In February 2019, with Osasuna flying high in the second division and chasing promotion back to LaLiga, graffiti began to appear on the streets of their city, Pamplona.
The first image depicted forward Roberto Torres as a saint. A month later, captain Oier Sanjurjo appeared as Superman. Then it was Chimy Avila as a boxer. Winger Ruben Garcia was pictured as The Joker. Defender Unai Garcia was Captain America.
The street art was the work of an anonymous, Banksy-esque artist and Osasuna fan known as LKN. In 2020, with the club back in the top flight, he unveiled his masterpiece. A billboard not far from their El Sadar stadium was seized by a reworking of Michelangelo’s “The Creation of Adam.” Renamed “The Creation of Jagoba,” it inserted manager Jagoba Arrasate into the “God” role, his touch creating life.
Was it sacrilegious? Probably. But Arrasate’s five years in charge of Osasuna have been pretty miraculous, winning promotion and guiding them to four mid-table finishes on one of LaLiga’s smaller budgets.
Now, beating Real Madrid in Saturday’s Copa del Rey final? That really would be a miracle.
– Live on ESPN+: Real Madrid vs. Osasuna, Copa del Rey final (Saturday, 3 p.m. ET)
Saturday’s game will be Osasuna’s second cup final in the club’s 103-year history. They’ve never won a major trophy. And at the La Cartuja stadium in Seville, they’ll face a Real Madrid team whose raison d’etre is winning finals: they’ve emerged victorious in 19 of the 23 they’ve played over the last decade. Do Osasuna stand a chance?
“What we have to do is compete,” the club’s sporting director Braulio Vazquez tells ESPN. “We aren’t going to Seville to have a beer by the Guadalquivir River. It’ll be a rojillo invasion with 25,000 of our fans. There, we’ll beat Real Madrid for sure. After that, we have to compete. It isn’t a day out, even if they are the favourites.”
“I didn’t enjoy the [2005] final,” former captain, midfielder and club record appearance holder Patxi Punal tells ESPN. “It was too much for me… The team that’s going to play this final on Saturday is much more mature than we were. There are five internationals, some of them played in the World Cup this season. They’ve been in bigger situations.
“Maybe that’s what I and that team lacked. We lacked a bit of a winning mentality. Our mentality was ‘we probably won’t win it, but imagine if we did…’ and the mentality has to be ‘we’re going to go there and take it home.’ We lacked the mentality to win the trophy.”
“Enjoy it after the game, because in a final against Real Madrid you won’t enjoy it on the pitch!” former defender Carlos Cuellar tells ESPN. “You’ll suffer. That was the same message that [2005 Osasuna coach Javier Aguirre] gave us. Humility leads to victory. If the game is going badly, there are periods when Madrid are on top, and it feels constant, you have to hold on.”
“Madrid are lethal in the transitions,” Punal says. “If you let Vinicius, Rodrygo and [Fede] Valverde run at you, if you’re not on top of them, pressing them, Madrid are lethal… [Arrasate] will find a way to put up a fight. We have to be able to get forward and scare them once in a while.”
Win or lose, this season has been an unequivocal success.
“We’ve achieved survival in the First Division, and we’ve done it comfortably, with a lot of games to go,” club president Luis Sabalza tells ESPN. “People might think that’s settling, but it’s the reality. Right now there are big clubs like Valencia and Espanyol who are caught up in a dramatic [relegation] battle.
“If we manage to finish as high as possible in the league, and play a Copy del Rey final, it goes without saying… We’re not used to this. Being in the final is exceptional. It’s the second in our history. But we won’t lose our heads. We know who we are and where we’ve come from.”
