THE REPORT The Reina and the virtue of playing with your feet

These are peculiar times for goalkeepers. The new goal kick rule put into effect last season has changed habits and encourages situations like the one starring Piqué and Neto last week in Vitoria. It will not be the last. Two voices authorized to analyze the new role of goalkeepers who have become more outfield players than ever are Miguel and Pepe Reina. Two generations, two eras, almost 40 years between the two between the three suits and a common denominator: mastering the game with the feet. Each one in his time. And in his own way.

The father responds from his Cordoba of the soul; the son, from Rome, the last home of his traveling professional career. Their telephone relationship is almost daily. Their careers, separated in time, have points in common. Miguel made his debut for Córdoba in Primera at the age of 18. Two seasons (1964-66) to be later signed by Barcelona (1965-73) and finish at Atlético (1973-80) with 33 years. Pepe also made his debut in the Division of Honor at the age of 18, exactly on December 2, 2000.. Barcelona played against Celta and entered for Dutruel, injured. He is about to turn 20 in the elite.

“And they have flown past me. The mother who bore me! They are fine and if I look back 20 years at that level it is to be proud. Make it a couple or three more! I have two years signed with Lazio, with the option of a third. If we enter Europe next season, a third is automatically executed. We will try to do that third … and then a fourth. Until you drop from exhaustion! The advantage is that I really like what I do. The moment I do not go with a smile to do what I have been doing until now, it will be time to get out of the car. Up to this point…”.

Miguel remembers his adventures with the ball at his feet. “Even if the goal with Violeta happened to me playing with the National Team in that goal kick in which we did not understand each other, I, at that time, handled me well with my feet. That move was done a lot to buy time. Take out fast. I used to train the serves a lot from my area, both with the ball on the ground and when I served with a volley. So, of course, if a teammate gave it to me, I could take it with my hand and then choose the serve. He had power and did not misdirect the balls. It hit very long. Whenever I could, I played as a forward in the games and I got into the rounds. Luis Aragonés made me work on it in training. We could use a precise and well-placed serve for our counterattacks. But of course, nothing to do with Pepe, who from a young age began to play with his feet. He is privileged in that sense ”.

The mentioned one remembers with clarity those beginnings in the inferior categories of the Barça. “I was lucky that when Van Gaal arrived at Barcelona he brought Hoek, who came from the Dutch school, as goalkeeper coach. Possibly, the one that previously adapted to the change in the rule of assignments to the goalkeeper and that they dominated that facet of the game. I was in the juvenile, 14 or 15 years. We had to learn to play with our feet as we went along. That has been my great advantage: working specifically since childhood what other goalkeepers have done long after”.

Of course those beginnings have nothing to do with the present. “Now everything has been modernized. Before, if we were lucky to have them, because not all teams had them, we worked with the goalkeeping coaches. It was a more specific job. Now we train with the rest of the team and we are involved in the same dynamic. You participate in possessions and all kinds of tactics, in addition to doing the most common preparation for our position afterwards. Now we are one of the group ”.

LThe two agree that the new rule and the majority predisposition of many teams to start playing from their area should not be detrimental to them. Miguel watches him as a spectator. “I don't think it's bad, it's about not raffling the ball with a long serve, which then has to be recovered again. If you have it, you take care of it. It is better to start from behind playing. With the rule changes since my time, goalkeepers have gotten used to playing with their feet and are more trained. A goalkeeper who does not handle his feet with certain dexterity is no longer understood. Those who do not get used to it will have a hard time. If you don't you are null, or one minus two. What happened the other day between Neto and Piqué is normal, I think the goalkeeper should have returned it to him first because Piqué opens up to give him that option ”.

Pepe sees it from within. “Sometimes, playing inside the area, it seems that we are causing the pressure of the rival, but if you do it well and jump that pressure line, you leave the team in advantage to play later. It is a battle that must be worked on. The rule, I understand, aims to facilitate the output of the ball played. Of course, if you don't do it right, it becomes a double-edged sword. I like it because I've been playing with my feet all my life. First, at Barça; then at Liverpool, although not so much. But at Naples we have played like that. I feel comfortable. I have adapted well to the times and I work hard. There are many ways to deal with it. You can lengthen the central ones, put them more inside. Everyone can choose what they want to do, or even play long ”.

Conversely, As a good specialist in the luck of penalties, he does not think the same about the regulations that force him to step on the goal line when shooting. “It seems like a lot to me. All goalkeepers think so. I admit that one cannot advance a meter, but a few centimeters… nothing should happen. It seems ridiculous to me. And on top of that they admonish you. It is enough punishment since they repeat the penalty ”·

Miguel and Pepe in their long football conversations have had a lot to do with how the goalkeeper's life has changed from then to now. Pepe remembers it well. “In this sense, my father had a worse time. My poor thing, if then I fucked her 25 times. He took it, let it go … Little could he say to me, that I was lucky to be training to play with my feet and I grew up in that education. The advice he has given me, more than technical, more than from within the field, has been from outside. Of attitude, of overcoming a mistake, of not coming up when things are going well for me … “

Holland, on Wednesday, is Spain's next rival. Y the oranje team is an irremediable part of the football life of the Reina family. Miguel will never be able to forget – he is remembered more frequently than he would like – that he scored an own goal in a game against the Dutch in 1973 in one of the most bizarre actions in football history. For its part, The son of the creature lived before the heirs of the clockwork orange two stellar moments of his life: the conquest of the World Cup in South Africa and four years later, in Brazil 2014, the end of that generation of three consecutive titles.

