Nacho Monreal (Pamplona, ​​1986) has experienced them in all colors in football, but on the other end of the phone an illusion is perceived that draws the attention of a veteran.

Just renewed for one more year, he has fought these last weeks against tendinitis to be part of the starting eleven tomorrow.

Because the Real needs him.

And he knows it.

There is a certain consensus that, due to your experience, both David Silva and you are essential in this final. We are two players with a long journey, who have lived experiences of all kinds and the club, regardless of the physical or sports issue, demands us be a bit of an example for young people, for moments of pressure or with many things at stake.

That they can look at us a bit.

And we accept it very gladly, as naturally as possible. Is the lack of experience the main handicap for the Real in this final? I don't see it as a handicap.

We are aware that the stakes are high, that we represent a great club, we have to do our best and we have to win.

It is true that there are many very young players who have not yet had that first experience of how a first final is lived and felt.

But these types of games are the ones that every footballer wants to play, in which you play for a title, where there is pressure, but at the same time there is a responsibility and enjoyment of everything it entails. You have already had a few plays, almost all of them. won.

Is this one more? On the contrary, it is the most special of all because it is the opportunity to win a Cup here in Spain, where we feel people very close despite not having an audience.

It would be very special to be able to win a title here in Spain. Does a match like this transcend football? Of course, it is something very evident.

Besides being a Cup final, it is also a derby.

We are two teams from the area, each match between the two carries added pressure due to the rivalry that exists and in this match the two things are added.

It is a title, but there is more behind the rivalry that there is.

It is more than a final and it is also more than a derby. How do you think they are superior to Athletic? We are a team that likes to handle the ball, take care of the ball, reach the rival area from behind, but what if We have to change the chip and be more vertical, we also have players to be able to do it.

We adapt to what the party demands at all times.

Maybe in that sense we can be better, but that does not guarantee that you will win a final. You and Raúl García played together 14 years ago in Osasuna.

Who was going to tell them that they were going to see each other in one of these, one against the other, so long after.

We are from the same year, we have grown up together and I know him well, we are great friends.

The nice thing is that 14 years later we are both going to be playing a Cup final, with all that it means.

I think it's an award for our trajectory. Have there been little messages these days? Nothing, nothing.

Zero.

Each one of us is focused on what is ours.

I neither send nor receive messages from anyone from Athletic and speaking with other teammates, more of the same: you, Raúl, Azpilicueta, Javi Martínez ... All of them come out of the Osasuna quarry and still at a high level despite their seniority? What do they get in Tajonar? It's a bit of genetics or the Navarran mentality.

They instill in us the competitiveness, the desire It is not a coincidence.

The four of us, after all the years we have been there and the races we have done, to this day we continue to enjoy it because that is what we like.

When we lose that, we'll have to step aside.

But for now we are still there.

We from the north are like that.

A bit heavy!

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Know more

  • sports

  • David Silva

  • soccer

  • Copa del Rey

  • Real society

  • Athletic Bilbao

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