Eibar - the champions who could go down

     SD Eibar are guaranteed a top-two place in the Segunda División. The fans should be looking forward to welcoming Real Madrid and Barcelona to their tiny Ipurua stadium up in the Basque mountains next year but could instead find themselves turning out to watch Real Unión and Barakaldo. Instead of ascending to La Liga, the club could be demoted to playing next season in Segunda B. That's a difference of two whole divisions between where they deserve to be and where they may end up. As with most screwed-up things in Spanish football, it is entirely the governing body's fault due to its short-sightedness and lack of forethought.
     Eibar has always been a small club. Situated up in the Gipuzkoa area of the Basque Country, the city is home to just over 27,000 people. The team plays in the 5,250-capacity Estadio Municipal de Ipurua and usually struggles to even half-fill that meagre allocation. In its 74-year history, Eibar has split the majority of its time between the Segunda and Tercera Divisiones; 26 years in the former, 28 in the latter and just 7 in between in Segunda B. Although they boast a strong Basque identity, the team's kit is rather more Catalan in flavour. Back in 1944 the team found itself short of a kit to play in and so the regional federation loaned it a full Barcelona one, and the colours have since stuck. The Catalan giants helped out again last week, agreeing to sell the unused blaugrana confetti from the last-day disappointment against Atlético Madrid at a massive discount to money-light Eibar. Apparently, if it's not used within a certain timeframe it turns lumpy. That would've been some way for Barça to celebrate any potential achievement next season - purpley-red mashed potato cascading down on the massed Culés. Bleurgh. Thinking about it, I'm sure Mono Burgos would have been able to find it a good home, if push came to shove.

Given a guard of honour by the Lugo players

     Eibar beat Lugo 1-0 at home last weekend with an early goal from loan-star Jota, and if they beat Numancia on Sunday they will secure first place, ahead of also-promoted Deportivo La Coruna (although they did lose 2-1 at home to los Numantinos on matchday 21). Depor travel to Girona the previous evening and may face a trickier test as the opposition are currently in 19th and fighting for their lives in order to avoid the relegation zone, while Numancia are safe from bothering either the top or bottom of the table, in 12th. By rights, the mountaintop city of Eibar should be preparing for a party already. And yet, although fans and players have already been celebrating with their cut-price confetti and bagpiping aplenty, there has been a slight edge to the festivities, an underlying worry...
     Eibar are something of an anomaly in Spain - they are one of the very few clubs in the top two divisions not to have any debt. The club operates completely in the black within its budget of EUR3.5m, the smallest in the Segunda. It pays its players on time, and in full. And yet, all these things are behind the reason little Eibar may be prevented from lining against the Ronaldos and Messis of the Primera División for the very first time in its history next season.
     Back in 1999, Spain decided it would finally take a stand against football clubs continually spending way beyond their means, without any punishment whatsoever, in order to get to and then stay in the Primera División. To this end, Real Decreto 1251/1999 was born. This states that every team in the top two professional divisions has to have a capital equal to 25% of the average expenses of all teams in the same league as them, not including the two with the largest and the two with the smallest outgoings. In addition, all clubs except for Real Madrid, Barcelona, Athletic Bilbao and Osasuna (for historical reasons) must convert to an S.A.D., or Sociedad Anónima Deportiva - a public limited sports company - after staying in the league for more than a season. To be fair the rule was brought in on good faith and was aimed at discouraging the massive debt Spanish clubs seem so keen on enveloping themselves in, but simply did not take into account small, extremely well-run clubs like Eibar. Goes to show what a rarity they are.

