José Antonio Camacho, icon of the madridista fury, has turned 65 this Monday, an age synonymous with retirement but that does not go with the always jovial spirit of this historic former player born in Cieza (Murcia) who between 1973 and 1989 marked an era in the merengue club where he showed claw, fight, surrender and heart, attitudes that Real Madrid has always highly valued. He has been one of the best defenders who have passed through the Santiago Bernabeu.
As a player, Camacho developed his sports career in the Real Madrid, where he played a total of 16 seasons, although he did not participate in any League match in 1978-79 after suffering a serious injury.
Camacho is the seventh player to have played the most games in all competitions in the history of Real Madrid with 577 behind Raúl González (741), Iker Casillas (725), Manolo Sanchís (710), Santillana (645), Sergio Ramos (640) and Paco Gento and Fernando Hierro (both 601).
He is also one of the first positioned in terms of seasons in the white club with those 16, tied with Raúl González, Iker Casillas and José Martínez ‘Pirri’. Only Miguel Ángel González (19), Manolo Sanchís and Paco Gento (both 18) and Carlos Santillana and Miguel Porlan ‘Chendo’ (both 17) surpass them, according to data from OPTA.
As a Madrid player he won 19 titles
As a Real Madrid player he won a total of 19 titles: nine Leagues, five Cups, two Spanish Super Cups, one League Cup and two UEFA Cups. In League he played a total of 414 games, 407 of them as a starter, in which he scored a total of nine goals.
It was international with the absolute Spanish team in 81 matches and played in the 1982 and 1986 World Cups and the 1984 and 1988 Euro Cups.
Extensive stage as a coach
After hanging up my boots started his career as a coach. He achieved promotion to the First Division with the Lightning at the end of the 1991-92 season and led the Vallecas in the highest category in the following campaign. It also amounted to Spanish in his first campaign in office (1993-94) and was his coach in the following two in LaLiga.
After leading the Seville in 1996-97, he was dismissed after 21 league games and the team ended up relegating to Segunda, he returned in the campaign following the Spanish. Camacho was second coach in the stage of Alfredo Di Stéfano at Real Madrid and first in 1998 and 2004, also in the club of his loves.
As a national coach He led La Roja in 44 games, suffering only seven defeats (28V 9E). Raced at the 2000 Euro Cup and in the 2002 World Cup after which he resigned from office after the unjust elimination at the hands of South Korea in the quarterfinals of the World Cup played 18 years ago and that was played in that Asian country and in Japan.
In the Portuguese league he coached Benfica during two campaigns, 2002-03 and 2003-04. He left the Lisbon team to return to the bench of the Real Madrid (2004-05), but resigned after only three games. He returned to the Lisbon club in the 2007-08 campaign. His last club in LaLiga was Osasuna, of which he was a coach for three seasons, between 2008-09 and 2010-11.
He was the coach of China between August 2011 and June 2013 and Gabon between November 2016 and September 2018. With the Africans he was 17 games, with a balance of seven defeats, eight draws and only two victories.