Olive Press Costa Blanca North and Valencia Issue 114

ONE OF OUR OWN

A BRITISH single mother is being evicted from her home in Javea for being a squatter - despite not missing a rent payment in SEVEN YEARS.

Kate Langshaw, 44, and her sevenyear-old son Lucas were given notice to leave their property, after becoming embroiled in an inheritance row between the owner and her ‘heartless’ politician son.

Despite Kate winning her case in May, the son, who stood in the local elections for the anti-feminist Vox party, was able to reverse the decision on appeal in just three months.

Questions remain over how the ruling was made so rapidly in a legal system that is famed for its slow pace.

Kate, for example, has not received a single alimony payment from the father of her son for four years after a successful domestic violence case against him. She is now facing tens of thousands of euros in court costs, legal fees and backdated rent - and the prospect of being left homeless with a young son and their dog

COSTA BLANCA

‘ORGY’ VILLA OF KISSING FA BOSS

O P LIVE RESS

Single

EXCLUSIVE

By Laurence Dollimore

Orri.

Kate told the Olive Press: “I’ve always paid my rent and did everything I was told to by the rental company, it’s terrifying to think we could all be on the streets.

“We are still in the summer season and I cannot afford to find a new place near my son’s school.

“I might even have to give up my dog as very few rental properties accept pets which would be heartbreaking for me but especially my son. He suffers from anxiety and Orri is crucial for his mental health.

“How can it be fair that I’m being kicked out? It’s madness. I hear stories that it can take three years to evict an actual squatter, and yet I am being asked to leave as a single mother paying rent.”

The issues began when the millionaire patriarch of the influential Bas family, based in Javea, died some years ago, leaving a slew of homes, land and money to his wife Christine English - and his four children.

The father had been

a successful property developer and was behind the large Don Pepe urbanization just off Javea’s celebrated Arenal beach. He left a number of apartments in the block, plus various other homes, over

which the siblings are understood to have squabbled.

The Olive Press understands at least one child, including son Daniel, took their mother to court to obtain more properties and money from her.

Unbeknown to Kate, who began renting her two-bed villa from mother Christine in 2017, son Danie managed to acquire the deeds in 2019.

Despite this, the rental company handling the tenancy advised her to continue paying rent to the mother, particularly as official notary papers still indicated that Christine was the owner. Finally last year, the son tried to ‘bully’ Kate to pay him instead of the mum with an increase of €200 more a month, despite her having a fixed contract of €600 in place until 2026. When this failed, he instead took her to court, claiming she was a ‘squatter’ because she had no contract with himdespite proving she had paid rent since 2017.

EXCLUSIVE

The Olive Press has tracked down a villa allegedly rented by controversial football kiss row boss Luis Rubiales to host an orgy with ‘eight to 10’ young women.

The stunning home is nestled in an exclusive Granada urbanisation, near where the ousted Spanish FA (RFEF) boss grew up in Motril, Granada.

Rubiales is alleged to have held the late night ‘orgy’ in Salobrena, with women as young as 18 during the Covid lockdown in 2020, according to his uncle Juan Rubiales.

He claimed he had the right to any earnings (known as usufructo) on the property, including rent. However his case failed in Denia court in May, when a judge ruled that mother Christine had the usufructo when Kate signed the rental agreement and she had therefore paid the right person. But the son took an appeal to the courts in Alicante, and, extraordinarily, the decision was reversed in July making the latest rental contract void. Worse, he is now suing Kate for backdated rent which totals over €30,000. She has been receiving help from social services, the Citizens Advice bureau and a local charity called Guardian Angels.

“They are all shocked by the decision and can’t understand how it happened,” added Kate.

Myra Azzopardi, senior adviser and paralegal at Citizens Advice in Spain, told the Olive Press: “This case is

shocking. First of all, the fact the appeal was won so quickly is very surprising, any other

The pair are embroiled in an ongoing feud after Luis sacked him from his press officer role at RFEF. The series of wild nights, which went on until 6am and broke Covid rules, was anything but popular with angry neighbours, the Olive Press can reveal.

Partying

“I remember when he was here, the noise was crazy,” one neighbour revealed. “Boom, boom, boom until the early hours, there was lots of music, drinking and lots of girls. “I could hear them all laughing and partying until five or six in the morning. They were here for a couple of days.”

The local, who only gave her name as Maria, said the property is owned by an Italian businesswoman. She added: “It was during the Covid pandemic and it was annoying but we did not call the police because that’s not the kind of neighbours we are.” Last year, Juan Rubiales, told an anti-corruption trial in Madrid that Luis had illegally used RFEF funds to rent the luxury villa for an ‘orgy’.

See Sordid and seedy, p6

mother and young son are branded squatters by ‘heartless’ landlord despite never missing rent

EVICTED: Mum Kate and Lucas in happier times

Continues on Page 4

‘Belli’ in Madrid: Instant hero or just another expat struggling to adapt and settle into his new life in Spain?

Quick thinker

A VALENCIA girl, 4, saved her mother’s life who was suffering an epileptic fit at her home and called emergency services, and gave them the house number and street.

Dried up

A LORRY carrying boxes of wine and cava caught fire close to Quart de Poblet on Monday, with bottles exploding as fire crews brought the blaze under control.

Summer toll

JULY and August road accident deaths totalled 19 in the Valencian Community - seven more than last year and the third-highest figure in Spain’s 17 regions.

Life savers

PARAMEDICS revived a girl, 8, who was drowning in a home swimming pool in Villena on Sunday and took her to Elda General Hospital.

TWO Brazilian women have been arrested for assaulting another prostitute that wanted to ‘work’ on the same Alicante street. The assailants aged 36 and 40 told their rival that they she had to pay a facility fee of €50 to search for cli -

Turf war

ents on the same road. When she refused, she was attacked by them and had her bag stolen.

The victim went to the police to report the incident who discovered the attackers had a long history of similar acts and had been previously arrested in 2020. They have been charged with extortion and robbery with violence.

BEATING THE RAP

INFAMOUS Irish mobster, John Gilligan, 71, walked out of court a free man, after doing a plea bargain deal with prosecutors over drug trafficking and gun possession.

The gangster - accused of being behind the murder of crime journalist Veronica Guerin - will not spend another night in prison in Spain.

The same applies to seven of

Infamous Irish mobster John Gilligan walks free from drug trial after bargain plea deal

By Alex Trelinski

Cat killer caught

A MAN who adopted and stole cats from animal shelters so he could kill them has been arrested.

The 28-year-old was detained after a Marina Alta animal shelter told police that a feline had been stolen in a break-in and another killed on the spot.

Police in El Verger using video footage identified the suspect as a local resident who had adopted a cat from another shelter, but then reported it as missing so that he could adopt another feline.

The shelter in question did not believe his story and denied his request.

The probe found evidence that during July, he stole two other cats from the same shelter and killed them - dumping their bodies either close to the building or his home.

The gang had faced drug offences and belonging to a criminal organisation, while the boss had an extra charge of weapon possession

his associates, including ‘Fat’ Tony Armstrong, who were told of the good news by a Costa Blanca judge on Monday. after a gun was found in his villa garden, in Torrevieja. He had been accused of masterminding an operation to smuggle cannabis and powerful sleeping-pills to his native Ireland in consignments of flip-flops. Other defendants at the Torrevieja hearing included Milligan’s son, Darren, 47, who skipped Spain last autumn - forcing two trial postponements - but was extradited in July. Police had first raided their homes between Torrevieja and Orihuela Costa in 2020. The three-day trial ended before it started when judge Francisco Ruiz was informed about the plea bargain deal.

