Everything started with Diego Jiménez

Those who do not know the history of Eibar, may not put a face to Diego Jiménez, a midfielder full of technique and quality born in Alcoy and raised soccer player in his beloved Alcoyano, a club in which he played from 1998 to 2012, the year in which he ended up in a Eibar in which Gaizka Garitano was already in command, still in Second B.

According to the leaders of the gunsmith club, that was the last season in which the coffers touched almost with cobwebs allowed to make a team to fight for promotion to the Second Division. Otherwise, the future of Eibar would go through fighting to maintain the category in Second B.

Those from Ipurua won the right to play the playoffs for the fourth consecutive year. The ghosts of the previous qualifying rounds were hovering over Ipurua, but without losing an iota of illusion. Eibar came from Alcoy 2-2 in the first round, which gave us hope. In the return at home, Alcoyano scored in the 78th minute, and it seemed that the nightmare was repeating itself. When half the stadium was already crestfallen, the figure of Diego Jiménez appeared, heroic, almost epic, to score with an unappealable right from outside the area the goal that made Garitano's men follow into the fight

The fight afterwards was not so cruel against Oviedo and Hospitalet, and Eibar returned to their favorite category, Second A, without even dreaming what would happen a year later, the historic promotion to First. Diego Jiménez did not celebrate that goal with which it all started. He is a gentleman and he proved it that afternoon. But, those who love Eibar know that, if it were not for that right hand on the bell, nothing that is being experienced today would have been possible. “I have a lot of respect for the club in which I was formed, and within my sports career I would only change that that goal had been scored by another, but that everything else would have been the same,” he says.

Life has changed, and the pandemic has also hit him in the form of being forced to close his gym, although he has returned to work as an osteopath and giving massages. “Before I worked three hours when I played football, but now …”, he laughs. He remembers his two years in Eibar with a more than special affection. “It is always said that the Basques are closed, but the thing is that two days after arriving we were already one more family from the city. I made good friends, people took care of my family in an incredible way. My wife was 27 years old and my eldest son 7, we had just crossed Spain to live in another place, and people were ringing the doorbell at home to see if we needed anything. I've never experienced anything like this, “he says.

When talking about the fans, his heart sinks. “A large part of my performance at Eibar was because of them. It's that I was going out onto the pitch from the bench and people cheered me on without even touching the ball. It made my skin crawl, and I will never forget that. In Eibar, despite not getting to play in the First Division, people made me feel like a First Division footballer “.

The feeling of affection is mutual. In fact, Eskozia La Brava paid him a tribute in his land, and its president, Joseba Combarro, has nothing but words of praise and admiration for the figure of Diego. “We wanted to thank him for his dedication and commitment in the years he was there, since this dream that we still live began with him. His goal was the passage from hell to heaven,” he says. “The event was very exciting, because meeting a person like Diego Jiménez happens very rarely in life. It is an emblem of Eibar that will always remain in history.” The distance, in this case, does not make you forget, and both Diego Jiménez from Alcoy and the entire Eibar fans from Ipurua, they will always have a special connection, invisible to the eyes, that can only be understood from the soul. Because yes, that's right, everything started with Diego.