The life of a person is only covered when it is counted in the first and third person. The self that lived, that felt, the others that saw. That is the strength of the biography of Juanín García that has just hit bookstores. That is counted complete. His life. With light from all angles. No shadows. Because no secret can bear direct light. And ‘Juanín. The history of the artist, a myth of handball ‘is the portrait of the athlete, but also of everything that has surrounded him. Next week it will be presented in Barcelona, on Monday the 15th, at 7:00 p.m., at the Altair Bookstore and the next day, in the morning, at the Barcelona headquarters, where the entire handball team will attend..
“I would have liked to write it all in the first person, that it read like a novel, but I had to put some chapters in the third person because I had to tell certain questions that Juan would never have said about himself: that he is still the greatest scorer in the history of the Asobal League and the Spanish team, for example, or that a A certain match or championship was won thanks to him ”, David Rubio, its author, argues, the fingers that, during the last long five months, have pointed directly to the life and work of Juanín. Founder and director of the newspaper La Nueva Crónica de León, this is his sixth book, his first biography. To write it, an inspiration, the life and work of Agassi written by JR Moehringer. “But, of course, there are too many differences between the life of Agassi (the dragon in his father’s yard who spits balls incessantly, the wigs, the Hollywood actresses) and that of a guy who has no great passions beyond hunting and fishing and who chooses as a background the henhouse of his house in the village to take the picture of the cover of his book. I think that says it all ”, explains the author. And yet the essence when holding the book is the same. Being before one of those figures that transcend sports, who are myths, forever. And that you can’t stop reading.
A forced withdrawal
From the courtyard of the La Granja school to the Olympic medal and the Champions League with Barça, passing by a sports hall in León with his voice shouting, his name: “Juanín, Juanín”. From orthopedic boots to the most cruel retreat, the one he was pushed into, he read in the press. The man who scored more goals than anyone else, 2,684 in the Asobal league, 822 with the national team. His goodbye, that forced withdrawal, is the beginning of the book. “The forced withdrawal organized by a board that, in my opinion, is not up to a legend like Juanín or a club like Ademar”, David Rubio argues. “I think there can be no one above Ademar, not even Juanín, but of course those who are not above the club, even if they believe it, are the president Cayetano Franco and his board of directors,” he completes, harshly.
Because Juanín is to handball what Iniesta is to football. An immense, tremendous, unrepeatable athlete. “Hopefully the book serves to do a little justice.” That player of 1.80 capable of subduing ‘morlacos’ of 2.15. “A short boy without pretense”, who cut passes, who ran with the speed of arrows, who has undressed in these pages that go through his career and life, an essential, now, in sports bookstores. To the ‘Open’.