FREE: Gilligan cut a deal

Despite prosecutors wanting Gilligan jailed for over eight years, the deal gives him a 22-month suspended sentence and fines amounting to €14,000.

The rest of Gilligan’s crew each got suspended 18-month prison sentences as opposed to original demands for nearly seven years behind bars. Gilligan spent 17 years in an Irish jail before being freed in 2013 after he was convicted of running a large-scale drug trafficking gang in the nineties that netted over €35 million. He was acquitted in 1996 for the murder of journalist Veronica Guerin with associate Brian Meehan receiving a life sentence for the killing.

Cut down

A WOMEN'S hairdresser has been exposed as the lynchpin of a drug trafficking gang operating extensively across the Marina Alta area.

Police say she used her business in Ondara to launder proceeds made from the narcotic sales. Her boyfriend was in charge of distributing the drugs in towns such as Pego, Pedreguer, Jalon, Denia, Orba, Vergel and Beniarbeig. Raids were carried out at their Beniarbeig home in addition to premises in El Verger and Benimeli, as well as the Ondara hairdressing salon. Six arrests were made, with cash and drugs including cocaine seized.

STROLL SHOCK

A WOMAN taking a lunchtime seaside stroll along Gandia’s main beach made the macabre discovery of human body parts washing up in the sand. The tide had brought in a leg and hip in an advanced state of decomposition.

Police investigating the gruesome find believe they may be the remains of someone lost from a refugee boat making the dangerous journey from North Africa.

Ice cool Jenni

SHE could be the most famous woman in the world right now.

But female football star Jenni Hermoso looked nothing but ice cool as she spent a few days on holiday in southern Spain.

Heading to Marbella after getting embroiled in the massive Spanish FA kiss scandal, she was spotted out and about in the Old Town.

And luckily the sharp eyed boss of ice cream parlour La Valenciana managed to

get a snap to record her visit.

“She came in with her family and ordered a nougat and white chocolate ice cream,” said Daniel Vila, who was working behind the counter at the time.

“At first, we didn’t realise it was her, but then I saw her tattoos while she was reaching out to pay.

“‘It’s the world champion!’ I blurted out.”

After agreeing to pose for a picture she revealed she was in Marbella for a week, before jetting to Mexico.

See Sordid and Seedy, p6/7

HIDDEN THOUGHTS

IT was on a long drive back from Portugal to Denia to catch the ferry to Ibiza that Paul Richardson stumbled across the little known region that would eventually become his home.

He was to turn his back on fastpaced modern life for a rural idyll – for the second time.

A decade earlier, he had landed in Ibiza to escape a hectic life in London, arriving on the White Isle in his ‘little brown mini’.

Apart from a suitcase full of New Romantic-style clothes he also had a deal to write his first book.

So eschewing the party hotspots – the clubbing scene in Ibiza was exploding in 1989 – he found a typical whitewashed cottage and settled into a self-sufficient lifestyle growing vegetables and keeping chickens.

“I didn’t know how long I’d be in Ibiza, but I knew it’d be at least a year to write the book,” Paul told the Olive Press. “In the end I was there for 10 years.”

While he still loves the island, he slowly watched the rural lifestyle disappear, as it became the St Tropez of Spain.

“Affordable rural living was not an option any more,” he explained, adding he had been harking for the old lifestyle back – and that was when he came across the perfect spot by accident. He had been to Portugal to interview classical pianist Maria João Pires, ‘she is quite brilliant’ says Paul, and on the way back he crossed into Caceres province. Here he was to find what he had lost. He fell in love with the wide-open landscape, traffic-free roads and lack of ugly modern buildings and was to return to explore alongside his partner, Nacho Trives, several times.

On one of those occasions they came across a finca for sale outside the village of Hoyos and made the decision to stay.

Now 23 years on he and Nacho - who married in 2010 - are still there. It is this period in his life that is the subject of his latest book Hidden Valley, which came out this summer.

“Everyone thought we were mad to leap off a cliff moving to such a remote place, especially as a gay couple,” said Paul.

In fact this is part of what the 59-year-old former Chichester Cathedral choirboy, Old Etonian and Cambridge University alum-

As the Olive Press continues with the serialisation of respected author Paul Richardson’s new book, Dilip Kuner finds out about his last 30 years in Ibiza and finally unspoilt Extremadura

the land and the people he got to know on his journey through the coming decades – but it was definitely not all a bed of roses. Paul added: “It was like the wild west. People lived full on, with bar fights and all. It was a hard environment and you had to be tough enough to stand up for yourself.

“I was petrified and stayed at home a lot. It was quite a while until l earned their respect.” But earn their respect he did and the help and advice he got from

CAN YOU SEE ME? THEN SO CAN ALL OUR READERS

that is very satisfying – it is a twoway process,” says Paul. But all things change even in Extremadura.

Paul explained: “Up until five to 10 years ago the matanza (pig slaughter) was a big thing. Everyone had a pig and came together for the slaughter. It was a cultural experience, something that had been done for hundreds of years. This is just one example of what is being lost.

“When I moved here it was remote, now communications are vastly improved. “Madrid is just three-and-a half hours away. It is not just a transport thing. It is communication. Back when I moved here there was no internet, no mobile phone coverage. Now everyone is connected.

“Youngsters don’t want to stay, so farms and land are abandoned, which leads to fires.

“Old ways of doing things –collective knowledge – are forgotten. Even the weather has changed.”

He concluded: “It is a real shame that this cultural richness is being lost.”

Will he move on again? Are there any more, hidden rural idylls out there for Paul to discover? We’ll find out in his next book, perhaps.

NOW turn to page 14 for the next serialisation of his new book Hidden Valley, exclusively in the Olive Press

Hidden Valley: Finding freedom in Spain's deep country is published by Abacus Books.

ONE of British television’s most successful and popular actors is coming to Spain this month to shoot a drama series about - British television!

David Tennant is one of an all-star cast filming Jilly Cooper’s novel Rivals set in the ruthless world of television back in the 1980s.

The Scottish actor shot to fame in 2005 when he took over the iconic role of Doctor Who from Christopher Eccleston and has reprised that role for three 60th anniversary specials that will be screened in November.

Shooting for the Disney+ production is heading to the Costa del Sol on September 18, where Tennant will be joined by an all-star cast including former Eastenders hard-man Danny Dyer.

One out, one in

NO sooner had heir to the Spanish throne Princess Leonor graduated from her Welsh school then her alma mater welcomed another royal student.

Her younger sister, the Infanta Sofia, has started her Baccalaureate studies at the UWC Atlantic College.

The school is 35 kilometres from Cardiff, and her schooling will cost her parents around €82,000 from their own pockets for the two years of study.

HAPPY COUPLE: Paul (left) and Nacho at home on their finca

Everyone had a pig and came together for the slaughter

HERO COP

AN off-duty policeman saved three children from drowning near Castellon.

The Guardia Civil officer was spending the day at Grao de Castello beach with his family, when he spotted the youngsters being swept away by the dangerous current. “The children were very tired and fright-

ened but the officer, despite the strong wind and swell, managed to first calm them down and then rescue them,” explained a spokesman.

Eventually he managed to pull them out of the water with the help of two other adults but he could then not get out himself. The exhausted officer eventually needed rescuing by a lifeboat. He was taken to a hospital where he made a full recovery.

Deadly DANA

AT least five people have died, while railways and motorways were blocked in serious floods around Spain.

The ‘historic’ DANA storms wrought destruction throughout the mainland, leaving a further three people missing.

