It’s the Sids! Barça reclaimed the title as Madrid’s giants faltered while Athletic, Celta and Rayo shook up the European places
T
he day La Liga 2024-25 began, Wojciech Szczesny was sitting on the beach in Marbella lighting up a cigarette, enjoying his retirement. The night it ended, he sat in the dressing room in Cornellà, 1,000km round the coast, and lit up a cigar instead. He had walked away in August, at 35 years old, unwanted and his heart no longer in it, or so he thought. Nine months on, here he was surrounded by kids half his age, a footballer again and winner of every trophy his new home country had to offer. He had not lost a single league match en route to becoming a champion.
“I’ve arrived where even my imagination wouldn’t even dare to take me,” Szczesny had said when he retired. And if he hadn’t dared imagine that, there was no way he could imagine this: a Copa del Rey, a Super Cup and a Champions League semi-final to go with the title.
Summer had started with Kylian Mbappé finally arriving at the Santiago Bernabéu. Madrid had just won La Liga and the Champions League; now they had the world’s best player too, beginning what Marca were already declaring “a dominance never seen before”. They were going to walk it, which was perhaps part of the problem.
