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Forced to play in exile due to the war in the 1991/92 season, the Serbian team played seven home matches under Fernando Martín and a matchup with Fuenlabreños, whose legacy survives 30 years later.
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“They offered us to host three Yugoslav teams, and we chose Partizan because it was the youngest and most identified with the people here,” recalls José Quintana, then mayor and president of Basketball Fuenlabrada today.
This April 16, 1992While all of Spain wept at Joventut’s misfortune, Fuente las Escaleras de in fuenlabraOpened only five years ago, it was packed with enthusiastic fans. They say about 800; maybe a thousand, who knows.
celebrated that day Istanbulthousands of kilometers away, the final of what was then called the FIBA Europa League, today the Euroleague, always European cup.
And when everything seemed doomed to victory for Penya, who had been in Badalona for more than six decades, filling her passion for basketball with meaning, Sasha Djordjevic three seconds to go, he stood up to score the last three and was crowned European champion Partizan Belgrade (70-71).
There was already talk of the Yugoslav curse, because fourth time In recent years (1985, 90, 91 and 92), a team from the extinct republic won the grand final of the year against a Spanish opponent. At Fuenlabrada, however, none of this mattered, as Partizan’s first and last historic title ever won in the highest continental competition, own self south of Madrid. Partizan Belgrade had won, yes, but also Partisan from Fuenlabrada.
A copy of that trophy is in Istanbul today. Fernando Martin PavilionOnly 500 meters from Fuente de las Escaleras, which turned into that historical night that passed. 30 years Rather than match hundreds of people from Fuenlabrada who feel this victory as their own.
Ever since Partizan, they had reason to do so, because circumstances had forced them. Balkan warHe had adopted Fuenlabrada as his second home, where he made his way to the championship with six wins in seven games.
demographic explosion
But that story begins much earlier and is the story of the “demographic explosion that has made Fuenlabrada the youngest city in Europe”. 6,300 births per year” in the words Joseph Quintanathen mayor (from 1983 to 2002) and today president of the city’s basketball team, Urbas Fuenlabrada. The demographic series is, in fact, some of the city south of Madrid. 7,000 population Being a city approx in 1970 150,000 in the early 1990s.
Fuenlabrada was the youngest population in Europe at the time, we were giving 6,300 births a year.
The high birth rate, as well as the arrival of families from the Community and other parts of Spain, created the need to build a house. sports offer powerful for children, but also producing references In elite sport that will allow adopters from Fuenlabrada to their new city to develop a sense of community.
“We had the option of football, but I think the team was on the field at the time. Third And it was so complex, I needed a big investment to make the leap. We decided to build a mansion that we named after him. Ferdinand Martin They talked about him all the time in schools because we understood he was a reference for children (who died in 1989),” Quintana recalls.
While construction of the pavilion was underway, the city’s mayor began work on attracting leading teams to Fuenlabrada. Bank of Madrid later both sponsored a basketball and a handball. Alcala de Henares. There were negotiations with Jaime the Third, then the head of the banking organization, but they did not materialize. The pavilion was inaugurated September 1991between friendly real Madrid and studentsand then it would be left without a fixed tenant.
In parallel, FIBA made a decision that would allow a temporary solution. Three teams from the former Yugoslavia that took part in the European Cup ( partisan Serbian and Divide and gibbon Croatians) had to play abroad because of the war: Croatia had declared its independence a few months ago and the escalation of violence in the region had reached extreme proportions.
Dorna’s role
Now a Spanish company known for organizing MotoGP, Dorna has been a permanent partner of FIBA in terms of image, sponsorship and television rights and has been tasked with finding a new home for these teams. I just opened Fernando Martín, the first call was to Fuenlabrada.
“They offered us to host any of the three teams. We talked about it at town hall and thought Partizan would be the best fit because it was. the youngest of the three and we realized that achieving greater identification with Fuenlabreños was an important factor,” Quintana recalls.
Partisan youth was an important factor in achieving greater identification with the people of Fuenlabrada.
After the offer was accepted, Partizan’s manager and trainer, a very young man, moved to Madrid. Zeljko Obradovic He debuted on a bench after retiring from the courts a few months ago. It was at Fuenlabrada that he would begin a career like no other in Europe, making him the most successful coach in continental basketball history: nine Euroleagues with five different teams.
“Besides being an outstanding coach, Zeljko is a very, very smart guy. That’s why he said they were willing to join us in our first meeting. any activity we want: signatures signatures, Education open doors, actions advertisement… They wanted to be part of the city so that the city would take care of them. What if they succeed,” explains the then mayor.