Thousands were forced from their homes as the weekend’s heavy rains swept through the country.

The deaths came despite everyone in the Madrid region receiving alarming text messages telling them to stay in their homes.

Among the saddest deaths was a 20-year-old man stuck in an elevator in the Tole do town of Casarrubios del Monte.

The man got caught when he went down to his base ment garage to move his car away from rapidly ris ing floodwaters.

However, the power cut while in the lift, trapping him in what would become a metal coffin.

"We heard him inside, crying for help, but it was impossible to reach him," revealed neighbour Manuel de Vera, 28.

As the sun rose on Monday morning, authorities discovered the lifeless body of a man inside a stranded car in the nearby town of Bargas.

The body of a 50-year-old man from Camarena meanwhile, was found in an open field.

To the north, two more lives

Down the pan

IF there is one thing you should never do in Valencia, don’t mess with its beloved paella, as Jamie Oliver discovered.

The celebrity chef found himself in the region’s bad books when he had the temerity to add chorizo to his recipe. Now Almirall, a maker of antacid tablets, is under the grill after suggesting the rice dish could cause acid reflux. Adverts for its medicine, Almax, featured a photo of paella with the tag-line: “Almax, and enjoy Valencia without acidity.”

By Walter Finch

were lost after a pair of hikers went missing exploring the Gorgol ravine in Tramacastilla de Tena, in Huesca. Authorities had better luck when they managed to save the life of a terrified 10-yearold boy who had spent a whole night clinging to a tree branch in El Santo, near Toledo. The car containing young Ethan and his family had been swept away

rent a full three kilometres until he managed to grab the branch of a seven-metre ash tree that his rescuer said was ‘as thin as a finger’.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” Ethan repeated to the security guard who found him, his face covered in mud, bruises and scratches .

“He clung on to life, I don’t know how he made it,” the security guard said.

Ethan’s father is still among the missing, as well as an 83-year-old man swept away by the current in Villamanta and a woman, 54, vanished from her car in Valmojado. An extensive search with divers is scouring the flood zones

Alicante province firefighters only dealt with 17 weather-related incidents during a day-long orange

The light-hearted advert was definitely no laughing matter for travel associations, including Conhostor and Hosteria Valencia.

After they threatened legal action to protect the region’s local gastronomy the adverts were reluctantly withdrawn.

Almost full

HOTEL occupancy topped 90% in the Valencian Community in August, according to the Hosbec hoteliers association.

Benidorm recorded 92.2% occupancy last monthjust 2.2% lower than record-breaking figures of 2019.

into the Alberche River - which according to neighbours looked like the ‘Mississippi’ - as it crossed a bridge.

His 14-year-old sister fell out of the backseat door but made it to a nearby fire station soon after, while his mother was found clinging to another tree.

Ethan was carried by the tor-

FIRE ON HIGH

NERVES were frayed when a fire erupted on the top floor of a Benidorm skyscraper on Monday. Onlookers stopped to look up as the flames took hold of a nearly top floor residence on Calle Irlanda at around 7.30am. Luckily, Benidorm firefighters extinguished the blaze in a short time with no injuries reported.

“I was out walking my dogs when suddenly people started to point up in the sky,” Andres Winther, 53, a retired footballer from Norway, told the Olive Press. “I could see lots of panicked faces in the lower windows. If anyone had been in the apartment at the time of the fire, I don't think they would have made it.”

The bad weather (left) caused more issues in Castellon and Valencia provinces with blocked roads and rail lines as well as fallen trees. Trains were delayed or cancelled on main lines all the way into Catalunya, with hold-ups on local Cercanias lines between Valencia and Utiel.

The Port of Valencia was closed on Sunday due to the storms and two Metrovalencia tram services ran with delays on Monday due to an electrical fault.

Around a dozen planes arriving and departing from Valencia were either delayed or cancelled due to Sunday’s strong winds. Incredibly, the AP-7 motorway was also blocked off for many hours between Valencia and Tarragona.

Eight lives left

A CAT used up one of its nine lives after falling 20 metres to the rocky ground at Benissa’s Pinets cove. Emergency services were called by bathers saying a cat had fallen into an inaccessible part of the cove, where it was moving slightly and meowing in pain.

Benissa cops went to the cove and carefully descended to get to the distressed feline. They found it had suffered a broken right-hind leg and had a cut to the head.

It is now ‘recovering well’ in the hands of a local vet.

Hosbec said that a strong influx of British and Portuguese visitors were responsible for boosting the August total. International tourists accounted for 59% of visitors, with the British market dominating foreign tourists at 29.6% followed by Portugal (14.1%) and France a distant third on 2.3%

The Costa Blanca (minus Benidorm) reported 91% occupation in August - down just 1.2% on 2019, with twothirds of hotel stays coming from non-Spanish residents.

From front Squat shock

person in Spain would be thrilled to get a case through a court in three months.

“But Kate is the victim here, she was paying the rent and the mother should have known exactly what was happening with her property.

“If that mother didn’t know what was going on I’d eat my hat. She has acted unjust and fraudulently and Kate should be taking her to court.

“The fact that the son wants to sue Kate for the huge rent allegedly owed is ridiculous. He should be suing his mother, as she was collecting the rent that the courts have now ruled she had no right to.”

The case has shocked the local expat community, which has set up a GoFundMe page to help with legal costs and a deposit for a new home, if needed. Search Kate Langshaw legal battle to find the donation page.

The Olive Press has contacted Daniel Bas and the agency for comment.

PANIC: As flames take hold of skyscraper

Half a dozen dead, including a man in an elevator, as extreme storms rock the country blocking railways and roads

NO SMALL MATTER

Dwarf bullfight stopped as ‘do-gooders’ brand it ‘degrading’

A TROUPE of dwarf bullfighters are up in arms after Murcia’s government banned a comedic show.

The mini-matadors insist they are the ‘victims’ of do-gooders, who claim it is humiliating for little people to take part in such a show.

But they insist they are ‘entirely happy’ and don’t feel at all degraded.

They argue that banning their show is ‘a total lack of respect’ for their feelings.

Their popular routine sees them dressed in gaudy clothes and heavily made-up, darting about the ring and leaping skillfully out of the path of charging bulls.

Above all, they insist they do not actually harm the animals.

But now the event, scheduled for Murcia’s bullring, next Wednesday (Sept 13), has been cancelled.

It comes after an official complaint was filed by an animal protection group to the region’s acting president, Fernando Lopez Miras.

The Franz Weber foundation made their plea to the Ministry of Social Rights, as well as the Disabled Persons Directorate at the Murcia government headquarters.

The foundation described the shows as ‘degrading’ for the dwarfs and a ‘cruel mockery’.

They cited a section of Spain’s General Law on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities that specifically vetoes ‘any bullfighting show in which there is mockery, ridicule or humiliation for people with functional diversity’.

Skilled

Spain’s parliament saw its Senate upper house back a measure last April to ban such events but the move still has to be approved by the lower house.

Daniel Calderon - a bullfighter and manager of the company, Diversiones en el Ruedo comedy troupe, insisted: “It shows a complete lack of respect and freedom.

“We are skilled professionals who work hard and entertain like other performers.”

He added: “All those who enter the ring are registered as bullfighters at

Stubbed out!

By Alex Trelinski

Spain’s Ministry of Culture, whatever size they are, and we enter of our own free will.

“Surely it’s discrimination to stop us from doing so?”

BRAVE FUN: but banned

Transport boost

A MAJOR investment to improve bus services in the Benidorm and Marina Baixa area has been announced.

