Our footballers kept busy yesterday, with all sorts of acts, events and promotions! Plus, other club news!
One. The effortlessly cool Esteban Granero headed to the Orcasitas football field to choose the 15 children (his “Piratas”) that will receive scholarships to his Technification Center. He was there for 45 minutes and selected the kids with the help of the coaches of the Orcasitas Sports Association, as well as signed autographs and posed for pictures. Oh, the happiness looks mutual!
Two. Meanwhile, the Real Madrid Foundation, with which el Pirata has habitually collaborated with in the past, unveiled two more collaborators in the form of Sergio Canales and Ricardo Carvalho (they were there just to look pretty, more so in the case of the former than the latter. I say this because they didn’t say anything during the presentation).
The Real Madrid Foundation and the Mapfre Foundation (Mapfre is a Spanish insurance company) signed an agreement to work together to develop sports schools in Brazil (one), Panama (one) and El Salvador (six). According to FP, the Foundation would like to open more than 100 schools all around the world and improve living conditions. The Mapfre Foundation is already involved in that latter goal, and sees Madrid’s sports schools as a fitting extension to the health and education centers that they are building.
I wonder if the team just picked the names out of a hat to see who would attend the event?
Three. Fernando Gago has been given the all clear, will train today with the team and is available to be called up for Sunday’s game against Depor! If you’ve forgotten all about Gago, I don’t blame you, so here is a quick recap of what happened. He injured his left knee in the Trofeo Bernabéu game on Aug. 24 eight minutes after coming into the game, and has been out since.
Sergio Canales is also expected to train with the team today.
Finally, the sick room is emptying! Let’s hope there won’t be any new patients…
Four. Karim Benzema and Lass were named to France’s squad for their upcoming Euro 2012 qualifiers against Romania and Luxembourg. France’s head coach Laurent Blanc also spoke – a bit harshly? – to a French newspaper about Karim: “he’s not used to working. When you’re speaking with him one-on-one, he listens. But then these players go out and meet people that tell them, ‘you’re the best, you play in Madrid, you don’t need to work.’ Those are false friends.” At least Mou is helping to keep Karim’s confidence up – as Karim came out of the Auxerre game, Mou told him, “very good work, Karim.”
Five. José Mourinho surprisingly closed off the training session of yesterday to the press, who were informed via text message. The customary post-training press conference was also canceled. Today’s session will be held under the same conditions, with Mou scheduled to speak to the press on Saturday. It’s being speculated that these changes were made after the controversial press conference Mou gave on the eve of the Auxerre game.
Six. According to Marca, the club has invited the 33 trapped Chilean miners to come watch a game in the Bernabéu (the article added “once they are rescued” but I think that’s pretty obvious) and a training session at Valdebebas. The miners were also invited to take the saque de honor before the game. FP sent the invitation letter to the mayor of Santiago, who in turn gave it to the minister of mining. The mayor is also the head of the Foundation of Friends Real Madrid-Chile, which explains the connection. FP also sent the miners 33 shirts signed by all the players and Mou, with the message “stay strong” on the front and with the number “33” on the back. The shirts were accompanied by pictures of the players signing the shirts.
Seven. More on Ángel di María’s car accident: it happened at 21:10h on Wednesday when he ran a stop sign and hit another car and a barricade. The two occupants of the other car were not injured, but Ángel’s girlfriend went to the hospital to have her chest area checked out. He was driving an Audi Q7, and his agent and a representative from Audi came to the accident site to help out.
Eight. And Álvaro Arbeloa gave an interview to Real Madrid, and finished with this quote. The interview itself was pretty boring, but Álvaro looked adorable, even if he and the rest of his musketeer friends need to get a new pose. Interview here and rest of pictures here.
Nine. Dr. Luis Serratosa will be the substitute on the bench of team doctor Juan Carlos Hernández, who was suspended for two games for his actions in the Levante game.