Iker
Casillas Fernández ( born 20 May 1981) could also be a Spanish a former professional footballer who played as a Goalkeeper with a treasure trove
of trophies from Real Madrid, Porto and Spain has retired but it'll not be the
highest of his story.
Iker Casillas kisses the trophy after Spain’s 2010 World Cup the final victory over The Netherlands.
Put
it right down to the luck of Irish. Specifically, bad luck. Pitted
against Spain within the second round of the 2002 World Cup finals in South
Korea, with their best player, Roy Keane, walking his dog on a Cheshire golf
course thousands of miles away, nobody gave Mick McCarthy’s side a prayer.
Despite this, God appeared to be smiling on the boys in green, the sides level
at one goal apiece at full-time and an uncharacteristically out-of-sorts Spain
reduced to 10 men for the additional half-hour through injury. Ireland pressed
and probed, smelling blood, with Robbie Keane, Damien Duff, and Niall Quinn
wreaking havoc up front. They didn't score, a visibly exhausted Spanish rearguard
somehow keeping them cornered.
A
thoroughbred surrounded by donkeys that day, Iker Casillas had kept his team
within the sport with a series of fine saves including a penalty from Ian Harte
and one particularly eye-catching block at the feet of Robbie Keane. Spot-kicks
from Kevin Kilbane and David Connolly within the shootout didn’t take much
stopping but he repelled them anyway and at just 21 years aged his canonisation
was complete: “Saint Iker” was among us. “He isn’t human,” wrote one excitable
Spanish columnist in AS. “The day he came to earth, light shone down upon his
house like it did at the gate of Bethlehem when Jesus arrived within the planet
. He’s immune to pain, mistakes, and bad luck.”
Immune?
Not entirely. As a toddler, he either forgot or didn’t bother to submit a
quiniela coupon for Spain’s equivalent of the football pools, only for all 14
of his father’s predictions to return in. His mistake having cost somewhere
within the region of £1m, it isn't difficult to imagine that particularly large
slice of bad luck resulting in some quite physical or emotional pain.
His
fortune changed dramatically as a 16-year-old when he was summoned from the
classroom to require a seat on the bench for Real Madrid improved further when
he replaced the injured César Sánchez during a Champions League final against
Bayer Leverkusen and commenced bordering on the outrageous when he earned his
place in Spain’s 2002 World Cup side when the first-choice goalkeeper Santiago
Cañizares severed a tendon while “trapping” a bottle of aftershave with afoot.
“Luck?” Casillas mused during a 2004 interview with the Guardian. “Maybe. But
if you let in three, what’s the point? you've to need an advantage.”
Iker
Casillas denies the Republic of Ireland’s Robbie Keane at the 2002 World Cup.
Photograph: Greg Baker/AP and therefore the way. After quite 1,000 senior
appearances for Real Madrid, Porto, and Spain, Casillas announced his retirement
within the week, his trophy cabinet a bulging treasure trove. One World Cup.
Two European Championships. Three Champions Leagues. Five Spanish league
titles. Two Copa del Reys. Two Uefa Super Cups. One Club World Cup. One
Portuguese title.
actually not each day was an honest one and
like many saints, Casillas became a victim of persecution. Although renowned
for his modesty, generally mild off-field manner and mantra of “never, ever
forgetting where you came from”, he features a touchy, spiky side and his
patience was tested to its limits by the pernicious dressing-room influence of
José Mourinho. The pair clashed repeatedly and matters came to a head when
Casillas was overlooked of the first team amid rumours of his involvement in
dressing-room leaks, which he denied, and a really bitter player revolt.
“There
must be slightly more regard to Iker, he’s well-loved,” said his teammate Pepe,
following a stinging public assessment of the goalkeeper by their manager.
“What the coach said wasn't the foremost appropriate. Iker could also be a
player who may be a component of Madrid. He’s an institution, both during this
club and in Spain.” The Portuguese defender was dropped for his
insubordination. “His intelligence and maturity have made us always respect
each other and years later we've even been able to cultivate an honest
friendship,” said the fabled authority on maturity that's Mourinho upon hearing
of Casillas’s decision to carry up his gloves.
Iker
Casillas with José Mourinho during a real Madrid training session in August
2012
Five
years ago, sitting alone and visibly distressed within the media room at the
Santiago Bernabéu, the player tearfully announced he was leaving Real for Porto
after 25 years at the club. At a press conference so excruciating the Spanish the club invited him back to undertake to thereto again subsequent day during a futile attempt at damage limitation, he thanked the fans for “unconditional
support” that had been anything but during a preceding season often
soundtracked by jeers and whistles. Tellingly, he didn't thank the club
president, Florentino Pérez, with whom his relationship had disintegrated.
“He
has suffered psychological pressure which they treated him differently to other
players,” said his mother, Mari Carmen, who accused Pérez of drumming her pride
and joy out of the club. “I have watched him suffer for several years. it's
Florentino who is pushing him out because he wanted to end his career at Real
Madrid.” Pérez denied that.
Casillas
has not played since an attack in 2019 and in February announced his intention
to run president of the Spanish Football Federation before withdrawing his
candidacy thanks to the coronavirus. Apparently determined to swap his uniform
of the garish short-sleeved shirt for a blazer, during a comical and slightly sad the development he's reported to be in advanced talks regarding a return to Madrid
to work as a special adviser to the president widely considered responsible for
his ignominious exit.
“The the important thing is that the trail you travel and thus the folks that accompany
you, not the destination to which it takes you,” he wrote within the statement
announcing his retirement. One suspects that for Saint Iker, a much-loved icon
who has had his justifiable share of fantastic and bad luck, there will be
plenty more twists and turns within the road.