Some €6.8million will be spent over the next two years to enhance routes between the area’s municipalities, including extra buses. Investments totalling €80 million will also be injected into lines 1 and 9 of the TRAM d'Alacant to better connect the region over the four years, promised the new regional government.

BANNED: Terrifying ordeal for the bulls

EL VERGER has banned bull runs with fires attached to the horns.

The controversial bous embolats runs have come under mounting protest over recent years. During the runs a wooden frame was set alight between the horns before the terrified bull was sent to roam the streets.

New Compromis mayor of El Verger, Basili Sartort, said that the practice ‘no longer represents the current values of good treatment of animals’. The traditional bous al carrer runs without fire will continue to be organised.

Voted top expat paper in Spain

A campaigning, community newspaper, the Olive Press represents the huge expatriate community in Spain with an estimated readership, including the websites, of more than two million people a month.

OPINION

Miscarriage of justice is a travesty

IT is an absolute travesty that a fully legal, tax-paying British expat is being branded a squatter after paying rent for seven years. How on earth could a judge side with a landlord when Kate Langshaw had not missed a single payment to HIS OWN MOTHER.

In particular, after Kate was specifically told by the estate agency that arranged the contract to continue paying the mother.

There are some serious questions that still need answering about this case.

As Citizens Advice chief Myra Azzopardi points out, the mother must have known she had no right to collect rent when she handed over the property to her son - but she collected it anyway.

Surely it is SHE who should be sued for backdated rent, not innocent Kate, who acted within the law at all times.

In addition, why did the son - who stood for the far-right party Vox in recent local elections - not address the actual contract?

This is yet another miscarriage of justice in Spain and a stark reminder of how seemingly unfair the legal system can be here - especially if you are vulnerable and appear an easy target.

We must make as much noise as possible to stop Kate being made to pay tens of thousands of euros that she simply cannot afford - and more importantly, to keep her from being left homeless.

The Olive Press vows to continue searching for answers and to expose the shameless, heartless family that has taken this unfortunate single mother, her son and her dog Orri for a ride.

PUBLISHER / EDITOR

Jon Clarke, jon@theolivepress.es

Dilip Kuner dilip@theolivepress.es

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John Culatto

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WITH his own mother locking herself in a Granada church and going on an ‘indefinite’ hunger strike until the ‘inhuman witch hunt’ against her son ended, it’s easy to think that Luis Rubiales must be a victim. The boss of the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) has certainly tried to play the underdog as he took on the might of the Spanish government and Fifa. His unquestioning belief that it’s OK to kiss a female player on the lips, throw another over the shoulder, and joke about marrying another in the locker room, has certainly

led to much navel-gazing in Spanish society. But crucially, his kissing of Spanish striker Jenni Hermoso as Spain won the World Cup has shone a light on his six year-long position at RFEF, as well as how he got onto the podium in the first place.

And it isn’t pretty reading, with numerous ‘victims’ and witnesses coming forward over the way he allegedly trampled on and abused them on his way to the top of Spain’s football pyramid.

The accusations range from misogyny and sexual harassment to misappropriation of

SUPPORT: Locals get behind Rubiales calling for ‘the truth’

‘HE’S one of our own, he’s one of our own. Jude Bellingham, is… well, actually he’s another expat, settling in well into one of the largest diaspora in Europe, the Brits in Spain. Movie star looks and being the first Englishman to win La Liga’s Player of the Month award - a feat neither David Beckham, Steve McManaman nor Gary Lineker ever achieved - has certainly helped the English midfield maestro feel at home. Indeed, it couldn’t have been a better start for the Brummie, who has become an instant hero in Madrid following his €103 million signing from Borussia Dortmund last month. He has even managed to equal Real legend Cristiano Ronaldo’s explosive start to life in Madrid after netting five goals in his first four games - including his most recent feat: scoring a 95th minute winner against Getafe at the weekend. We will have to wait two weeksafter the international break - when Madrid take on Cham-

public funds, while anyone who dares to expose his alleged conduct is subject to aggressive legal threats - as Hermoso disgracefully, found out herself.

“The list of women and men aggrieved by Rubiales and his insults, bravado, blackmail, threats, espionage and persecution is too long and must stop,” La Liga President Javier Tebas wrote on X (formerly Twitter) after the furore broke.

And the rotten smell of corruption and sleaze has, it turns out, been pervading the halls of the Spanish RFEF in Madrid for years. Indeed, his own uncle, Juan Rubiales, came out

SORDID AND SEEDY ONE OF OUR OWN

from his job at RFEF over accusations of leaking confidential information with the aim of damaging his nephew’s reputation. Juan Rubiales confided that Luis would use a villa on the Granada coast (see Orgy Villa on page 1) to host sordid parties for his closest allies and fellow board members.

Present at these gatherings, he described as ‘orgies’, would be around eight to 10 young women, under the pretence of a ‘work event’, with their pay and all other expenses stuck on the federations tab. “He is a man obsessed with power, obsessed with luxury, obsessed with money, even with women,” he claimed to El Confidencial . “I think this boy needs a programme of social re-education.”

He has a point. While president of the Football Players’ Association (AFE) between 2010 and 2017 he would allegedly ask marketing manager Tamara Ramos what colour underwear she was wearing and tell her to ‘put her knee pads on’. When she informed him in confidence she was pregnant, the first thing he did was to organise a meeting to announce it to the whole office - clearly irked that she would soon take maternity leave.

pions League (CL) debutants Real Sociedad to see if he can break Ronnie’s record. But is he to become a galactico, like Ronaldo, Zidane or Beckham - or a flop like Michael Owen and Eden Hazard?

The first warning signs must come from the awkward spell of the last famous British player who attempted to adapt to life in Spain. Despite winning four Champions League medals, Welshman Gareth Bale became a major figure-of-fun over his lack of Spanish and efforts to integrate after arriving for a world record fee in 2013.

While the former Tottenham forward performed wonders for the merengues (in particularly CL finals), he was not well-liked either in the dressing room or the stands.

Bellingham, the opposite face of Bale

What’s been apparent since Jude landed in Madrid has been his attitude as

much as his football.

Unlike Bale, he has made it clear he is keen to integrate as quickly as possible, which will mean eating at strange hours, getting used to extreme temperatures (cold and boiling) and plenty of late nights.

According to sources he is also insistent on mastering the language, unlike Bale who ‘only spoke in English’.

But then again, he does have a head start: He studied Spanish at school until the age of 13 and apparently has sought the advice of Beckham who stressed the importance of learning the lingo.

From day one, he has been seen joking with everyone, with many of the players sharing pics of themselves with Belli at the gym or just hanging out together.

It is probably fair to say that his previous experience in Germany served as the ideal apprenticeship. While he spoke to the media in English, he was known to

From orgies with ‘eight to 10 young girls’ to using public money to pay for home renovations, the scandalous own goals of football boss Luis Rubiales are raining in, writes Walter Finch

‘Belli’ in Madrid: Instant hero or just another expat struggling to adapt and settle in his new life in Spain? Walt Finch finds out if Jude Bellingham is to be the next Gary Lineker or a flop like Michael Owen

LEGEND: €103m Belli has won over the fans in a month

WITH the holiday season winding down, tourists heading home and the nights drawing in, this can only mean one thing: the kids are back to school.

While most parents and children look forward to the vuelta al cole , and some can’t wait for the school gates to open, it can be a nerve-wracking experience for some families, especially if they’re new to the Spanish system.

Perhaps your primary-age daughter is shy about joining class, or your teen has spent most of the holiday out till 5am and lying in bed and it’s a major jolt to the system.

