• Officer. "The time has come to say goodbye"
  • Opinion: the fate of Iker Casillas
  • 10 great moments: from Trondheim to Johannesburg

It is in the ash, in the burned earth, where the devastation is noticed.

On August 24, 2011, Real Madrid played the Santiago Bernabéu Trophy against Galatasaray. It must be that one night of a calm drink and a summer cut. Pelillos to the sea. But the summer tournament did not help this time for the fan to be deluded with lost causes (Kaká scampered half a part), or to remember old heroes (Milan Baros, former Czech benchmark, then played with the Turks). The focus was on two specific places in the stadium. The first, the side of the field where the members of the Peña La Clásica were located, who displayed a large banner with the motto: " Mou, your finger shows us the way"There were so many other fabrics scattered around the stands, but none with such an evident message. The other great claim was the white bench. Iker Casillas was nailed there. Gesture of marble. The image, in full pachanga, would not have been strange to not being the only footballer who, even when in good condition, did not step on the pitch for a minute, Mourinho made 10 changes, Casillas saw them all from his seat .

Just a week earlier, on August 17, 2011, Spanish football probably reached the height of its degradation. It was the day that Barcelona played the second leg of the Spanish Super Cup against Real Madrid at Camp Nou (3-2, 2-2 in the first leg). But also the day when the same actors, up to now too concerned about following the masses of their foremen, almost always encouraged by their respective media trenches, noticed that the show had nothing to do with sport anymore. That this was demeaning. The image of José Mourinho sticking his finger in the eye of Tito Vilanova, then assistant to Pep Guardiola and whom the Portuguese ridiculed with the nickname "Pito", made the water overflow from a toilet that was no longer enough .

"War between Catalonia and Spain"

It was Iker Casillas who took the initiative. A year ago, Spain had conquered the first World Cup in its history in South Africa. And three since, under the protection of Luis Aragonés, the team had shaken off its historic complexes in the Euro Cup won in Vienna. Those who had been companions and friends since children in the eternal international gatherings, had ended up joining a war that, in reality, was not theirs . But the one of those who fought to impose a soccer model from the benches. An ideology with which to endure. But also the war of all those fronts that found in soccer a loudspeaker with which to amplify their lower instincts.

"That was crazy. It seemed that we were in the middle of a war between Catalonia and Spain. That madrididismo began to emerge that I never liked . I'm a Real Madrid player. I want Real Madrid to always win. But I didn't want to go to those extremes "Casillas confessed to Jorge Valdano in an interview with beIN in November 2018.

"In the classics with Mourinho there was no rivalry, there was hatred," Iniesta recalled.

Between reproaches and insults

Casillas called Xavi Hernández. The talk didn't even come in five minutes. They had enough time to insult each other. To pile up reproaches due to a series of classics in which the kicks abounded, the trash talking of outskirts and, above all, the frustration. But also to bridge the same hell. "The situation was not normal. It was already regrettable. It had gotten out of hand," Casillas would finally admit, in October 2014, to Iñaki Gabilondo on Canal Plus.

Carles Puyol also received a call from the Real Madrid captain. And Vicente del Bosque, the coach, did the rest in his own way. Sanity should suffice.

"But I did not apologize to Xavi. Not at all. As much as some people wanted to sell that the Real Madrid captain had dropped his pants. I called to tell him that this was going to take its toll on us." Casillas was always clear on the argument. Not so Mourinho, despite the fact that the Portuguese coach never directly reproached him for having led the peace treaty . "He never said anything to me. I cannot assure that Mourinho was angry that he made that call. But there are many people who say that it bothered him."

Casillas, in any case, played all that season 2011-2012. Despite Real Madrid being eliminated by Barcelona in the Copa del Rey quarterfinals, and by Bayern in the Champions League semi-finals, Mourinho achieved what seemed impossible. Leave the Guardiola team in the gutter and catch the League of 100 points.

The day of sacrifice

Until the day of sacrifice came. Casillas was a substitute at La Rosaleda on December 22, 2012. Real Madrid lost against Malaga (3-2) with Antonio Adán under fire. It had been 10 years and seven months since he had been left out of the starting lineup by technical decision. The trust between both sides had been shattered .

On January 23, in a Cup match against Valencia at Mestalla, Arbeloa gave Casillas a fortuitous kick that led to a fracture in his left hand. The medical report was devastating: two months off . Six days later, the journalist Sara Carbonero, the goalkeeper's partner, in an intervention on Televisa, stated that there was a division in the Real Madrid dressing room around the figure of Mourinho. And the marimorena was armed. Casillas did not play a single minute more that season.

Traitor. Mole. Accusations in nightly media taverns. Press conferences in which his performance in training was discussed . Even extreme competition with Diego López, who also came face to face with collateral damage: forgetfulness in the national team. He had no options to enter the list of the World Cup in Brazil.

Casillas never raised his voice in public. "It was unfair. Absurd. Maybe I should have answered Mourinho. But I opted for the good of the club and the silence." Mourinho, on the other hand, saw it in a very different way: "Casillas confronted me and in a way that he is better than anyone: hidden," replied the coach in an interview with the Record newspaper in 2018.

Beauty in Kiev

The memory leads once again to that call of August 2011. And the consequence that few noticed. Spain conquered 11 months later their second consecutive European Championship after completing at the Olympic Stadium in Kiev one of the best finals in the history of the competition (4-0 to Italy). That generation did not play a game more beautiful and complete than that .

Casillas paid a high price. He could no longer stop a descent into hell that lasted four years, until his tearful departure from Real Madrid.

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Know more

  • Real Madrid
  • Iker Casillas
  • Pep Guardiola
  • Sara Carbonero
  • Spain Supercup
  • Vicente del Bosque
  • Jose Mourinho
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