José Luis Mendilibar and Fran Garagarza have renewed for a season (2020-2021) with Eibar. The Zaldibar coach will complete his sixth consecutive campaign at the Gipuzkoan club First Division, although in total there are 7 campaigns in which Mendilibar has led Eibar, since it premiered on the Ipurua bench in 2004-2005 in the Second Division; and then he trained Athletic Club, Valladolid, Osasuna and Levante, until in July 2015 he returned to the Eibar team. For his part, Fran Garagarza will complete 10 years as Eibar's sports director and will continue to be in charge of making the signings of footballers, along with the technical secretary, Mikel Martija, who has also renewed.
Garagarza, who joined the sports management in 2011, has reached an agreement with the directive for the two parties to agree on its continuity looking to the future before the end of the 2020-2021 financial year, which the mutrikuarra will complete regardless of what happens when they trade before the end of March 2021, once the winter transfer market is over.
Although it was an open secret, Eibar confirmed the news on Friday, July 31, the last day of their contracts. This contractual relationship had lasted a month -since June 30-, because Both the coaching staff, the sports management, and almost all the footballers (except Orellana and Escalante), agreed to continue in the discipline of the Barça team until the end of the 2019-2020 season., which was affected by a three-month suspension break due to the coronavirus.
It had already been advanced by Jon Ander Ulazia, CEO of the Gipuzkoan First Division club. “Mendilibar and Fran Garagarza (sports director) have been working side by side since the goal of permanence was achieved and the scenario was clarified. In the coming days there will be news about both. The club has not stopped having a coach and sports director. His work has not ceased. They have a contract until July 31. There has been no power vacuum at any time. There will be news about them in the coming days, “Ulazia announced Wednesday.
Follow the entire coaching staff and Azkargorta renews 3 seasons
Along with Mendilibar, his entire coaching staff will also follow, consisting of Toni Ruiz (physical trainer), Iñaki Bea (assistant coach), Josu Anuzita (goalkeeper trainer) and Andoni Azkargorta (analyst of rival teams and second coach). Andoni Azkargorta, who began working as an assistant to Gaizka Garitano, spying on opposing teams, in the 2014-2015 campaign, when Eibar debuted in Primera, and continued to perform this function when Mendilibar arrived in the summer of 2015 -with time also assumed the functions of second technician, has extended his contract for three seasons.
José Luis Mendilibar Etxebarria (Zaldibar, 1961) has led Eibar in 250 official matches between the two stages he has lived in Ipurua. Since taking over the team in the First Division in the 2015-2016 campaign, the Zaldibar coach has sat on the Barça bench 207 times (190 league games and 17 Copa del Rey games), reaping 68 wins, 54 draws and 85 defeats.
He started in Arratia, in Regional Preferente, and has finished in Primera
After his journey as a footballer (he was a midfielder) in Bilbao Athletic, CD Logroñés, Sestao, and Lemona -clubs of Second Division and Second B-, the Biscayan 'hung up his boots' in 1994 without having been able to play in First Division. He remained linked to football as a coach by inertia, since he never thought of such a possibility when he was a player. At the age of 33, he started in a modest way, in the Arratia (1994-1995 season), a Biscayan club of Regional Preferred, which in his second campaign promoted to Third Division. This allowed him to lead teams from the Athletic Club youth team (cadet B of Athletic, Basconia, Bilbao Athletic, again Basconia, and Aurrera de Vitoria).
His life changed when he decided to leave the Basque Country to accept Lanzarote's offer., a group of canaries from Segunda B to which he directed two campaigns (2002-2003 and 2003-2004) and in which he coincided with Toni Ruiz (physical trainer), both contending for the promotion phase to Segunda. He had left his family to carve out a career as a coach. The bet went well, since Eibar trusted him for the 2004-2005 season in the Second Division. On the first occasion that he took the reins of the azulgranas they fought for the promotion to First until the last league day, although they did not succeed. Almost a decade later, Gaizka Garitano, whom Mendilibar trained as a footballer at Ipurua in the 2004-2005 financial year, achieved success with Eibar.
He relieved Gaizka Garitano at Eibar, whom he trained at Eibar
Mendilibar relieved Gaizka Garitano at Eibar, who after achieving two straight promotions as a Barça coach He was also the one who sat on the bench in the debut of the Eibarreses in the First Division in the 2014-2015 financial year. Although Eibar descended due to sports demerits in May 2015, it rose in the offices shortly afterwards due to the administrative descent of Elche due to its repeated defaults to the Treasury.
Mendilibar signed for Eibar on June 30, 2015, when it was not yet known whether the Eibar players would play in the Second Division or in the First. He did it in the highest category in the 2015-2016 season and since then it has been verified that Mendilibar is the ideal coach for Eibar and vice versa. Since the Zaldibar coach has the full confidence of the Eibar management, something very different from what was found in Athletic Club (where he made his debut in the First Division in the 2005-2006 campaign) and Levante, where it only lasted a few months. . Although things went better for him in Valladolid (who went up to Primera) and Osasuna, he also ended up being dismissed in both teams.
De Blasis will not continue at Eibar
Pablo De Blasis will not continue at Eibar after having finished his contract at the end of the 2019-2020 season, as confirmed by the club on Friday. The 32-year-old Argentine winger arrived at Eibar in the summer of 2018 from the German Mainz, and has completed two seasons (2018-2019 and 2019-2020) as Barca, playing 58 matches (54 in the league and 2 in the Copa del Rey). ) in which he has scored 7 goals.
In his first exercise (2018-2019) at Eibar, De Blasis played 24 league matches spread over 1,515 minutes, scoring 2 goals, and played a cup match.
In the 2019-2020 season, the Argentine has had a greater role, playing 30 league games (1,590 minutes), in which he has scored 2 goals and distributed 3 assists. In addition, he has played 3 cupbearing matches, scoring 3 goals and giving 2 assists.
De Blasis has shown his versatility, because although he came as an extreme, Mendilibar has also used him as a lateral defense with an offensive vocation, fulfilling the file on many occasions. In the campaign that just ended he had more prominence after the league break, when he achieved 2 goals, one of them decisive that gave Eibar a vital victory in Granada (1-2) in the fight for permanence.