Manuel de Castro | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 De Castro circa 1919 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| President of theGalician Football Federation | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Born | (1885-08-09)9 August 1885 Vigo, Galicia, Spain | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Died | 27 August 1944(1944-08-27) (aged 59) Vigo, Spain | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Manuel de Castro González[a] (9 August 1885 – 27 August 1944), better known asHándicap, was a Spanishsports journalist, football executive,manager,[1]referee, and politician.[2] He was one of the most important figures in the amateur beginnings of football in Vigo, being noted for his prominent role in promoting football in the city and as the fundamental head behind the foundation ofCelta de Vigo in 1923.[3][4]
As a football executive, he held the presidency of theGalician Football Federation. As a coach, he managed both theSpain national team in ten games between 1921 and 1927,[5] as well as theGalicia national team.[2] And as a referee, he founded the College of Arbitrators of Galicia.[2] He also promotedathletics, of which he also served as president of the Galician Athletics Federation.[4] He was a defensor of the idea of "complete athletes", people who dedicated themselves to more than one modality.[2]
Born in Vigo, he was one of the pioneers who began playing football in Vigo on theMalecón field in the early years of the 20th century.[3][6] He began his journalist career as an editor for theSprint newspaper, and already in 1909, he wrote in the magazineLetras y Deporte, the first sports magazine in Galicia, later moving on toFaro de Vigo (1912–1930), in which he became a fervent disseminator of sporting activity, signing his articles under the pseudonymHándicap.[3][6] He is thus considered "the dean" of sports reporters in Vigo.[2] He also wrote forVida Deportiva, the magazine where the first campaign in favor of building astadium in Vigo appeared.[3][6]
In 1921 he began to carry out the functions of coach of the Spain national team, as part of a Selection Committee of Spain made up ofJulián Ruete andJosé Berraondo, and the first match this Committee oversaw was afriendly againstBelgium 9 October 1921, which was Spain's first-ever game after the Olympics as well as their first-ever game on home soil.[7] This Committee was formed and reformed numerous times in its history, also partnering with the likes ofEzequiel Montero andRicardo Cabot in 1925–27.[5] He oversaw a total of 10 games, winning 9 of them, which results in a ratio of 0.90 wins per game, a national record still unmatched.[2] During his time at the head of the national team he would develop a great friendship withRicardo Zamora.[2] In addition to the Spanish team, he also managed the Galician national team on numerous occasions, in a time when most of the team was made up of Celta players.
He was at theAntwerp, Paris, andAmsterdamOlympic Games and dedicated two books to the first two.[3] On 1 September 1920, Spain facedSweden in the quarter-finals of the1920 Summer Olympics, and they were trailing 0–1 when thecaptain,José María Belauste, launched a voice to teammateSabino Bilbao that was picked up in the chronicles by the only Spanish journalist present at the match,Hándicap, who thus collected one of the most mythical phrases in the history ofSpanish football:"¡A mí el pelotón, Sabino, que los arrollo!" ("Send me that ball, Sabino, I'll crush them!" in Spanish).[6][8] And that is how it went, with Belauste scoring the equalizer, thus immortalizing this phrase that was subsequently viewed as the reason why the national team was dubbedFuria Roja (Spanish Fury).[9]
He combined his work as national coach with the role of vice president of theReal Vigo Sporting, a position he used to promote, together withJuan Baliño [es] andPepe Bar [es], the idea of merging Sporting with his city rivalFortuna de Vigo, to achieve a more powerful team that could successfully compete against the likes ofReal Madrid,FC Barcelona, andAthletic Bilbao.[3] He began to work on the idea in the mid-1910s, which would fail in his first attempt in 1915, but this did not discourage him, and in his second attempt in 1923, he reached an agreement between the two sides;[2] taking advantage of the fact that the Galician national team, a combination of the best players from Vigo, had reached the final of the1922–23 Prince of Asturias Cup after beating the likes of theCentro team (a Castile/Madrid XI) by a score of 4–1,[10] and despite losing thefinal, the Galicia fans were very pleased with the team's performance in the competition, thus welcoming with tremendous enthusiasm the idea proposed by Manuel de Castro, and hence, on 23 August 1923,Celta de Vigo was born.[10]
In 1924, with the help of his brother, the former football player and athlete Fernando de Castro, he founded the Galician Athletics Federation.[2] In the following years, he would limit his activity to refereeing, even founding the Galician College of Arbitrators.[2]
On 27 August 1944, he was "the victim of a tragic accident" when he was run over by a train in the vicinity of the Eijo Garay Gardens when he was leaving an exhibition. His death caused deep sorrow throughout the footballing world, whereHándicap enjoyed great prestige at a local, regional and national level.
A bust of him, sculpted by Rafael Álvarez Borrás in 1946, has been located on the street that bears his name in front of the Balaídos stadium since 20 May 1956.[3]
In 2011, the "Manuel de Castro" award was established[11] to reward the best Celta player of the calendar year,[12] election made by vote among the entire Celta environment (fans, media, players, etc).