Spaniard who faced Brazil in 1962 doesn’t forget Garrincha and neither does the referee

Adelardo Rodríguez, 82, is a man of good memory.

With 553 matches for Atlético de Madrid, a record holder in the club’s history, it would be normal for memories to be confused with each other at this point in life, for certain plays to become part, in your memory, of games in which those moves were not necessarily happened. In the case of Adelardo, this is not the case.

Almost five decades after having retired, he still remembers, for example, what Argentine Ricardo Bochini told him during the 1974 Club World Cup between Atlético and Independiente. “Hey kid, you won’t leave me alone for a second,” recalls the former Spanish midfielder, who played for the Madrid club for 17 years between 1959 and 1976.

The memory of the confrontation for the World Cup is positive, after all, his team won the title over Avellaneda’s team with a 2-0 victory and Adelardo lifted the cup. But the prodigious memory also keeps some frustrations from the gamer days.

The biggest one, perhaps, with Chilean referee Sergio Bustamante, who ruled out what would have been his second goal against Brazil in the 1962 World Cup, in the third game of the group stage. Spain was already winning 1-0, Adelardo’s work, when the referee called a controversial foul in the Brazilian area to cancel a beautiful volley that ended up in Gylmar’s angle.

“I was just over 20 years old and it was a great joy to score a goal. But another one was annulled, also scored by me, which I’m still looking for irregularity”, he says, with good humor, in a conversation with journalists from all over the world. world at the Wanda Metropolitano stadium, the club’s home since 2017.

After beating Mexico in the 1962 World Cup debut, 2-0, the Brazilian team saw Pelé say goodbye to the game against Czechoslovakia and also the World Cup after suffering a muscle strain in the 0-0 draw with the Czechs.

For the last match of the group stage, against the Spaniards, Brazil still needed to confirm the classification and without its main player. Amarildo was given the difficult task of replacing the King.

But things did not start well for the Brazilian team. In the 34th minute of the first half, after a score in midfield between Adelardo and Puskás (who had played in the 1954 World Cup for Hungary and became a Spanish national), the Atlético de Madrid midfielder, who made his debut that June 6 for Spain, received in the middle and, from outside the area, kicked low in the corner to open the scoring.

The first stage ended with the partial victory of the Spanish team by 1 to 0. Aymoré Moreira’s Brazil had not yet managed to find themselves in the game, perhaps due to the absence of Pelé, a natural reference for the team.

“Strictly speaking, therefore, the 1-0 against, in the first phase, was, for Brazil, an excellent result, as it translated a scarce numerical superiority that could be undone without great difficulties, if the situation reacted and gained a new tactical and technique in the second half”, published the Sheet in his account of the match in the next day’s edition.

In the final 45 minutes, Brazil’s fortunes changed. Thanks, also, to the performance of the referee Sergio Bustamante, with two capital bids, one after the other, that could have decided the duel in favor of Spain.

At 14, Enrique Collar made a good individual move on the right and faced Nilton Santos. The Spaniard passed the Brazilian side, who took him down shortly after the penalty area line. Nilton Santos took a step outside the area, in an attempt to deceive the referee. He managed. He bustly didn’t see the penalty and only scored a foul.

In the collection, Bustamente would reappear. Puskás lifted the ball in the middle of the area, the Brazilian defense cleared it and Adelardo turned a volley to the back of the net. The referee, however, scored a push by the midfielder.

The unmarked penalty and the disallowed goal helped keep Brazil in the game. It was then that Amarildo appeared, who, with two goals, would start to pave his place in history not only as a substitute for Pelé, but as the protagonist of the second world championship.

First, the Botafogo forward took advantage of Zagallo’s left cross and deflected it into the goal. At the end of the match, after an individual move on the right, Garrincha crossed at the second post and Amarildo, his partner at Botafogo, headed in to define the Brazilian victory in Viña del Mar and confirm the spot in the next phase.

For Adelardo, who would play 13 more games with the Spanish national team, there was the bitter taste of elimination and of what it could have been like to score two goals and, who knows, beat Brazil in a World Cup. A result that could have changed the course of the entire competition.

“I made my debut for Spain at the World Cup in Chile and nothing less than against Brazil. I was excited. In that match, they told me that I had to tag the organizer of the Brazilian team, which was Zito, but what Garrincha did was a something from another world. I wanted to imitate what they did, but it was impossible”, completes Abelardo Rodríguez, unable to forget both Garrincha and the disallowed goal that he still, in detail, tries to explain to this day.