There will be two trophies inside the Santiago Bernabéu on Wednesday night, and only one of them belongs to Real Madrid. Before Los Blancos face Real Sociedad, the club will stage a Cucurella tribute to mark Spain’s World Cup triumph — with the trophy itself carried onto the pitch and Marc Cucurella honoured in front of a home crowd that has only just started to call him one of their own.
The plan was first revealed by El Partidazo de COPE and reported by Bernabéu Digital and Madrid Universal. Cucurella will not be alone: Real Sociedad’s Mikel Oyarzabal is being honoured on the same night by his own club, because the pair are the only two footballers who will step onto the grass at the Bernabéu having been part of the Spain squad that won the World Cup in the United States a little over a month ago. They pose together, then they spend 90 minutes trying to beat each other.
Why The Cucurella Tribute Lands So Early
Cucurella has been a Real Madrid player for a matter of weeks. He arrived from Chelsea this summer for a reported fee of around €60m, one of the marquee additions of José Mourinho’s first window back at the club, and was presented at Valdebebas calling it an honour to wear the shirt. Very few signings get a moment like this handed to them before they have played a competitive home game in white.
It is also, quietly, a useful moment for him. Cucurella joined as a world champion but also as a player Madridistas had spent a year watching in an opposition shirt, and the reception to his early appearances has not been uncomplicated. A trophy presentation on his first big Bernabéu night is about as generous an introduction as the ground offers.
Oyarzabal, And A Tribute Both Clubs Share
The gesture is not a Real Madrid exclusive. Bernabéu Digital note that other grounds have already done the same thing this month — San Mamés and the Riyadh Air Metropolitano among them — as Spain’s champions are welcomed home club by club. Oyarzabal, one of La Roja’s central figures at the tournament and still Real Sociedad’s most important player, will be recognised by the txuri-urdin rather than by the hosts, with both clubs taking part in the same ceremony.
Bernabéu Digital add that Luis de la Fuente is likely to be in attendance, as the Spain manager has been at the other tributes, though that has not been confirmed. The World Cup trophy being physically present, per Madrid Universal, is the detail that will get the phones out: it is a rare chance for a Bernabéu crowd to see it up close.
The Football Behind The Ceremony
Once the trophy leaves, there is a rearranged LaLiga fixture to play. Real Madrid go into it having taken all three points at the RCDE Stadium, while Real Sociedad, coached by Pellegrino Matarazzo, arrive on the back of a narrow home defeat by Real Betis. It is Mourinho’s first match in charge at the Bernabéu in his second spell, and he will do it without two forwards and a midfielder: the squad list published on Tuesday left out Aurélien Tchouaméni and Endrick, with academy names called up again to fill the bench.
Cucurella, fit and available, should be part of it. He spent the summer winning the biggest prize in the game with Spain; on Wednesday he gets to show it to 78,000 people and then, minutes later, defend his own left flank against one of the men who helped him win it. Madrid’s night has a ceremony to get through before it becomes a football match — and for one new signing, that is not the worst way to be introduced to the Bernabéu.
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