Many of you will have a child who isn’t fluent at Spanish and is worried about communicating with

Be prepared

AS ‘Back to school’ season is right around the corner, parents all over the country will be fretting about the upcoming school year while their children are glued to their tablets.

To help soothe this arduous season, the Olive Press has created a list of important tasks to tackle to ensure a smooth sailing start to the year.

BUYING UNIFORM/NEW CLOTHES

One very important thing to remember when preparing your child for going back to school is clothing. Even if your school does not require a uniform, children grow very quickly in very short periods of time. New clothes that are adequate for all weather types and that fit your child perfectly are necessary for back-to-school prep.

EQUIPMENT

The list of equipment your child needs will grow exponentially as they get older.

The Olive Press attempts to demystify Back to School 2023, by mother-of-two Jo Chipchase

classmates.

Some students will be changing their school, which can be a life-changing decision. They might be switching from a state school to an international college, or a Montosorri or a Warldorf establishment.

Other students will be repeating an academic year, having failed to pass an exam or two in June, presenting a particular set of challenges for both the kid and parents alike.

Or, perhaps, you’re simply wondering where to obtain this year’s school mate-

Five things to think about before starting school, with Kayleigh Beardsley

Helpfully, schools sometimes send out lists of what you will need, from pencils to protractors. It may also be helpful to ask your child if there is anything they personally would add; not every child is the same, and some may work better with extra or different items.

LUNCH

Lunch is a big part of the school day, and sometimes it is a child's favourite hour. Whether pack-up or school dinner, making sure they have either money or food is essential. For school dinners, it's pretty simple—setting aside some money every day for them. Packed lunches are a little more complicated, but they are great for picky eaters or for you to keep tabs on what your child is eating. Some schools have some strict rules about the contents of the lunchbox, so check in to see if anything is prohibited.

TRAVEL

Whether your child is starting at a new

school and you haven’t decided on the best way to get them there or you need to get them a bus pass, having travel to school sorted is imperative. It’s the first obstacle for your young ones on their first day back and having an easy experience with the bus or already being familiar with their walk will make them feel well prepared for their first day back.

PREP THE UNIFORM

Children may not like having tags in their clothes as it is not ‘cool’ but having your child's name in their uniform can be a game-changer. No more rummaging around in a pile of jumpers left in a pile at school. In addition to adding their names to their clothes, getting them to wear in their shoes is a life saver. The first day of school may be daunting for them anyway, why add uncomfy shoes to the mix? Letting them wear their shoes means no blisters on the first day and one less thing for them to worry about.

Whatever your child’s school circumstances this September the Olive Press sets out to demystify ‘back to school 2023’.

What types of education are available in Spain?

For parents who consider their children to be individual ‘square pegs’, who don’t fit into the ‘round holes’ of state education, based largely on continuous assessment and exams, there are alternative

rials without it costing a small fortune. choices available throughout

Continues on next page

LEARN SPANISH ONLINE

STUDY SPANISH WHEREVER YOU ARE NEW GROUPS FOR ALL LEVELS STARTING IN SEPTEMBER

hola@panlengua.com

www.panlengua.com

Across

1 “Tales from the --woods” (Strauss waltz) (6)

5 Moony (6)

8 Chopped up tree fern is complimentary, property-wise (4-4)

9 Leave out (4)

10 Pond flower (4)

11 Christmas tradition (4,3)

12 Cargo platform (4)

14 Not hers (3)

15 Rotate (4)

17 Stomach-related (7)

19 Salt away (4)

20 Heroic narrative (4)

21 Too much (8)

22 Programme of political violence (6)

23 Inhuman human (6)

Down

2 Climber’s tool (3-4)

3 Bananas (5)

4 Marshal (5)

5 Support for climbers (7)

6 Not much water (7)

7 Not being straight (5)

13 All at sea, aspired to give up (7)

14 Conceal (7)

16 Examines and corrects (7)

17 Brilliant reflection (5)

18 Ships’ companies (5)

19 Got into bed (5)

All solutions are on page 15

Crunching the numbers...

From front

Spain.

There are 7,806 private schools in Spain, with 14,694 In the public sector…so roughly a third of the schools are independent. Among other interesting official stats, with a 97.3% enrolment rate, there isn’t much homeschooling or truancy going on in Spain. Meanwhile 9.9% of Spain’s pupils are foreign, while in Andalucia, 21% are educated outside the state system and in Valencia this rises to 25%, explaining

STATE EDUCATION

PROS

3 Your child will be involved in your local community

3 Their friends will live locally

3 They will quickly be fluent at Spanish / bilingual

3 There’s no need to transport your children to school

3 It is free of charge

CONS

2 Rigid structure based on continuous assessment

2 Difficult for parents who don’t speak Spanish to understand what’s going on

VS

why there are so many internation al schools on the costas, including many with French, British and Amer ican syllabuses.

International schools

In the case of British schools, these offer Cambridge exams and allow pupils to take GCSEs and A-Levels.

Most offer an individualised learning

PRIVATE EDUCATION

PROS

3 Cambridge exams are provided

3 Caters for entry to UK universities

3 International Baccalaureate entry

3 Individualised learning plan

3 Constant contact with parents / partici pation in the learning experience

3 Speak to educators in English

CONS

2 The cost each year

2 Paying for school uniform, that your child must wear

2 Less immersion of your child in their local community

2 Friends might live further away

2 Not much creative learning, in terms of art, drama, etc.

2 It is relatively easy for your child to repeat a year. Re secondary education, the repetition rate is 5.5% for state institutions combined to 1.4% for independent.

Learning the language

IT is September once again, and that means back to school for everyone - including the Costa de Valencia Spanish language school in the regional capital.

The beginning of the academic year also marks the start of our long-term extensive courses, our intensive Spanish language courses and, above all, the preparatory courses for the Spanish university access test for foreign students, known as UNEDasiss, PCE or EBAU.

The Costa de Valencia school of Spanish has obtained the official accreditation from the Instituto Cervantes, which guarantees compliance with its quality standards for teaching the Spanish language. We are also a registered Examination Centre for DELE Spanish diplomas, the CCSE and the SIELE certificates, so our students can obtain an official title certifying their knowledge of the Spanish language at our facilities.

CCSE and DELE A2 exams are a requirement for the acquisition for the Spanish citizenship.

On our website, www.costadevalencia.com, you can find information about Valencia, our school, the courses we offer and the socio-cultural activ-

Costa Valencia is the top-rated language school in Valencia

ities we organize.

Intensive 20 Course

Our Intensive 20 Course is aimed at students who need to improve their Spanish in a relatively short period of time.

In this course we work on all the skills (oral and written expression, reading and listening comprehension), giving special importance to communication, which right from the first day is carried out in Spanish.

It includes 20 classes per week (1 class = 50 minutes) in very small groups of 4 - 8 students maximum, plus socio-cultural modules.

Face-to-face courses start every week, and at all levels.

Extensive Spanish Courses

In 2023/2024, we offer two different types of long-term extensive courses:

Our Extensive Course 4+6 for Au pairs, Erasmus exchange students and other residents in Spain and anyone else who wishes to apply, taking place from the beginning of September to the end of June. And our Extensive Course 10+6; this course is also useful for the extension of the student visa These courses provide students with the opportunity to learn Spanish or improve their knowledge while combining classes with other daily activities (classes, work, childcare, etc.), as lessons take place in twice-weekly and four- times weekly sessions from 10.00 am to 11.40 am.

To meet the needs of all our students, we offer four and two levels according to the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (A1-A2-B1-B2). The courses are structured in such a way that students progress gradually through these levels, and the price depends on the number of months booked by the student.

