 1920, of the 21 players in the squad, 14 were Basques. Similarly, over the years, Athletic has provided more players for the national team then any other club, including Real Madrid or Barça.
However, Athletic are not the only Basque team, and other clubs such as Real Unión, Arenas Club de Getxo and Real Sociedad have also provided players. Furthermore, these four clubs were all founding members of La Liga in 1928 and by 1930 they were joined by CD Alaves, which meant that five of the ten clubs in the Primera División of Spain’s national league were from the Basque Country. The saying Con cantera y afición, no hace falta importación, translated as With home-grown teams and supporters, there is no need for imports made sense during these early days, although in the current heady world of international signings and megabucks, Athletic's commitment to its roots has meant that has struggled to be competitive at the top level.
One of Athletic's early star coaches was Fred Pentland, who arrived in 1921 and revolutionised the way the team played using the short-passing game, so typical of modern Spanish football. His first period lasted until 1927, during which time he won the Copa del Rey before leaving to coach Atlético Madrid, Real Oviedo and Spain. His Golden Years, however, were after his return to Athletic in 1929. Pentland's successes included Liga/Copa del Rey doubles in 1930 and 1931. Whilst bagging the Copa del Rey in 1932 and 1933, Athletic only managed runners-up in La Liga, but it was almost four doubles in a row. Furthermore, and this is painful for a Barça fan, in 1921 Pentland's Athletic beat us 12-1, which remains FC Barcelona's worst defeat in history.
However, after the civil war, a strange bond began to develop between the two clubs as both Catalonia and the Basque Country were singled out for the dictator's political, linguistic and cultural repression. After the reprisals had subsided, Athletic was forced to change its name to Atlético Bilbao, following a decree issued by Franco, banning the use of non-Spanish language names, and the club was no longer allowed to play a Basque-only team.
The same year also saw Zarra make his debut. Over the next thirteen seasons he went on to score 294 goals in all competitions for Atlético, plus another 20 for Spain in as many games, and his 38 goals in the 1950/51 season still stands as a record. In the 1943 the club won the of La Liga and the old King's Cup, which had been renamed the Copa del Generalísimo double and they subsequently retained the General's Cup in both 1944 and 1945.
During the early 1950s the club featured the legendary forward line of Zarra, Paniza, Rafa Iriondo, Venancio and Augustín Gainza, who helped the club win another Copa del Generalísimo in 1950. The arrival of coach Ferdinand Daucik improved the club's fortunes further. He led the team to another double in 1956 and to further victories in the Copa del Generalísimo in 1955 and 1958. In 1956 the club also made their debut in the European Cup, eventually being knocked out by Manchester United.
What helped the club succeed in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s were the strict limits imposed on foreign players. In most cases clubs could only have three foreign players in its squad, meaning that at least eight local players had to play in every game. While Real Madrid and FC Barcelona circumnavigated these rules by playing dual citizens such as Alfredo Di Stéfano, Ferenç Puskas, José Santamaria and Ladislao Kubala, Athletic adhered strictly to their youth team policy, showing little or no flexibility. The 1960s, however were dominated by Real Madrid and Atlético Bilbao only had a single Copa del Generalísimo win in 1969.
The twilight years of the regime brought new reflections on what it meant to play for Athletic, stilled called Atlético, and what it meant to be Basque.Just like international teams, the club has always used the grandparent rule, allowing the recruitment of some players of Basque descent. This enabled Barcelona-born Armando Merodio to play for the club. However, previously during 1960s other players such as Jesus Maria Pereda, Miguel Jones and José Eulogio Gárate were overlooked. Although none of them were Basques by birth, all three grew up in the Basque provinces and could be classified as naturalised Basques. Gárate even had Basque parents.
On a positive note the 1960s saw the emergence of an Athletic legend José Angel Iribar, but the 1970s brought few trophies. The emotional climax of the decade December 1975, before the aforementioned game against Real Sociedad, Iribar and the Real captain Kortabarria carried out the Ikurriña, the Basque flag and placed it ceremonially on the centre-circle. This was the first public display of the flag since the death of Franco.
In 1977 the club reached the UEFA Cup final, only losing on away goals to Juventus. By now the club had reverted to using the name Athletic Bilbao, and in 1981 appointed Javier Clemente as manager, who soon set about putting together one of the most successful Athletic Bilbao teams in the clubs history. Young players from the cantera such as Santiago Urkiaga, Miguel De Andres, Ismael Urtubi and Andoni Zubizarreta joined veterans Dani and Goikoetxea. In his first season in charge, Clemente led the team to 4th place in La Liga In 1983 the club won La Liga and in 1984 they won a La Liga/Copa del Rey double. In 1985 and 1986 Athletic finished 3rd and 4th respectively. The fact that I arrived in Spain in 1988 means that my opinion of Athletic will always be tinged by this Glory Period, and consequently Barça v. Athletic is a game I always look forward to.
However, Athletic Bilbao has failed to win a major trophy since the success of the first Clemente era. A succession of coaches including Iribar, Howard Kendall, Jupp Heynkes and Javier Irureta and even a returning Clemente failed to reproduce that side's success.
The most successful Athletic coach since Clemente has been Luis Fernandez, appointed in 1996. In 1998 he led the club to second in La Liga and a season in the Champions League. Fernandez benefited from the club adopting a more flexible approach to the cantera Now anybody could play for Athletic, just as long as they acquired their skills in the Basque Country. Thus Patxi Feirrera from Salamanca and Biurrun, a Brazilian-born player who immigrated to the region at a young age, played for the club in the late 1980s. Despite this new approach, their definition of a Basque is still open to interpretation, with both Ufarte and Benjamin being overlooked despite having Basque parents. Perhaps having Basque-sounding names also influences the decision.
A change in policy enabled Fernandez to sign Bixente Lizarazu, the first French-born Basque to join the club, and Ismael Urzaiz and José Mari. Athletic also began to recruit players from the canteras of other Basque clubs, for example Joseba Etexeberria from Real Sociedad in 1995, leading to allegations of poaching and causing considerable bad feeling.
In recent seasons Athletic Bilbao have languished in mid-table and the club was embroiled in a relegation battle during the 2005-2006 and 2006-2007 seasons. In 2006 top-flight survival was ensured on the 37th match day when Deportivo de la Coruña were beaten at Riazor 2-1. Javier Clemente began his third spell as club coach in 2005, at a time when the club were bottom of the table. He is widely acknowledged to have brought defensive stability to the team, and so is also credited with having saved the club from relegation, but despite this he was not left in charge for the 2006-2007 season. The 2006-2007 season was one of the worst in the club's history, top-flight survival was ensured on the last match day when Athletic beat Levante at San Mamés 2-0, whilst last season was a little less tortuous with Athletic finishing a modest 11th in La Liga.
However, despite the lack of on-field success, a majority of the club's supporters think the club's identity is more important than winning trophies, and according to an El Mundo survey in the 1990s, 76% of Athletic fans would rather see the club relegated than give up the cantera policy. It is sad to reflect that the most successful Athletic team of recent times has been the women’s football team who have won the Superliga Femenina four times between 2003 and 2007. Perhaps this is because women's football has not yet been infected by the whims of capitalism and so can remain truer to its cultural roots.
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The second project is an idea for a book about Spanish Football. You can visit my research project-cum-website at www.spain-football.org and there's also a list of contents at SpanishFootballKnols
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