"I have not lived anything like this and I do not think I will live it again"

Barcelona“It is a very special week. You see children walking down the street in our shirt or the elderly talking at the bar about Sunday's match. On days like these, you realize how important the football club is to the municipality”, says Carles Aguirre, president of L’Horta de Sant Joan, one of the 174 teams between Quarta Catalana and Tercera RFEF who are playing promotion playoffs this weekend. The first leg is in La Fatarella, which is also from Terres de l’Ebre and, like L’Horta de Sant Joan, plays on a sand pitch. In less than 24 hours, the fan bus was filled. “It’s the last category, but the feeling is the same. For us, who are a village of a thousand inhabitants, it is a great success”, Aguirre proudly claims.

Sense of community

“In many towns and neighborhoods, the field is a meeting point for neighbors and football is the excuse to see each other. And in modest clubs used to never winning anything, the possibility of promotion makes everyone want to be part of it. It’s like a big party”, explains Cristian García, who has been documenting Catalan amateur matches for over a decade. “It’s exactly that, a big football party. Usually, 250 or 300 fans come to our field for matches. Well, look, at the final of the play-off last year we were about a thousand spectators. It wasn’t just people from the town, but from all over Bages”, comments Francesc Pérez, who after the promotion to Primera Catalana left the presidency of Joanenc, the club from Sant Joan de Vilatorrada.

“The field was packed like an egg, but on the way to Puig-reig there were 200 of our fans. When we came out onto the pitch and saw them, all dressed in yellow, we were amazed”, adds Asier Chaves, goalkeeper and communications manager of Joanenc –“in a small club everyone does everything”, he says–, who in 2015 moved more than half a thousand people to Parets del Vallès on the day of the promotion to Second Catalan category: “I was a youth player and at that moment I decided I wanted to stay many years with the town’s team”.

Blockbuster derbies and promotions

With the format change implemented last year, more promotion play-offs are being played than ever before. Now there are semi-finals and finals, and in most categories the proximity criterion is used. This means that many play-offs between neighboring teams are played, matches of maximum rivalry. "This week we have a Lliçà d'Amunt-Lliçà de Vall," exemplifies Cristian García, known as The Catalan Groundhopper. On Saturday he will travel to La Plana de Vic to see Atlètic Balenyà-Bigues and Centelles-Aiguafreda, an Osona derby full of tension.

One of the most keenly felt promotions he experienced last year was that of Júpiter. In the decisive match to move up to Lliga Elit, the equivalent of the sixth division, the Verneda club gathered 3,072 spectators at its stadium. The promotion goal arrived in stoppage time and caused a massive pitch invasion. "I ran out, I threw the shirt... and suddenly, 200 or 300 fans entered the field! I remember the captain, Patrick, coming to give me the shirt because someone had taken it from me," comments Sergi Monsó, the goalscorer, with a laugh. It's the most emotional of his life: "As a player, it's not normal to experience many play-offs and even less so with an atmosphere like this or scoring a goal with so much significance for the club and the neighborhood. It wasn't too long ago that Júpiter had been in Segona Catalana."

The play-offs are experienced with tension on the pitch and in the stands, but also in the kitchen and at the bar. “We work a lot, it's madness. On top of that, you have to anticipate it because you can't run out of sandwiches or beer. And normally during the match the bar gets saturated,” says Mari Alés, from the bar at Can Vidalet's ground, who a year ago touched the sky with promotion to Tercera RFEF. She enjoyed and suffered the promotion against Atlètic Sant Just in equal measure. Even though the first leg was played in the late afternoon, at lunchtime there were already people queuing to taste her callos“For what we lived and because we had many years of bad luck in the

“For what we lived and because we had many years of bad luck in the play-offs, the lighthouse of the West for a whole generation of Andreuencs. “If a the promotion from Salamanca, the beacon of the West for a whole generation of Andreuencs. “Can a play-off change your life? Yes, it can happen”, he opines.

Ask Luis Gallego, who in the summer of 2021 took Guineueta up to Tercera RFEF. The Nou Barris team had lost the first leg of the promotion 2-0 in Tona, and in the 80th minute they were tied 1-1. They needed to win by three goals. "In the 81st minute we made it 2-1, but in the 87th minute they whistled a penalty against us. Giancarlo saved it and in the 91st minute we scored the 3-1," recounts the coach. "During that week I told the players a hundred times that if we were short one goal, the atmosphere would provide it. The neighborhood would score it. I had never seen the stadium like that day," he reflects.

Easier said than done, because in the 93rd minute, from a corner kick, the miracle happened. "I still get emotional when I think about it. When I arrived, Guineueta had never gone beyond Segona Catalana and we went up to Tercera RFEF. For a humble club and a working-class neighborhood, it was unthinkable," explains Gallego, who was carried on shoulders and even had a fan kiss him on the mouth during the celebration. It was the time of covid, but the masks had flown off a while ago. "I haven't experienced anything like this and I don't think I ever will again," he states. The magic of play-off, the main festival of Catalan football.