Wednesday, November 13, 2024, 12:12
His ordeal began on September 6, 2022. “My life changed completely that day,” he confesses in a moving letter published on his social networks. Real Madrid, his team, was playing against Glasgow Celtic in a match in the so-called Youth League (the youth Champions League). Marc Cucalón (19 years old), the protagonist of this heartbreaking story, received a harsh tackle that caused him to tear the cruciate ligament in his right knee. A serious injury, of course, but an ailment that multiple athletes have suffered who have then returned to the grass.
It has not been your case. After almost 800 days of nightmare, this young man has said enough. It’s over. He can’t take it anymore. «After several complications, this injury has forced me to make the hard decision to say goodbye to football, at least in the way I had always dreamed of. During these last two years I have fought physically and mentally with all my might and I have tried everything in my power to enjoy this sport again, but it has not been possible to recover. Don’t get me wrong though: this is not a sad farewell,” he writes.
But why has a torn ligament caused the retirement of one of the so-called pearls of the white youth academy, with excellent vision of the game and great class? During the operation, a bacteria affected the cartilage of the joint. The consequence is that it caused a serious infection, rarely seen. That has ended up retiring the one that some were already calling the new Xabi Alonso from ‘The Factory’.
Because Cucalón was one of those footballers marked for the future of Real Madrid. He landed in Valdebebas, the sports city of Real Madrid, in 2016, from Zaragoza, a team that he also has very much in mind as can be seen in the publication he made on Instagram to announce his farewell. He was active as a child and never stopped growing. Álvaro Arbeloa, his last coach, had even given him the captain’s armband that fateful season.
He won’t wear it again. He leaves it. It’s over. He will not step on the grass again as a player. «I take away unique sporting and personal moments. Now I have a new stage ahead of me, a new life in which I am sure that I will apply all the experiences that have marked me until today. And I do it with the same enthusiasm and motivation with which I have worn the Real Madrid shirt all these years.