Official Spanish exams preparation courses

We offer different exams preparation courses for DELE (Diplomas in Spanish as a Foreign Language), SIELE (International Service for the Evaluation of the Spanish Language), CCSE (Constitutional and socio-cultural knowledge of Spain) and preparation of Spanish Exams (Abitur, Matura, etc.)

Spanish university access

Our preparatory course for the Spanish university access test for foreigners (UNEDasiss, PCE or EBAU) is aimed at helping students pass the entrance exams for Spanish universities by focusing on four subjects, on which students will be assessed in their access test.

Depending on the type of university degree chosen by the applicant, students must select certain specific subjects for the entrance test:

Subject 1: Spanish language and text analysis (all applicants)

Subject 2: English or French (all applicants)

Subject 3: Mathematics II or Applied mathematics for social sciences (Baccalaureate subject)

For full information on these and all the other courses and activities on offer at the Costa de Valencia, please visit www.costadevalencia.com (available in English, Spanish, French, German and Italian), email info@ costadevalencia.com, or telephone (0034) 963 610 367.

2 Child is less likely to be fluent at Spanish

2 The need to transport children to school – possibly at a geographic dis- tance

2 The school holidays do not match Spanish holidays

Subject 4: Choice of subject relating to the degree

For example, if a student wishes to apply for a degree course in medicine, subjects 3 and 4 must be Mathematics II and Biology, respectively. Our UNEDasiss course begins in October and runs until the end of May, timed to coincide with the date of the official exams.

To ensure that students have no problems requesting a visa, the school will provide a certificate. Once here in Valencia, we will help the student with the process to validate their baccalaureate diploma with the Ministry of Education. For full information on UNEDasiss, visit http:// unedasiss.uned.es

At the Costa de Valencia, Spanish language school we take your health and safety very seriously. We are pleased to have obtained the SICTED certificate of Advanced Good Practice for the reduction of the risk of contagion of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus and the Certificate ELE Safe School to COVID-19, by FEDELE.

Every

plan, which wouldn’t be available in state schools and they are likely to have excellent purpose-built facilities.

They communicate with parents in their native language, making parent-teacher meetings a breeze.

International schools also provide a convenient pathway to enter the UK university system seamlessly.

They are a popular choice with parents who come to Spain for contract work, or a limited time only, and don’t plan to remain here – although this sort of working life has decreased with Brexit.

Parents can expect to pay from €10,000 to €35,000 per year, depending on whether the child boards at the school.

Parents will also have to buy uniforms and other extras for their children.

Montessori

Spain has various Montessori schools, with most big cities offering at least one.

Developed in the early 20th century by Italian physician, Maria Montessori, and based on scientific experimentation, the emphasis is on developing natural interests and activities, and on hands-on learning and real-life skills, rather than using formal teaching methods.

OPPORTUNITY: International schools provide a pathway to UK universities

The idea is to encourage independence by supporting children to learn in a well-prepared environment and it discourages grades and tests.

Popular elements of this system include mixed-age classrooms, freedom of students to choose their own ac tivities, uninterrupted work time, and special ly-trained teachers. The cost can be from around €200 per month.

The Waldorf / Steiner system

Spain has over 70

Spanish Language Courses

Every Monday, all year round, all levels, small groups

Parent and kids/Teen courses

4-6, 7-11, 12-15 years

Spanish Citizenship DELE + CCSE

Preparation DELE A1-C2

Examination center, Preparation and registration

UNEDasiss/PCE

Preparation course for University Accessing Exam for Foreign students (Non EU)

READY FOR THE FUTURE

IT may be high summer, but Shackleton International School is preparing to put its first intake of Year 9 students through the IGCSEs.

It is an exciting time for the school, which has been steadily expanding its facilities continuously to ensure it is ready to support pupils through their new academic challenges.

In fact, over the past few years Shackleton has grown significantly from an initial 110 students up to the age of 11 to 436 aged up to 14 for the 2023/2024 academic year.

As the number of pupils quadrupled, the school’s facilities have had to be extended too.

A second school building has been unveiled that is connected to the original facilities.

The extension includes more classrooms and multipurpose spaces that will be used for numerous activities,including new science labs,

Shackleton International School prepared to guide new Year 9 pupils through their next academic challenge

cooking classes, more sports areas, amongst other experiences.

A recording studio for the students to experiment with photography and videography as well as learning about light property uses in both disciplines is also part of the facilities available.

There is also the existing STEAM area for the study of Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Maths as well as a radio room where they can learn how to record and edit podcasts.

Children will also be able to enjoy a delicious meal as a brand new kitchen is included in the recent extension.

Parents may also join for mealtimes - providing they pay a small charge and notify the school at least a day in advance.

The quality and high standards set by the school have

seen demand for places grow amongst the foreign community, with 56% of students now coming from expat families, and with 44% Spanish.

They are attracted not just by the high standards, but also by the ethos behind the school.

It was named in honour of the celebrated explorer, Ernest Shackleton, who with a combination of integrity, leadership and determination is viewed as a historical role model.

The school philosophy is about inspiring youngsters with confidence through encouraging creative thinking and talent; speaking modern languages besides Spanish, and using the latest teaching methods based on the British education system.

Shackleton continues to position itself as a reference school in the region, providing a quality education using the latest technology in education to create citizens who are critical thinkers, adaptable and ready to succeed in the changing world in which we live.

For more information about the Burjassot-based School, visit their website at www.shackletonschool.com or Facebook page, Shackleton International School.

The new building includes laboratories and multi-purpose spaces

27 nationalities participated in the school’s International Fair (left) and (above) the new dining hall

EDUCATION: The right school means happy kids Continues on next page

STATE VERSUS INDEPENDENT A parent’s view

JENNI STEPHANIDES of Sevilla is both a par ent and teacher, with one daughter attend ing a state school, while the other is at the international school where she teaches.

“Both girls started at the international school, as my husband and I work there. We were offered free places, which ensured the girls could continue their education in the British system, in case we decided to move back to the UK.

“But after three years, my eldest daughter was moved up a school year. Because of her birthday, she had been placed into the correct ac ademic year for the UK, but not for Spain – this was holding her back educationally.

“My youngest meanwhile was placed into the correct academic year.

“When we decided to stay in Spain, we gave both girls the choice to move to the Spanish system to integrate more with the local community. Both declined at the time.

“My eldest is about to start her final year and intends to attend univer sity in the UK. However, my youngest moved to the Spanish system last year and thrived immediately.

Friends

“In the international school, she had many friends from around the world, but the Spanish girls didn’t include her, and she wasn’t confident speaking Spanish.

“Now, she is fluent in Spanish, has achieved fantastic grades in her first year in the public system, and has many friends from the state system.

My eldest stands by her decision to stay at the independent school.”

Peter Jones is the opposite. Both his children started their education in inland Valencia province at a state school from a young age and enjoyed it and thrived.

But as they entered their teens Jones, a businessman who spends his time travelling around Europe, agreed with his wife and their children that they should try out a private school on the Costa Blanca coast. The family felt that they would get more chances to excel in arts and music and, above all, meet a more international group of children, who would in turn ‘broaden their horizons’.

“It has definitely worked and they are both loving it, with the eldest taking her A-levels and planning a good university in the UK, while our younger daughter will probably do the international baccalaureate and go to university in Holland or Germany.”

He continued: “While it meant coming up with around €2,000 more a month, it has definitely paid off. They are completely bilingual and still friends with their old local pals, who, of course, are all planning universities, if at all, in Spain.”

