Oviedo's doctor, Diego Cervero, carries Cazorla on his shoulders as Oviedo celebrates their La Liga promotion at Carlos Tartiere Stadium on 21/6/2025.

At 11:43 PM on 21/6/2025, Cazorla knelt on the sideline of Carlos Tartiere Stadium. Then, as the final whistle blew, signaling the end of the promotion play-off final between Real Oviedo and Mirandes, he jumped up. At 40, but with the spirit of a child, he led the crowd onto the field in celebration. With a 3-1 victory in the second leg and a 3-2 aggregate win, Oviedo returned to La Liga.

Amidst the cheering fans, tears, overflowing emotions, and endless hugs, the man who twice won the European Championship with Spain's golden generation, who tasted victory at Wembley, Camp Nou, and Bernabeu, declared this his life's dream.

"We've been in the mire for too long," Cazorla said. Over the past 24 years, the northwestern club had fallen to the Second, Third, and even Fourth divisions, twice nearly disappearing from the football map altogether.

Cazorla was born in Fonciello, a small village of just over 100 people in the parish of Lugo de Llanera, a 10-minute drive from Oviedo. Like his father, Jose Manuel, an ambulance driver who died in 2007, Cazorla was born a Real Oviedo fan.

Small in stature, young Cazorla possessed something special, attracting attention even when playing with other boys his age. At 8, he joined Oviedo, witnessed the club's relegation at 16, and had to leave at 18 without ever playing a first-team match. 20 years later, at 38, Cazorla's dream of playing for his hometown club came true. In 2023, he returned home to prepare for the final chapter of his career, with the club playing in the Second Division. Things were much better than when he left, but not ideal.

Oviedo's dark period began in 2001 with their 18th-place finish and relegation from La Liga. Two years later, they dropped to "Tercera," the Fourth Division in the Spanish football pyramid. This league is divided into 17 groups with nearly 350 teams, playing on small, park-like fields. Cazorla's "mire" was not just a metaphor.

The financial crisis at Oviedo in the early 2000s forced Cazorla's departure just as a first-team opportunity might have opened. In 2005, the club was promoted to Segunda B (the Third Division), where 80 teams compete across 4 regional groups. By 2015, they were back in the Second Division, but it took almost another decade to reach the top flight.

Upon his return, Cazorla yearned to end the club's long wait. He accepted the minimum salary, around 100,000 USD per season, and declined any bonuses. "I'd play for free, but the rules don't allow it," he said at the time. Cazorla had one request: 10% of the sales from his number 8 jersey should go directly to the club's academy. He hoped young talents – like himself, Juan Mata, or Michu before him – would never be forced to leave again.

Cazorla endured a 636-day injury layoff and 12 surgeries. 10 cm of his Achilles tendon was removed due to infection. The bones in his foot became soft like clay. Skin from his arm was grafted onto his heel, splitting the tattoo of his daughter's name. Then-Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger called it the worst injury he had ever seen. Doctors told Cazorla he should be happy just to walk again. So, his return to the pitch in 2018 was a miracle. But 5 years later, he returned to Oviedo to set the stage for another.

An Achilles tendon injury almost ended Cazorla's career in 2018. Photo: Guardian

An Achilles tendon injury almost ended Cazorla's career in 2018. Photo: Guardian

In their first season with Cazorla, Oviedo reached the play-off final but lost to Espanyol. Many thought it was the end. But the veteran midfielder didn't want the dream to end incompletely.

This season, Cazorla's free-kick against Almeria sent Oviedo to the play-off final against Mirandes. A knee injury kept him out of the first leg, forcing him to watch helplessly from the stands as his team lost 0-1. In the second leg, a match Cazorla described as "the most important of my career," Oviedo fell behind again in the 16th minute, making the aggregate score 2-0. But then Cazorla's class shone through as he controlled and dictated the game. When Oviedo was awarded a penalty just before half-time, he grabbed the ball, kissed it, and scored, sending the stadium into raptures.

In the second half, teammate Ilyas Chaira's early goal sent the final into extra time with extreme tension. Finally, with Cazorla off the field exhausted, veteran Francisco Portillo scored a stunning goal to make it 3-1. The score held, sending Oviedo back to the pinnacle of Spanish football in their centenary year.

Cazorla's penalty equalized for Oviedo in their 3-1 comeback win against Mirandes in the play-off final on June 21st. Photo: Real Oviedo

Cazorla's penalty equalized for Oviedo in their 3-1 comeback win against Mirandes in the play-off final on June 21st. Photo: Real Oviedo

During the celebrations, Cazorla was carried on the shoulders of Diego Cervero. Cervero, a former striker from Oviedo's lower league days, is now the club's doctor. When the team was relegated to the Fourth Division, Cervero vowed not to leave until they returned to professional football – the top two divisions – and he kept his word.

Cazorla then took the microphone and sang the unofficial anthem composed by Melendi, an Oviedo-born musician and former club academy player. It's a song of hope and pain: "We can't live like this, watching our team suffer." The lyrics resonate, culminating in "Volveremos" (We will return).

The slogan "return" is everywhere, on every corner of the city of Asturias. The last time Oviedo played in La Liga was at Mallorca in 2001. Then, Veljko Paunovic was a player. Now, he's the head coach. "A cycle is closed," Paunovic said. "Oviedo is back where it belongs."

The next day, as Cazorla stepped onto the stage next to America Square for the victory celebration, the streets were packed. "Without you, Oviedo wouldn't exist," he said. These were not empty words. Without the fans, Oviedo might not have survived for Cazorla to return to.

In 2003, Oviedo was relegated twice in one summer: once on the field, and again due to financial penalties after players sued for unpaid wages. A poignant image of Oviedo's plight is the coach working in a toilet, his desk beside a urinal, one of the few places with natural light after the electricity was cut.

The then-mayor abandoned the club, and the City Council tried to establish a new club as a replacement. But the fans didn't. They fought, rebuilding Oviedo under President Manuel Lafuente. Fans did everything, from cleaning and repairing to outnumbering every opponent in attendance. They marched in support of Oviedo. The team itself was rebuilt from scratch, from those remaining in the academy.

Oviedo fans fill the streets during the promotion celebration, marking the club's return to La Liga on June 22nd. Photo: EPA

Oviedo fans fill the streets during the promotion celebration, marking the club's return to La Liga on June 22nd. Photo: EPA

In the second leg of the play-off final against Mirandes, a giant tifo displayed by Oviedo fans said it all: "Proud to have never abandoned you." Indeed, they never did. Oviedo fans refused to let their club die, even in 2012 when it teetered on the brink again: Interpol was pursuing the club's owner on fraud charges.

In the fight to keep Oviedo on the football map, the fans gained something, changed something: a resistance, an identity, an ideal. And because of that, the club was saved a second time, with a new generation of fans alongside the old, culminating in this happy ending.

Last weekend, Real Oviedo's 36,962 shareholders from 86 countries, along with thousands more in the city, lined up around the Carlos Tartiere Stadium to celebrate the return. Some were even fans of Ipswich, Portsmouth, and Stoke. But one of the largest shareholders, a symbol of the 24-year rescue, wearing the number 8 shirt, was Cazorla.

Cazorla had waited a long time, and so had the fans. "It's crazy, and also funny, that the best moment of my life is this, at 40," he said, looking out at the crowd filling Galicia Avenue as far as the eye could see. "I've been lucky enough to experience wonderful things. I've won many cups, but I grew up with Oviedo, and the feeling of winning here is different, unique."

Hoang Thong (via Guardian)