Athletic’s acting sports director, Rafa Alkorta, accompanied by his lieutenant, Andoni Aiarza, and the director of Methodology and Analysis, Andoni Bombín, highlights the “closeness of the three” without regretting the decisions taken: “If you do everything honestly and with heart…”, slides into the desire to be “a top club worldwide”. He stresses to the former lion that this process was to identify the “kind of talented player with a heart” they wanted to see make it to the first team. “That they understand what you have to be to play for Athletic,” he clarifies.
The current electoral process lays down his legacy: “It makes us sad, it’s clear. It seems short, it has passed very quickly” and Alkorta adds that someone “would have to reconsider since Lezama had to have a minimum continuity of eight years”, slides as a challenge to get “players to the first team”. He reveals that two of the three candidates for Athletic’s presidency have “approached” to learn first-hand about the global work carried out. “The bar has been set very high in Lezama”. The criticisms have occurred, but he contextualizes them: “I haven’t stopped to think if they have to hurt us or affect us, we know what we do every weekend with the players,” he clarifies. The academy players who make the first team preseason is a matter of the “next Sports Director and coach”, he clarifies. The worst of this period at the head of the Sports Directorate is clear. “To say that he did not renew a player, some historical ones and the day of Gaizka Garitano’s resignation,” he lists. Regarding the Álvaro Núñez case, he clarifies that “we have not reached an agreement despite the contract and improvement, he has also been brave. They are decisions at the contractual level”, he clears in this regard despite wanting to renegotiate it after an agreement in the past month of october. The contracts “are by objectives” for years. The Guruzeta thing, which will land this summer except for an unexpected swerve, launches that “it does not” concern it. “I could return perfectly. I have given my report and the next one will be the one that decides”, without wanting to delve into the matter of the renewal of Iñigo Martínez.
A hackneyed maxim: “It is getting more and more difficult to sign outside,” warns Alkorta regarding the first team, slipping that twelve players in his three-and-a-half-year term have been promoted to the first team from the subsidiary, with two playoffs for promotion to Second, or Basconia. Eleven of those twelve debuting youth squads are still linked to the club, except for Larrazabal, who belongs to Real Zaragoza, which strengthens this ratio. 20.5 years on average in the subsidiary and in the last section four youths actively participated in saving the First RFEF. From Basconia, eleven youngsters have played in the Third RFEF this year, in 2003, the youngest in the category. The CIES study reinforces the minutes in the elite of homegrown players as leaders of the five major leagues (55%), ahead of Real Sociedad (43%) and Celta (41%). Aiarza insists that Lezama’s goal is “to be highly competitive in all our teams, to train in values and to win competitively,” he says about Lezama’s role. “Vision, mission and values”, they proclaimed in their campaign slogan three and a half years ago. “Lezama is a reference in world football,” he underlines about Athletic’s academy, an example of production with “such a small garden”, with a feeling of belonging that translates into “performance and the search for excellence in every way”.
Regarding the agreed clubs, it clarifies concepts: “In Bizkaia, 100% that Athletic wants to join join and in the rest of the territories more and more footballers want to join Athleticfor being the project that brings you closer to the first team”, slides Aiarza, highlighting in the covid situation the club has responded by optimizing the records through a scouting system and parceling out the facilities. The current plan predicts 45 additions and 50 departures planned for this course, “we will work until June 30 as if we were here all our lives,” Aiarza warns about the “micro-society” that they have formed in the Lezama factory with different sensitivities, origins and status. He affirms that they will leave these “tools” for their predecessors.
For his part, Bombín insisted that it is “a high-performance school” and that the focus stems from “the player, the talent, the diamond, which is what we have to take care of.” Always the training contextualized in “the collective”, although focusing on “individualized care in a weekly control of technical and medical analysis”. He adds that they “respect” the game models and the “maturational processes of our players.” microcycles “no” have been linear and the “data” show traceability in the performance indicators with the gps, with the incorporation this legislature of a “mathematician and data engineer” channeled from the base to the first team. The Infantil of 2008, which now merges into Cadets, and the Juvenile de Honor in the Champions Cup, being second in the final against Barça without players from the subsidiary or Basconia, have been the last to compete this last weekend, which which shows the robustness of Lezama. The least scored and highest scorer in the category were the boys piloted by Jon Solaun. Up to 16 Bilbao Athletic players from below and eleven youth players at Basconia will underpin the two subsidiaries of their quarry pyramid for the 2022-23 campaign.