Nobody better than Portu to certify Girona’s tremendous victory against Barcelona and their historic qualification for the Champions League. The figure of the 31-year-old Murcian striker, Portu (Christian Portugués Manzanera, Beniel; Murcia), personifies the Míchel dimension, a coach who not only pays attention to football but also to the lives of his footballers and his bond with Montilivi. Like Girona, Portu has gone through different emotional states, he has lived the best moments and also the painful ones, until he achieved glory with his memorable performance against Barça: three goals (two his and one assist) in one breath that culminated the local comeback.
“I had a thorn in my side with this club,” argued the forward at the end of the Montilivi match. “In my last year here I experienced the other side of the coin, which is relegation, and I felt like one of the most responsible because I always played and didn’t give my best. Now I can take away that pain and enjoy because I love this club very much,” Portu argued, “There is nothing more beautiful than writing your name in the history of the club you love. The word that defines it is family. It is proven that even if you are small you can fight against the big ones like Barça.”
The entry of the red and white attacker was decisive for the fate of the match because it boosted Girona and demoralized Barça. Portu came onto the field in the 64th minute, when the Blaugrana were winning 1-2, and in just one minute he scored the tie after an assist from Dovbyk, set up Miguel in the play to make it 3-2 and crossed an extraordinary volley, rated as the goal of the League by Michel, in the final 2-4. The forward went from holding his anger over his substitution to exploding with joy in communion with the Montilivi fans.
“He told me: ‘You’re touching my balls because the other day I scored a goal – it happened against Cádiz – and now you’re putting me on the bench again,” Michel said. “And look how he went out into the field; He came in with a brutal mentality. “I want these types of players on my team,” concluded the Girona coach. Portu’s depth on the right wing, also reinforced with the incorporation of Yan Couto as a winger and poorly defended by Cancelo, lit up the game for Girona, subdued for an hour and brilliant in 30 minutes, 10 of which were carried out by the Beniel player.
Portu returned to Girona on the last market day after giving up a notable amount of money in Getafe. He wanted to be a protagonist again in a team that he joined in 2016 from the relegated Albacete. He was promoted to the First Division with Girona and scored significant goals against rivals like Madrid. Real Sociedad signed him in 2019, enough time to enjoy the Copa del Rey title before being loaned to Getafe. The Murcian wanted to be the protagonist, he had once debuted in the elite with Valencia in 2014, and he returned to Girona.
The forward from Beniel played with the Valencian reserve team in Second B and before that in Third, a category in which Girona spent many years, even playing in the First Catalana and the Regional Preferente. Until the footballer and team have reached the Champions League in the so-called Míchel dimension. The challenges do not stop for the coach: second place in the League, playing against Inter and Liverpool in the Champions League and winning a title. Furthermore, he currently aspires to play in the next Super Cup with four rounds left to finish the League.
First, in any case, it will be necessary to comply with UEFA’s demands in order to compete in the Champions League. The tournament organizer does not accept extra stands and therefore Girona will have to reduce the Montilivi seats from 14,000 to 9,000 – or look for a new venue – and also adjust its organization and shareholding to maintain its link with Manchester City. Logistics, in any case, is not a matter for Míchel or Portu, who share their taste for dynamic and offensive football and especially for goals, as seen against Barça.
Girona has scored 73 goals, one less than Madrid, although if the goals scored in their own field are counted, it totals 46 to 43 for Ancelotti’s team. The most remembered will, in any case, be Portu’s 4-2 against Barça in a moment of plenitude in Montilivi. The volley reached the net thanks to the faith of Portu, the north wind that came from the encouragement of the white and red fans and the gusty football of Girona. You have to know how to be on the field, resist when things are not going well and the players seem stiff, and let go when they play in your favor as happened with Barça.
Nobody knows how to interpret the liturgy better gironin than Portu, the Murcian in love with Girona who scored a “goal that only he had imagined”, in Michel’s words. “Look at Portu, he scores goals, but I never start him,” the coach told Yan Couto when the Brazilian was devastated at not starting against Barça. “You’re dragging me down, but nothing’s wrong,” the man from Murcia responded, convinced that it would have an impact on the game. “I’m going to go out and score again,” he responded. So it was.
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