The call came, a five-minute warning, and then the bombshell landed. It did so about the same time as Aeroflot flight 2501. In the long, slow queue at Sheremetyevo airport were staff from a Spanish radio station: presenters, reporters, producers, technicians, arriving in Russia to cover a World Cup they still thought Spain could win. “Julen Lopetegui’s gone to Real Madrid”, someone told them, standing there, watching the first message appear on his screen. “Nah, no way” came the reply. But their phones too flickered into life, beeping frantically, and, bloody hell, it was true. It couldn’t be – not now – but it was.
Across the city of Moscow Luis Rubiales, the president of the Spanish Football Federation, had been informed by Real Madrid five minutes before they released the communique, or so he said: he was told, not asked, and he was furious. The statement, read as they stood there at Sheremetyevo, was short and to the point, venomous: Lopetegui would join after the World Cup and for the next three seasons. As it turned out, neither of those things were true, but he really was going to Madrid. The very next day, in fact: the day the World Cup began.
Calls were made, messages sent, trying to make sense of it all. This was huge and completely unexpected; they had been caught out but they moved swiftly. There was a moment during the press conference the next day at which Rubiales announced the sacking of Lopetegui when he slowed down and uttered “two days”. That said it all.
That was six months ago, but the passage of time does not diminish the impact; it may even seem more extraordinary from here, still conditioned by that moment, but no longer in the middle of that wild swirl, so much happening so fast. Spain sacked their manager the day before the World Cup began. Put like that, it is still quite something.
Spain’s sporting director, Fernando Hierro, took over. His first job was to take the final training session before their opening match. He had just one year’s managerial experience – a season at second division Real Oviedo – and was not sure he would manage again. He had not wanted this job, had never contemplated it, but someone had to do it. “I came in a suit, I’ll leave in a tracksuit,” he said. Hierro, like all of them, left early. The final loss came in Moscow in the last 16 a fortnight later, but they were defeated from the beginning.
The night Spain were knocked out by Russia on penalties there was a sadness and anger, of course, but there was something else, an odd stillness, a sense that it had become unavoidable. It hadn’t needed to end this way because it didn’t need to start that way.
And this was not even the end yet – not, at least, for Lopetegui. Even back in the summer, there was something inevitable about how the rest of this story would unfold. It was easy to imagine him getting sacked at the Bernabéu, asking himself what the hell he had done. One hundred and thirty-eight days later, it happened. His was the chronicle of a death foretold; the surprise was that it happened so fast.
Timing was everything, haste at the heart of it all. Pride, too. Zinedine Zidane’s departure from the Bernabéu less than a week after the Champions League final; the sudden, unexpected scramble to find a replacement; the difficulty in doing so. All that played a part. And when Madrid finally found a new manager – their fifth-choice or sixth – they would not wait, nor accommodate.
Rubiales had only just arrived in the presidency at the federation and the man it chose, Lopetegui, had only just signed a new contract there. All that played a part, too.
Rubiales said he had asked for more time after he got the call from Madrid and was denied it. He called Lopetegui but could not get through. He was in Moscow at the Fifa congress but left and flew south to Spain’s training camp in Krasnodar, sitting in the front row, anger consuming him. That night he barely slept. Calls were made, discussions held. There were confrontations, division. The next morning he announced that he was sacking Lopetegui.
He said he had to, on a point of principle. Others were adamant that he had not needed to. The consequences were great. Spain had no coach and the World Cup was starting the next day; Madrid got their manager early. Lopetegui climbed silently into the back of a white van and was driven to the airport, banished. The next day he was presented at the Bernabéu.
There was an hour’s difference between the time when Lopetegui had been supposed to be speaking to the media and the time he actually did. One hour and 3,569 km. On a hot evening in Sochi, down on the Black Sea, Hierro held a press conference before Spain’s opener against Portugal at the Fisht Stadium. In the media centre, Spain’s football reporters watched the press conference Lopetegui was actually holding at the Bernabéu. Announced as Madrid’s manager on 12 June, sacked as Spain manager on 13 June, he was presented on 14 June.
There were tears as he spoke, supportive applause from an audience which defended him then and dropped him later. “Yesterday was the saddest day of my life; today is the happiest,” Lopetegui said.
He thought the chance to manage Madrid would never come around again. The chance to manage Spain at the World Cup certainly will not. He had not expected to be denied it, but that was the price he paid for this opportunity. That meant it would forever be difficult to disassociate the two days, to divorce one from the other: being Madrid manager was always likely to be tinged with regret, a little bitterness, even if he was wildly successful.
In October his Madrid team were defeated 5-1 by Barcelona at the Camp Nou. It was their fifth defeat in six. Already sentenced, he had lost as many games as he had won. He was sacked without ceremony. Julen The Brief, some called him. There was still no real replacement, so another manager Madrid had not planned to put in charge was put in charge, Santiago Solari taking over.
There was no explanation, either, no public appearance from the president, just another statement. One that eschewed best wishes, the usual goodbye and good luck, and put the boot in instead. In four months Lopetegui held the two biggest jobs in world football for any Spaniard and was sacked from both. For different reasons, sure, but one had led to the other.
As Spain’s players left the Luzhniki Stadium, knocked out of a World Cup that finished badly and started worse, Koke said: “They took away our leader.” And for what?