From previous page

Waldorf, or Steiner schools. Dating back to 1919 in Germany, they are based on the educational philosophy of Rudolf Steiner.

It is one of the world’s largest independent school groups and the educational style is holistic and is intended to develop the pupils’ intellectual, artistic and practical skills, as well as their imagination and creativity. Under this system, teachers play a significant role in defining the curriculum and classroom methods. Assessments are integrated into the daily classroom

activities and formal testing is limited to the actual requirements for students to enter post-secondary education, and

not the continuous, formal assessment that occurs in a state school. Fees are from around €200 per month.

CHOICE: There are several systems for your kids to go through

By Laurence Dollimore

THE unpretentious tourist resort of Motril, on Granada’s Costa Tropical, should have been enjoying the last few days of summer last week.

Instead, it found itself at the centre of a global media frenzy over a story that wouldn’t look out of place in a Pedro Almodovar film.

The protagonist was the 72-year-old mother of ousted football boss Luis Rubiales, who had locked herself inside the Divina Pastora church, declaring a hunger strike over the ‘mistreatment’ of her ‘honourable’ son.

Angeles Bejar insisted he had done nothing wrong by kissing Jenni Hermoso and she was passing the hours of her self-confinement ‘crying and praying’.

Within hours, dozens of camera crews and journalists from Spain, Portugal and the UK had camped outside - including the Olive Press.

We were expecting a huge backlash and, indeed, we heard that a counter-protest would be arriving, but it soon transpired to be the total opposite.

While thousands of Jenni supporters had gathered in Madrid, there was no chance of Motril turning on their ‘son’, the local boy who had ‘made it big’.

for the PSOE socialist party at the Junta.

Indeed, he had risen to the very top as the Employment Delegate for Granada and, almost inev-

HUNGER:

Angeles on strike in local church

itably, we discovered got sucked into the huge ERE scandal.

It emerges he is still facing trial for his part in the biggest corruption case in Spanish history that during a decade alone saw €680 million stolen from public coffers.

An inconvenient truth brushed under the carpet by local supporters

And we quickly discovered why: Luis was born into privilege as the son of Manuel Rubiales, the mayor of Motril for over a decade.

And therein lay the crux - indeed probably the exact reasons why poor little Luis thought he could get away with anything.

For daddy had not only run the town like his fiefdom, as most mayors invariably do in Andalucia, but he had gone on to become a senior bigwig

He is facing three years in prison for using public money from Brussels, via Madrid, to help stimulate employment and help ailing companies.

But that’s ancient history here in old school Andalucia - an inconvenient truth brushed under the carpet by locals who are still suspicious of the central government.

Indeed the onslaught of national - and international - criticism against Luis only served to provoke a rally-round-the-flag effect in Motril.

Dozens of residents showed up to voice their support for Rubiales and his mother, decrying the ‘extreme feminism’ they claim is ‘sweeping across Spain.’

This fervent support laid bare the fractures caused by Spain’s ongoing culture wars, symbolised by the rise of Vox, which calls to redefine domestic violence as ‘intrafamilial violence’, claiming male victims are too often ignored.

Gender-based violence is a key issue for far-right Vox and shows the country has a long way to go to shake off the ‘machismo’ attitudes that still run rife in southern Spain.

Motril is no exception, with women and men of all ages blasting the ‘witch hunt’ of Rubiales.

“Men do much worse in the streets everyday and never get punished,” one local told the Olive Press, adding: “The justice system in Spain is broken.”

While the dust has seemingly settled on Motril, for now, the issue of women’s rights is far from over in Spain.

After the meeting he allegedly made the vulgar comment that she should have ‘got f***ed from behind instead’. He has insisted the claims are false and announced ‘legal proceedings’. Almost as sinister are the allegations he used

GALACTICO: Belli slots the 95th minute winner home against Getafe

speak halting German among his teammates. An atypical football player

Bellingham decided at a very young age to bravely take the step to try a new country and quickly adapted to life in Germany, having landed in Dortmund at just 17.

However, the difference between England and Germany is not as great as with Spain

Fortunately the powers that be at Real believe he can adapt to life in the capital, although inevitably there are still some niggling ‘fears’ that he will find the pressure too much.

For now, the backroom staff at Real - not to mention his entourage of staff and family - are working around the clock to ensure one of the great talents of world football stays wrapped in cotton wool off the pitch. And on the pitch - fingers crossed unless you are a Barca or Athletico fan - we are looking at a cross between Zidane, Ronaldo and all-time legend Emilio Butragueño.

€120,000 of AFE funds to pay for a renovation to his house, not to mention suspicious trips to New York with female colleagues.

Architect Yasmina Eid-Mached claimed he told her to ‘send the costs’ of his sumptuous Madrid villa to the union.

She also alleged that during a later argument, he subsequently pushed her aggressively and grabbed her arm, leaving her with injuries to her wrist and ribs.

This apparent attitude towards women continued after he won election to become the president of the RFEF in 2017.

It was most publicly noticeable in his rock-solid support for divisive and unpopular women’s coach Jorge Vilda (who eventually managed the team to its World Cup victory).

Come late 2021, three senior players of the women’s team, Alexia Putellas, Patri Guijarro and Irene Paredes, wrote an email to the RFEF complaining about Vilda and the federation itself.

Among various complaints was their anger that Vilda refused to let the players lock their hotel room doors and search their bags while on national duty.

Rubiales and the RFEF then made a public statement lambasting the criticism and threatening the players with a five-year ban from the national team.

They implied the players were blackmailing them by ‘applying pressure to the federation’.

Many of the players had simply had enough, and on September 23, 2022, 15 players posted an open letter to the federation.

This resulted in all the players being banned ‘until they apologised’. Only three did in the end.

Now they are joined by the rest of the squadsome 56 in total - who have announced they will not play again for Spain while ‘the current management’ remains at the RFEF.

It is hard to disagree with them.

After Rubiales mum brought her own protest to a rapid end after just three days, she would do well to put herself in the boots of those four and a half dozen players… and the thoughts of 99.9% of the Spanish female population.

My poor little boy… the son of a political ‘fraudster’!

FATHER AND SON: The Rubiales

TURTLEY AWESOME!

SOME 57 loggerhead sea turtles have hatched on the Arenales del Sol beach in Elche despite torrential rains that lashed the coast on Sunday. It was a special moment for the 100 volunteers who had guarded the nest since July 15.

As the storm threatened to swamp the beach they even built a sand dyke to successfully protect the nest from the waves.

As soon as the eggs hatched, some of the volunteers placed the hatchlings in a safe place until the waves had subsided enough to release the baby turtles into the sea.

Wolves out

THE EU is having doubts about the viability of a project tackling the recovery of the wolf population in Europe. The institution is now considering how ‘dangerous’ the species can be for humans and other animals.

“The number of wolf packs in some European regions is becoming a real danger,” Ursula Von der Leyen, President of the European Commission, said. She added that the commission is having talks with scientists and environmental experts to implement ‘measures’ to tackle the issue. The talks come a month after wolves were declared extinct in Andalucia, however, they are still present in other areas of Spain.

Fire cost

AUTHORITIES in Tenerife are estimating that the forest fire that broke out on the Canary Island on August 15, and which razed 15,000 hectares of land, has caused €80 million worth of damage.

The fire is still burning three weeks later, but is reported to be stable. The blaze has so far affected a perimeter of 90 kilometres across a total of 12 municipalities, with 13,000 people evacuated. Most of these have since returned home.

The island’s premier Rosa Davila gave the damage estimate, and added that the local government is likely to declare the island a ‘disaster area’.