Pepe gives priority in his retina and in his brain to the triumph of the World Cup in Johannesburg. “It was the happiest moment in Spanish football. I can add little more now that neither I nor all of us have already said. The 23 of us who were chosen and the lucky ones to be there will always be remembered, but I don't want to forget all the previous generations who did their bit. so that it was possible in the end. If they tell me that I am going to suffer a 5-1 against the Netherlands to end a winning cycle, after being world champion, I would have delighted to sign it. The cycle is there ”.

The ten years of that memorable goal by Iniesta were fulfilled last July and Pepe celebrated it by opening a WhatsApp group in which all the champions are. “We are 23. We congratulate each other and I hope that when we are all retired, that we don't have much left, we can get together and enjoy a meal remembering those moments. The group is still open, no one has unsubscribed. He is not very active, but it is nice for me to continue having contact with them and to know how things are going for each one of them ”.

From the 5-1 World Cup in Brazil, Pepe has mixed feelings. “It was a weird match. If Silva had scored 2-0 on the occasion we had, everything would have been different. It is not an apology, those of us who have been there for many years know that this happens in games. If we score that goal, maybe we were talking about another World Cup. Who knows. Their goal before half-time hurt us a lot and things went wrong in the second half. They were far superior. It's true that at half-time, although we were tied, the feelings were not positive. It happens many times when you are tied at the end. It's a blow. Sometimes you recover and sometimes you don't. But we also didn't have the premonition that something so fat was going to happen next. The group in general was not like before. We were a bit at the end of the cycle. It was palpable. We didn't have the locker room strength of previous years, but it's always easier to talk when you know the game ended 5-1. Now you remember that the spirits were not good. No. What had to happen happened and that's it ”.

Miguel, at 74 years old, takes with good humor the fact that he remembers his play against the Dutch. “There is no interview that they do to me in which the goal with Violeta or the one in the final of the European Cup of Heysel against Bayern does not come out. I've gotten used to living with it. It's something that I can't forget because they keep reminding me. The amount of good things I did in my career and they only remember those two. What are we going to do!”.

And that of the comic with the Selection there is no trace in images. Not one can be traced online. The action was reflected for the story in a photo in which the post and the ball are seen in the foreground, pure white. Violeta running behind the ball with a scared face and Reina and Cruyff in the background, in the background. A friendly between Spain and Holland was played in Amsterdam (2-5-1973). It was the Kubala National Team in the middle of qualifying for the World Cup 74. That match was a good rehearsal for the rival's category with some players from Feyenoord, European champion in 70 and most of Ajax, champion in 71 and 72 and on track to be for the third time in a row that same year.

The tie (1-1), goals from Rep and Valdez, looked on the scoreboard and the first half was over. Like so many other times, Reina approached for a ball that had gone out on the back line to the right of his goal and stayed on the side of the large area waiting for his teammate Violeta, a classic midfielder of those who he embedded himself in the defensive line when necessary and, having made a good career at Zaragoza, took off towards his position. He had to wait for the ball to come out of the area, touch it with his foot, put it back in and catch it with his hand to serve long. A mechanized move that was spoiled because there was no less than Cruyff, who put pressure on Reina. In his presence, he wanted to accelerate his touch and half stumbled returned the ball legally (he had already left the area) to his partner, who, convinced that Miguel would execute the action normally, had left the small area. When he wanted to react, the ball had already passed him and he was meekly preparing to cross the goal line by the furthest stick.

“Violeta stared at Cruyff instead of looking at me and following the trajectory of the ball that was returning her. I could have entered the area to cancel my partner's serve. The play would have been repeated and nothing more. Now, of course, that play with the new rules could not happen. The fact is that we did not understand each other and the ball ended up entering to general derision and my corresponding anger. The truth is that I hit it with my left and my strong leg was the right one, but it didn't have to have entered in any way, I hit the ball well ”.

Kubala glared at him and replaced him at half-time. He made his debut for García Remón and Reina did not play with the National Team again. He stayed in five games and that then was the best placed goalkeeper to take over from Iribar. He paid dearly for that play. “Kubala gave it to me and Kubala took it from me. First he blessed me and then he un blessed me. I can not say anything. Errors are paid. I continued with my career and I still had seven good years at Atlético. A shame because the National Team always made me very excited ”.

The party, in question, ended with a Spanish defeat. In the second half, the Valencian Valdez tied the game again and in the last minute Cruyff (some reports give Israel the goal) sealed the Dutch victory (3-2).