He is about ten years old and wears the Barça jersey with Pedri’s “8”, but apologizes with conviction: “No, my idol is Lamine Yamal.” “I want to be like him,” he remarks at the door of the school Rocafonda in the Mataró district of the same name, where the new Barça figure grew up. The nervousness of the first day of school disappears when you ask about the most famous neighbor: Yamal, son of a Moroccan father and an Equatoguine mother, was born on July 13, 2007 in Esplugues de Llobregat, but came to Mataró as a child via Granollers. The children talk about him with wide eyes and exhaustion. They smile shyly into the camera, Draw with your hands the 304 that has become fashionable with its celebrations for its belonging to Rocafonda: it refers to the postal code (08304). It looks painted on many walls. The children are divided into two groups: those who know how to do the gesture and those who cannot.
They are divided into two groups: those who saw him in the neighborhood and those who did not see him. “I haven’t seen him yet,” Nil admits, emphasizing the “yet.” “All the children are excited. “It makes her and the whole neighborhood proud,” the mother agrees. Keep going: “It’s good that every now and then something beautiful comes out of the neighborhood, a flower, even if it only happens very occasionally. And if it has to do with sport, even better, because it is an additional motivation for the youngest ones. So they can see that there might be another way out.
According to INE, Rocafonda is one of the most punished neighborhoods in Maresme Almost half of their families are at risk of poverty and the average income is a third of that in the Center or Eixample, two affluent areas of the city. Little Catalan is spoken: almost no bar watches TV3. According to the latest study of the population of Mataró (2022), it is the neighborhood with the highest proportion of households with five members (8.6% of the entire neighborhood), six, eight and more than eight.
It has grown due to immigration: internally in the 60s and 70s and externally since the late 90s. It is the only neighborhood in Mataró where the Catalan-born population does not reach 50% (48%). The proportion of those born in Andalusia is still 8.4%, while foreigners make up 36%, with Morocco clearly predominating: more than half. This is the case of Yamal’s father Mounir, who is well known in Rocafonda and generally highly respected. In the local elections in May, Vox received 14% of the vote in the district and it was the second force: in the center it was the sixth (6%). Participation did not reach 50%.
In a nearby bar, a 45-year-old woman, perhaps 50, complains that institutions are doing nothing to prevent Rocafonda’s “collapse.” “Everything is being destroyed because of immigration, because of drugs, because of everything there is. The neighborhood will shit and no one will help. It’s a ghetto.” “This boy has become an idol for the little ones, a role model to follow. When he comes, they follow him like a pack.” It is a matter of pride that he claims to be from Rocafonda, because a neighborhood as unstructured as this one needs someone to give it a voice. At least the kids who are on the streets all day say, “Damn, there’s a way out.”.’ Or ‘it’s possible,'” she concludes. “Since there are few good examples, at least the light flows and comes out,” says another woman. “When someone in the neighborhood bombs like that, it’s always good,” says another man.
If you walk down the street from the school, you come to a square: three men in their late thirties are sitting on benches. It is said that he played with Yamal in the Catalan third division. Another, with a scar on his cheek, eats a cake with a lid. When he’s finished, he takes a bottle of whiskey out of a bag. It’s 9:30 in the morning. The third responds and talks about Jamal: “You will never see him like that boy. Lamine had a different path.” He only ever thought about football. He never spent time with disreputable people.“I hope it continues like this.” I’m happy that he plays for Barça, my team. “Before I arrived in Spain my goal was to play for Barça, although I would have gone to Madrid,” he agrees. Like him, many cross the sea with the intention of playing for Barça.. “The people of Rocafonda aren’t bad, are they?”, he repeats before saying goodbye. His voice illustrates the weight of the stigma.
A few meters away is El Cordobés, Yamal’s father’s favorite bar. Carlos, the boss, proudly points to a wall with a signed youth team jersey. Her father took her with him: “They are very neighborly people. Lamine is a normal guy, very humble. Nothing went to his head. “It stays the same”. He knows well the story of Lamine, a culé since his youth: “He came to La Masia at a very young age. His parents couldn’t give him an education because they didn’t have money, and his father went to Barça,” telling them: “If you want him to continue, you have to give him an education.” Avenida Perú connects Plaza Joan XXIII, where they lived, with a train station: “I saw them come by every day to go to training. Every day. Lamine always walked by and held his father’s hand.” They didn’t pay for the train because they didn’t have a cent“.
Abdul has a clothing store in Plaza Joan XXIII. He also appreciates a Lamine T-shirt. The player’s grandmother, a regular customer, gave it to him: “She’s like my mother.” It’s the best gift they’ve given me“. He continues: “It is the flag of the neighborhood, a good example.” The neighborhood is ruined. Full of bad examples. In a corner of the square Arabia, the grandmother’s hairdresser, says her children brag about living in the Yamal district.
He spent the day chasing the ball on the court, the terrace of his house. It used to be made of earth and now it is made of cement and it is forbidden to play football. He also spent hours on a soccer field 300 meters away. Between one place and another his uncle Abdul runs an Arabica bakery. On the outside sign there is a montage of a picture of Yamal at the Camp Nou that he took a few years ago. He was convinced that because of his talent he would one day reach the top. He admits that he is from Madrid, like his father, his brother, like many people from Rocafonda, but that he has often worn his nephew’s shirt. He will celebrate his goals, even if they are for the white team.
Inside has the bakery hung a poster with the numbers 04/29/2023 and 83’48”, the day and minute of his debut at Barça: against Betis (4-0). He was 15 years, nine months and 16 days old, making him the youngest debutant in the club’s LaLiga history. This Friday he had the honor of becoming the youngest player ever to play for the Spanish team (16 years and 57 days).
His driver is his cousin Mohamed, 28 years old and Abdul’s son. “I have work for at least the next two years”, he says with a laugh, before talking about Yamal: “He’s normal, as always. He doesn’t get nervous. He always has the ground under his feet.” One day, on the way to a game, They invented the celebration of 304 with a mutual friend, after “a while of testing and juggling with their fingers.”. He’s counting down the days until Yamal can celebrate with the first team for the first time, with his first goal. And he proudly presents this season’s jersey, which his cousin gave him. It’s not signed yet: “He’ll sign it for me. There is no rush.” But Lamine Yamal seems to have it.
