The other day the Uruguayan team had an extremely difficult opponent. Their squad includes players from Girona, Real Sociedad, Athletic, Alavés and Braga. The teams did not determine the winner and scored a goal against each other. Who stood up to Marcelo Bielsa’s boys? Baskonia’s unofficial selection. And he has a rich past, including in Soviet football. But first things first.
What kind of team is this and why is it not in UEFA and FIFA?
The Basque national team is a team created in 1930 that represents the Basque region of 2.2 million inhabitants exclusively in international friendly matches. The local federation itself organizes them.
Most of the inhabitants of the Basque Country do not consider themselves Spanish and still want to secede, and during the reign of Franco and the civil war this was even more so. Therefore, identity is important for Basques, including football.
Basque national team fans in the match against Uruguay
Photo: Martín Silva Cosentino/Getty Images
Attempts to secede from Spain failed. The radicals of ETA fought for the independence of the Basque Country for 60 years, from 1958 to 2018. Without success. The same happened with Catalonia, which also has its own unofficial national team. In 2017, a referendum was held there and legends such as Pep Guardiola and Gerard Piqué voted in favor of the region’s independence. The Spanish authorities harshly repress these impulses, and the Catalan authorities are no exception.
There was also an attempt to bring at least the Basque football team to the official international level. In December 2020 they beat Costa Rica with the famous Keylor Navas in goal (2-1). The president of the local football federation, Luis María Elustondo, was inspired and immediately requested official permission from UEFA and FIFA, apart from the Spanish team.
Spanish football coach Luis Rubiales was strongly opposed and Elustondo’s idea failed. The example of the individual teams of Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales in the United Kingdom did not work, because they are much more independent than the Basque Country. Let’s imagine, for example, that there is a Tatarstan team with Daler Kuzyaev and dreams of competing separately from the Russian team. It’s almost impossible to do something like this.
The Basque derby is one of the most brilliant in Europe:
One of the most brilliant derbies in Europe awaits Zakharyan. The history of the Basque confrontation is unique
Who plays in the Basque team
And the immediate answer is the Basques who did not qualify for the Spanish team. And not just Spain, because Iñaki Williams has been playing in Ghana in recent years. When footballers have the option of representing the official team or competing exclusively in friendly matches, the priorities are obvious.
What can we say if in the last 10 years the team has only played six games: with Tunisia (3-1), Venezuela (4-2), Panama (0-0), Costa Rica (2-1), France? Po from league 2 (3-0) and only with Uruguay (1-1). And even then it was possible to reach an agreement with the Uruguayans largely thanks to their coach Marcelo Bielsa, who successfully worked with Athletic Bilbao and maintained good feelings for Baskonia.
The Basques do not have a fixed squad or even a coach: they meet exclusively before the games. Now their squad, coached by Hagoba Arrasate of Osasuna, includes Iván Martín, Andoni Gorosabel, Aritz Elustondo, Asier Villalibre, Álvaro Djalo and other well-known players who are not yet likely to break into the Spanish team.
Although in the future everything is real, because the Basque team is not official, you can easily change it for another. Like the Catalan team, which Piqué calmly changed for the Spanish team. Even despite radical political views.
Mikel Balenciaga at the Basque national team match
Photo: Juan Lazkano/Getty Images
Many top-level players have passed through the Basque national team: .
Here’s who leads the Basque national team in games played since 1990: Xabi Prieto has 14 caps; 13 – Aritz Aduriz, 12 – Igor Gabilondo and Gorka Iraizos. And here’s who, in terms of goals for her: 12, from Aduriz himself, 6, from Julen Guerrero, 5, from Oscar de Paula.
Great contribution to football in the USSR
Fast forward to 1936. A civil war broke out in Spain and Franco’s troops, with the support of Hitler and Mussolini, quickly seized new lands. Baskonia did not want to swear loyalty to the dictator, and in this he had the active help of the Soviet Union with the general ideas of socialism. In the USSR, many orphans were transported on ships away from the epicenter of events and hundreds of Soviet volunteers fought for the Basques.
Many were victims of the bloody war. To alleviate their suffering, a Basque journalist enlisted the support of the government and organized a tour of the Basque national team through Europe to raise funds. And the team was considered extremely powerful: the current champion was Athletic and almost two-thirds of the Spanish team were Basques. Germany, France, Brazil, Portugal: they all lost to the Spanish in those years.
Before the trip to the USSR, which promised Baskonia 100 thousand pesetas, he warmed up against the French champion Marseille (5-2). Then the guests took turns testing the Soviet giants: the cup winner Lokomotiv (5-1), Moscow, Kiev and Tbilisi Dynamo (2-1, 3-1 and 2-0, respectively), as well as the national teams of the Leningrad clubs. , Dinamo, Georgia and Minsk (2-2, 7-4, 3-1, 6-1 respectively).
In this case, it is necessary to take into account the mental state of the Basques, whose homeland was destroyed by the war. Striker Isidro Lángara learned in Moscow of the death of his parents, and goalkeeper Gregorio Blasco, away from Baskonia, lost not only his mother and father, but also two children. At the same time, the German Condor Legion carried out a terrible bombing raid on Guernica, in which up to 850 people died. Later, Pablo Picasso painted a painting about that tragedy.
Picasso’s painting “Guernica”
Photo: Carlos Álvarez/Getty Images
Baskonia’s only defeat was inflicted by Spartak (6-1). And even then, the match became scandalous due to a controversial penalty: the guests left the field twice in protest and returned only at the personal request of the chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars of the USSR, Vyacheslav Molotov. The same one who later signed a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany against the Soviet Union. Ivan Kosmachev, who judged that match, was expelled from the All-Union College of Referees.
The rivalry with the Basque Country changed Soviet football forever. How exactly, wrote the legendary Soviet coach Gavriil Kachalin in his book “Football Tactics”. He just played against the Basques at Dynamo.
Gabriel Kachalin
legendary soviet coach
“In 1937, the Basque team that visited our country convinced us that the “double see” system (with three defenders) demonstrated by the players of this team was more progressive. National football accepted the novelty and became the main form of play for all Soviet teams. This system contributed to the development of our football and the formation of quality players, it completely balanced the composition of the team, equalizing the number of attackers with the number of defenders. Disturbing this balance of power during the game to strengthen one area inevitably weakened the other. “A change in the style and nature of the game was associated with a change in the rules or system of the game.”
The Basque guests improved Soviet football and clearly demonstrated its imperfections. If his selection had been official in recent years, it might have generated some heat as well. Of course, as long as the players choose it and not Spain.
Imagine: a team with Unai Simón, Kepa Arrizabalaga, Robin Le Normand, Aymeric Laporte, Íñigo Martínez, César Azpilicueta, Martín Subimendi, Mikel Merino, Ander Herrera, the Williams brothers and Mikel Oyarzabal, led by Xabi Alonso. If he is not a contender for gold in the World Cup and the European Championship, he will certainly participate in the playoffs.
