Fifty years on Aitor Aguirre and Sergio Manzanera still share a connection after their protest against executions in Spain in 1975
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mid the clatter of studs and the shouts of encouragement, the players of Racing Santander filed out of the home dressing room and into the tunnel to face their opponents. All of them, that was, except two. The broad-shouldered centre-forward Aitor Aguirre and the winger Sergio Manzanera lingered furtively.
“We said that if we could do something to damage this military regime, we should,” recalls Aguirre on the terrace of the restaurant he ran for many years after his retirement. “But it had to be subtle, or they wouldn’t let us out on the field. So, we slipped into the toilets with a pair of bootlaces. I tied one onto Sergio, and he tied one onto me, so they looked like armbands.”
They swiftly rejoined their teammates, leaving an empty changing room behind. A very different scene would greet them on their return at half-time – the narrow corridors packed with armed police after their protest had been noted and repercussions began. Judicial proceedings, death threats and public condemnation soon followed. Yet the experience would only serve to forge an emerging friendship into a lifelong bond.
