The Espanyol visit the Camp Nou on Saturday (21 hours) to face Barcelona, a long-awaited derby by the parish parish after a year in exile from the Second Division.
The blue and white team wants to take advantage of the ups and downs of a Barça that grabs onto the arrival of Xavi Hernández to give a blow at the table before the eternal rival citizen. A triumph at the Camp Nou that parrots have been choking on for more than twelve years, specifically since February 21, 2009, the last victory del Espanyol in feudo culé (1-2).
What went down in history as the ‘Delapeñazo’ thanks to the double of Iván De la Peña, survives in memory of the parakeet fan who aspires and dreams of being repeated next Saturday.
That February 21, 2009 Mauricio Pochettino’s Espanyol He was the bottom of the championship and arrived dying at the Camp Nou, with the water up to his neck. Nobody gave a euro for the eleven parakeet, but he made the bank jump in the leader’s field, a Barcelona of Pep Guardiola to which nobody coughed and less at home, in that campaign.
Of that Espanyol who beat Barça at the Camp Nou for almost 13 years (twelve years and 9 months) there is only one survivor left in the current squad Vicente Moreno: Dídac Vilá. The one from Mataró did not play the 2009 derby, but he was in the Pochettino squad Well, the Argentine coach gave the alternative that season to the youth squad side. And it’s still there.
Dídac is the only ‘survivor’ in Vicente Moreno’s dressing room of that Espanyol that gave the great surprise almost 13 years ago. But linked to the Catalan club also remain today some of the players who were at the Camp Nou that February 21 or, at least, were part of the squad of Pochettino: Raúl Tamudo, Rufete, Javi Chica and David García.
Tamudo, the historic top scorer of Espanyol, was part of the team that beat Barça, just like David García, today ‘scouter’ and responsible for recruiting players for Espanyol grassroots football. While Rufete, the sports director and Javi Chica, today coach of Juvenil B, they did not play that derby but they were in that Espanyol (2008-09) that gave the bell.
The last visit to Camp Nou, of sour memory
The team of Vicente Moreno will try to emulate the feat of Espanyol de Pochettino and incidentally, will try to archive the sad and cruel memory of the last visit to the Camp Nou. Was the July 8, 2020, when Espanyol certified its mathematical decline after losing 1-0 at the Barça Coliseum.
Read also