5,250-capacity Ipurua, up in the mountains

     All of this means los Armeros, whose social capital is EUR422,253, have to raise EUR2,146,525 in order to be able to take their rightful place in La Liga next season. This leaves the club with roughly EUR1.7m to raise and only a matter of months in which to do it. If they can't raise the funds by early August they will be relegated back to the maelstrom that is Segunda División B. In order to make up this massive amount, the club has set up the defiendealeibar site, where people can buy shares at EUR50 (£40) each. This has been doing extremely well so far, but as there is a limit on how many shares an individual can buy, it will take a lot of interest for the club to make its target.
     It must be emphasised at this point that Eibar are not the only club to be affected by this law - Lugo and Mirandés were in the same situation last year and both managed to come through the other side. However, the two situations differ as neither of those two were on the verge of promotion (Lugo finished 11th and Mirandés 15th) and people have been incensed by the possibility that the best team in the league, which had only just been promoted from Segunda B the season before, could be relegated back there. 'Unfair' is a word that keeps cropping up, and it is indeed unfair that Eibar could be punished simply for being well-run while most of the other teams around them continue spunking money up the wall. Another way of looking at the blatant injustice of the situation is that it could in fact help Eibar: The other two clubs managed to raise their capital to meet the amount specified in the complicated workings set out in the Royal Decree even though they were unfashionable small clubs whose story did not make big news even in Spain, let alone internationally. Conversely, Eibar's story has been widely circulated to bellows of justified outrage, and so in theory it should prove easier for them to raise the necessary capital thanks to the goodwill of football fans both at home and abroad. Add World Cup winners Xabi Alonso and David Silva raising awareness of Eibar's plight (the pair both used to play for the Basque side on loan from their respective clubs) and fingers crossed Eibar will be a fixture in the Primera División calendar next season. Football paper Marca seems pretty sure they're up, often not even mentioning the precarious position Eibar finds itself in when it deigns to report on the Liga Adelante.

Celebrating now, but will they be
celebrating come August?

     Nonetheless, the problems would not stop there for Eibar were the football authorities to graciously accept them into the Primera. Four of the team that beat Lugo last week were players loaned from other clubs. Matchwinner in the last two games Jota is borrowed from Celta Vigo and will return to his parent club with his model girlfriend Jessica Bueno. A double shame for most supporters. Two-thirds of the players loaned in from Real Sociedad are set to leave Eibar for sure: Dani García and former Tottenham never-man Yuri Berchiche are leaving town and the future of Alain Eizmendi is up in the air at the moment. The winger Jose Luis Morales could return to Levante and although he'd obviously prefer to stay and go up with the team to La Liga, the Brazilian Gilvan Gomes previously agreed to return to Hércules. Perversely, the winger could yet be in the same boat as Eibar nonetheless, as he could have been going up but is instead going down - Hércules are four points from safety and therefore destined to finish stone-last in the Segunda. Many of the rest of the squad are at polar opposite ends of their playing careers, and one can imagine it will prove difficult to lure higher-profile 'names' to play in front of fewer than 5,000 fans week-in, week-out. But that's not how they do things in these parts anyway - the manager has previously stated that no player is bigger than the club and that is a phrase to which they are keen to stay true. In Gaizka Garitano's own words; "One thing is non-negotiable: we're all the same, there are no splits and anyone who does not share that view has no place here."

Eibar's other 'ascent'

     After the 1-0 win against Lugo, the Eibar players 'celebrated' their pending promotion (fund-raising notwithstanding!) by undertaking the gruelling Santuario de Arrate climb by bike. This is a 7.5km route that begins in the city and ends 535m higher above sea level. I don't know which sadist on the coaching staff came up with the idea but I can imagine that half-way up many of the players will have been wishing the league had relegated them after all!
     The donations keep dripping in bit by bit, and the club has so far raised nearly 72% of the necessary amount with 61 days remaining in which to raise the rest. Hopefully enough people who care about justice in football will come forward between now and then to ensure Eibar are playing at the level they have earned. Club president Alex Aranzabal flatly rejected the proposal that the club could be sold to outside investment, saying "we'd rather take the punishment and get demoted rather than share the soul of what SD Eibar is as a football club." Let us hope it does not come to that.

Anyone interested in helping SD Eibar by buying shares can do so via http://www.defiendealeibar.com/
Also to help, please retweet #defiendealeibar on the Twitter to help raise awareness.