Partizan were still based in Belgrade, but they traveled to Spain to play their fortnightly European Cup group stage at home, for a total of seven. they stayed during three or four days They studied at a hotel in Madrid, in the presence of children who went on excursions with Fuenlabrada schools and made them love them. This 7 November Debuted in Fernando Martín, sweep (87-67) At Maes Pils in Antwerp.
Given the scant interest aroused by the two parallel experiences, Cibona’s noble harbor (Cádiz) and in Split One KorunaFuenlabrada responded to this game with around 80% turnout: “And then, in the other six games, one hundred%. Since there was no place for everyone, there were some who were left outside the mansion. This ID It happened immediately with Partizan with Fuenlabrada and with Fuenlabrada with Partizan”.
As of the second match, the pavilion was full, some were left out due to lack of capacity.
The Belgrade team won six of the seven matches played under Fernando Martín. Only studentskind of broke the spell in the derby. Alexander Varonathen the vice president of the student club, “and a good specialist of Fuenlabrada, because he had a company here, he was responsible for sending some of them. 500 Dementia fans and the animation was more balanced”. swept the varsity team (75-95) The only defeat for Partizan at home.
Clash with the other Spanish team Joventut in the training group Lolo Sainz. They hoped to find a friendly atmosphere in Badalona, but after losing the match by one point, they stumbled upon a win in favor of the Serbian team, to the anger of the historic Spanish coach. (76-75).
In the next game, against Bayer Leverkusen Banners with the German legend “Partizan de Fuenlabrada” appear spontaneously in the pavilion. The congregation was already complete, the city was already dedicated to the person who became his team, he was aware of the punctuality of this coexistence. Actually, in March 1992 FIBA hosts the quarter-final match of the Serbian team at home. Bolonia Virtue. They won and then they won the Final Four in the semi-finals in Istanbul. Milan and against the final Youth.
And Fuente de las Escaleras de Fuenlabrada was packed to celebrate. And it’s all over there. Or not.
Because if the city south of Madrid today has a classic team in the ACB League, a category it plays in. 23 of the last 24 seasonsThis is partly due to Partizan’s forced ‘erasmus’. “This experience is a basketball teamwhich people loved very much. We were looking for people from the City Council who came to live in Fuenlabrada to identify with the city and we realized that, own equipment it was a good way to do that,” explains Quintana.
Partizan showed that there is a demand for basketball in the city and that people like it very much.
This ‘Fuel’Founded in 1983, it played in the third category of professional basketball that season. He does the next four in the second (Primera B first, EBA after the reconstruction) and buys the square of the building with a view to the 1996/97 season. rocks Huesca for 400 million pesetas and was released on the ACB. It fell off the same route, rose again the following year, and emerged from the elite in just one more course in 2004/05.
Discretion
In short, the legacy of those four months of togetherness, November 1991 and February 1992survives even today. Therefore, this Saturday, Urbas Fuenlabrada will commemorate the 30th anniversary of their match against Monbus Obradoiro with a photo exhibition with a replica of the European Cup Partizan gave them for their 20th anniversary, and many more events.
Also the local team will wear blackAs the Serbs always do and back 92With reference to 1992. festivities putting the finishing touch on the municipality’s anniversary of a new friendly match between ‘Fuenla’ and Partizan.
Tomorrow will be very special…
9⃣2⃣ We removed the number 92 and hung of it.
With Europe’s you can take your own photo.
️ Photo exhibition @PartizanBC
⚫ The team will play with a special kit,
Come with black!#FuenlDNA #Desire pic.twitter.com/B3KbWY3Zv9– Urbas Fuenlabrada (@BFunlabrada) April 8, 2022
It will be the Serbian team that will celebrate the event in Belgrade next week with the participation of a Serbian team. Fuenlabrada delegation who was invited to the party. As Quintana’s relationship with Partizan, and especially with Zeljko Obradovic, who has just started this season, remains alive, he will not be coming to the date due to a personal matter and will do so despite himself. second scene 28 years after completing the first, he is on the bench.
“We talk a lot, we usually see each other once a year when he comes to spend the summer at his house. Barcelona or when he comes to Spain to play Euroleague games with the teams he manages,” says Quintana.
To ask. And you never suggested to train Fuenlabrada?
Reaction. Nerd! Its cache is too high for a club like ours, impossible.
p. Yes, but ‘Fuenla’ is not just any team for him…
r. This is true. Well, maybe when he’s close to retirement [tiene 62 años]… Yes, maybe yes. It would be nice, really.
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