“My love, we are going to Parma.” With 43 years goalkeepers also make gloves out of romance. The message was from Buffon to his partner last summer to announce the return to his old team, a Parma that survives in Serie B.
His professional colleagues are jumping over the 40-year-old wall with increasing frequency. That figure is more of a stimulus than a barricade. In Espanyol it is Diego Lopez, co
n 39 years, which shows each week that the category has no age. Others go down that road in LaLiga.
Claudio Bravo is 38 years old;
Manolo Reina, 36; Neto, Oier, Cillessen, Asenjo, are from the group of 32. Goalkeepers who lived near the border of 40 – above or below – remember their feelings.
Pain in the morning
Andrés Palop left Spanish football at the age of 39.
One year in Germany was the last catwalk to goodbye. The exporter from Valencia, Villarreal, Sevilla and Bayer Leverkusen does not resort to magic formulas to explain longevity and remains with the “mentality and head. From there the illusion and motivation, competitiveness and balance to
train yourself well and take good care of yourself because the body does not forgive “.
You have to take good care of yourself because the body does not forgive and one day it tells you: ‘You have squeezed me to the fullest
Andrés Palop (Former goalkeeper)
Palop also marks that
“You have to be excited in each training session. That’s what you see in Buffon’s training sessions with Parma. So until one day the body tells you: ‘You have squeezed me to the maximum’.
You have to realize when you don’t get where you were before. “The ex-cancerbero admits that the pace and weight of the months was noticeable above all in” recovery, not so much in placement or speed. In my case, my back suffered the most.
If you fall twice in another position, in ours every day it was 70, 80 times.
You woke up in the morning and it hurt, yeah The body takes its toll on you in the long run. ”
Athletes players
César Sánchez was placed with 40 years under the sticks of Villarreal. “There are no secrets: it is taking care of yourself and you are reaping what you sowed.
Today everything has changed a lot. You will see more people playing until they are older. Soccer is more physical, but training systems have been improved, food, everything is measured. I started at Valladolid in 1990 and the goalkeeper did the same as a winger.
Now the players are athletes who play soccer. “
The exporter from Valladolid, Real Madrid, Zaragoza, Valencia, Tottenham and Villarreal recalls the transformation of the method in the position and
how “it went from a volume job: many shots, many actions, to a specific job
for the goalkeeper “.
The visit to the gym
Alberto Cifuentes, 41 years old, brushed against Cádiz to be the longest-lived goalkeeper in our football,
record held by Ricardo, who did not want to leave his opinion. Cifuentes considers that “you gain in tranquility, stability and maturity. You know yourself better.
With 25 years before a game I was at home thinking; At 35, I could be assembling a piece of furniture
or taking a walk. ”
The exporter from Mallorca, Rayo, Murcia or Cádiz, among others, estimates that “there is no other formula than the illusion of going to train every day. I did not have a privileged physique,
I was rather skinny and at 32 I started working out more in the gym. The most important thing is the head. What cost the most was the first fall to the ground. The first three weeks of the preseason were difficult for me. Then nothing, during the season it was like a lettuce “.
Over time you stabilize and in the end, although you lose your ability to recover, you even enjoy the moment when you are going to train. New sensations arise
César Sánchez (Former goalkeeper)
César Sánchez emphasizes that “with the passage of time physical condition is lost, but I did not see myself slower,
you read stocks better and anticipate better. The goalkeeper was considered to have maturity at 28 years old, seeing one debut at 18, 19 or 20 was not as normal as now.
De Gea, with his physique, can play until he gets bored.
In the last phase of the race, the ability to recover is lost. In my case, I didn’t suffer when I got up in the morning, even when I retired I thought I could have continued. ”
A field trip to Bayer Leverkusen awaited Palop at the end,
a “very different experience. I had Leno in front of me. It suited me very well, but I suffered because I was not used to working so much with the other players. Then it is true that they protected me.
It was a brutal experience. “
The former goalkeeper recalls those extraordinary daily agendas:
“I would come in at 9 in the morning and come home around 5 in the afternoon.
Everything was programmed: fatigue analysis, training in the gym, group training in the field, weight session, food and recovery session in cold rooms … “.
Stop feeding
All emphasize the importance of food throughout their careers. Palop recalls the creed of Dr. Escribano at Sevilla: “When I was 35 years old at Sevilla,
He told me that every year I had to lose a kilo. I weighed 87 kilos and I reached 83, but I felt weak. I stabilized at 84. He was not a big, muscular goalkeeper and at 84 he was fine. “The path for the last sprint of his career was already marked:
“I followed that advice to the letter. I didn’t even taste sweets or processed foods.
All well measured so as not to wear you out. If you look at Diego López, he is thinner now than six or seven years ago. ”
Cifuentes admitted that “I changed my diet a lot.
When I was young I had a chocolate palm tree, which was made from industrial pastries. All that he didn’t even touch at the end. ”
César acknowledges that food “is essential. Before, to maintain weight or lose it, they bet on not eating.
You came to a preseason with three extra kilos and you thought you would lose yourself just by running and stopping eating. It was not scientific at all. ”
When you are young you have a chocolate palm tree; then neither the tests. The most important thing is the head and the preparation, at 32 I worked more in the gym
Alberto Cifuentes (Former goalkeeper)
He had a short and unique experience at Tottenham in 2008.
“Juande was the coach and everything was measured with Dr. Escribano. You knew your ideal weight and the measurements to take. Then Redknapp took over from him and he went to total freedom even on match days …”.
You have to be sponges to take advantage of what is communicated to you for years. César remembers how “you receive a lot of advice. At 19 you see yourself capable of anything
and you think that the one who tells you is from another era; then the years go by and you see that everything they told you becomes reality. Ravnic helped me at Valladolid. Then, later, Ochotorena was a reference and key for it to last longer. “The goal does not shrink when crossing out identity cards.
Cifuentes describes it this way: “The goal only gets small when you turn around and don’t see it.
As a veteran you control the game more, you talk to the defenders and you are aware of more things than just the ball. Then there are doormen of many kinds. I knew he was not fast and he always had to be well positioned. What I never thought about was saving myself a stretch on the floor. ”
The final wisdom
For César with seniority an ideal state is reached because “after the initial phase of euphoria in a career,
then you stabilize and in the end you enjoy it and savor it until the moment you go to train. In a goalkeeper, the mental is very important and in that final period sensations arise that you had not had. ”
There is a place for nostalgia. Cifuentes declares his “envy when I see Diego López or Buffon now.
They stay great. In these years it will be seen how the goalkeepers are going to retire later and later. There is much more preparation, the fields have improved, the diet is taken better. “And you go to Parma.