Calling the blaze ‘the biggest seen in the Canary Islands in the last 40 years’, Davila added that the impact would be severe for those working in agriculture and livestock farming. She also used the opportunity

Damage worth €80m of devastating fire on Tenerife

By Simon Hunter

to call for a ‘permanent base for firefighting planes’ to be built on the island.

“After three years suffering terrible fires all over the Canaries and after the fire that the island of Tenerife has suffered, I don’t think there is any question that the Canary Islands need a permanent base for firefighting planes,” she said.

Elsewhere, firefighters have been tackling devastating blazes in Greece, Italy and Portugal, driven by searing temperatures that scientists have linked to climate change.

Human seafood

WARM sea temperatures have encouraged small fish to take a bite out of Costa Blanca bathers.

Around 15 people a day have been treated on Benidorm’s Poniente beach for bites caused by small grey fish - oblada melanura - also known as saddled seabream.

They target bathers with small cuts, moles or warts, particularly prevalent among older people.

In the worst cases they draw blood and leave teeth marks, while swimmers with jewellery appear to be attracting attention.

While not life-threatening, the nibbles still come as a nasty shock to swimmers.

According to scientists the behaviour is caused as sea temperatures reach 30 degrees making the fish hungrier.

“With warmer seas, the metabolism of fish grows and they need more food,” said Professor Alfonso Ramos, of Alicante University's Laboratory of Climatology.

The saddled seabream is an aggressive species, well known to people visiting Tabarca island, off Santa Pola, where tourists feed them.

Numerous species from traditionally warmer areas like the Red Sea are coming through the Suez Canal and are discovering the delights of the Mediterranean, added Prof. Ramos.

NOT ALL EMISSIONS CAN BE REDUCED TO ZERO

By Martin Tye

Industrial processes will always produce emissions.

These gases increase global temperatures by trapping the sun’s energy.

WHERE DOES 2050 COME FROM ?

Now politics come into play.

Back in 2015, some 197 countries agreed to try to limit global temperature increases to 1.5C by 2100. We have failed to do this. For this to happen, scientists calculated that we would need to reach net zero emissions by 2050.

As with most political endeavours talk is cheap, and making long term promises just kicks the problem down the road.

Individuals can do their bit – reduce travel, install solar panels, switch to electric vehicles, eat less red meat etc, but real changes need to come from the world’s governments. In the main, governments continue to over promise and under deliver.

Ambitious rhetoric lacks the extra investment needed and the new policies that need implementing are left in limbo.

To negate this we have to offset these emissions by actively removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.

Planting trees is a natural method…but rapid world deforestation still continues. Fewer trees absorb less CO2.

The world’s largest polluters do not have a cohesive, effective, plan.

China says it aims for carbon neutrality by 2060. The US still emits more carbon per head than China. The EU still talks about 2050, but is failing miserably.

India, a huge emitter, has pledged net zero by 2070 but has published very little by way of policy to make you believe this is possible.

India is more intent on its massive space programme investment.

Russia has claimed 2060 as a target date. But nobody believes much that comes out of the Kremlin. Meanwhile we witness increasing climate devastation around the world.

It’s ironic that the world’s biggest polluters are suffering the most.

DYKE: Volunteers dug in to save the nest

FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL

WINE TIME

THE simplicity of late-summer eating, the sensuousness of it and the concentrated taste of produce at a pitch of ripeness: figs, nectarines, melon, pears. The balm of an ice-cold salmorejo, silky with oil and piquant with garlic. Yellow figs, intensely sweet, with thin slices of ham. A Russian salad made with cooked carrots and peas, potatoes and a little onion and a boiled egg, all of it diced and bound together with homemade mayonnaise.

Hunger comes at odd times of the day and night. I’ve taken to eating at five in the afternoon and sleeping until eight. For lunch today, my summer staple: linguine with a raw tomato sauce. For midnight supper a thin fillet of our own pork, a scatter of oregano, pepper and salt sizzled on the griddle and sliced

Figs,

in baffling

into strips.

Just beside the stove stands a bowl with the remains of the grated raw tomato from lunch, ready seasoned with fresh basil and olive oil, so I slide the red slick on to the hot pan, push it around a bit, et voilà, an instant sauce for my pork steak.

Struggling to eat the fruit that now arrives in baffling quantities. Pears that are green and hard and

then turn yellow, aromatic and juicy. (I’ve taken to drying them in slices out in the sun, on the chicken-wire rack we use for sun-drying tomatoes.) Strawberries, smaller and smaller as the season progresses but more and more strongly perfumed, to the point that a cloud of strawberry smell bursts out from the fridge when you open the door. Japanese nashi, shaped like apples but tasting more like pears, with a pellucid crispness to their pearly flesh. Small yellow peaches, good to eat but even better peeled, sliced and bottled in syrup for the winter. Cantaloupe melons, the round ones with the orange flesh, gloriously perfumed, the best of all possible breakfast foods. The pig gets all the peelings and pips. Meanwhile the fire has retreated from the forefront of my consciousness. This morning on my early rounds I catch myself thinking: How can a landscape be so ravaged, so damaged, and still retain its loveliness? Yet it does. The surface may be temporarily scarred, but the lie of the land, its shape, its soul, can’t be touched. As the sun came up I walked out of the house and away to the edge of the forest. From here there was a view that filled up my senses always, the

PICKING: The grapes were plentiful but noone knew the variety

land falling away towards the stream, the valley holding the village clustered around the church as if in cupped hands, and sometimes a big horizontal brushstroke of snow tinted rose-pink on the distant peaks. All around me lay the vineyard. A faint dew had fallen overnight, moistening the leaves. Trailing fronds of grapevine reached out to touch each other, their leaves having lost their sprightly greenness and begun to turn brownish yellow and redden around the edg-

es, as if the lifeforce was now being diverted away from the plant itself and into the swelling fruit. I liked the way the vines surrounded the house, hugging it protectively, gently bobbing like a lake of green. At any time of year they were worthy of my attention. The black, wrinkled stumps standing mute and unflinching in a winter downpour had an air of something mineral rather than vegetable, as if carved out of black volcanic basalt. In April the buds burst into delicate

pears and melons

quantities… And - finally - the grapes swelled and were ready to pick for wine. Their variety, no one could tell me, writes Paul Richardson of life in September in his new book, Hidden Valley

One vine was a lonely thing, but a large number of them were magical

FATTENED UP: The pig gets all the peelings and pips

FOOD,DRINK & TRAVEL

shoots, which unfurled into tiny leaves and grew tiny clusters of green pinheads: embryo grapes. One vine on its own was a lonely thing, but a large number of them was a magical collective entity, sprouting and fruiting as one, branches moving in the breeze like a single organism.

Baudilio, the old man who had worked this land for half a century, once told me his father had first

laid out the vineyard nearly a century ago, planting it with vine cuttings brought from an important winemaking region far from here where he regularly worked the grape harvest.

Baudilio had more vineyards around the village and a bar in the main street serve glasses of his strong, pungent white wine.

A new season

LATE SEPTEMBER: Practically its own season. Bright, fresh days with the memory of water – the downpours of last week, which stopped summer dead in its tracks – still present in corners of the land where the sun seldom reaches, still damp, the soil still dark after rain.

How the grass revives, brave little blades of a vivacious green pushing up and out, stippling the ground like a computer-generated colouring-in.

In springtime he ploughed between the rows with a plough drawn by the family mule, which lived in the hut that would eventually become my bedroom. What no one could tell me, not even he, were the grape varieties. In the old days nobody much worried about such things; varietal identity is a modern obsession. There was white and there was red, and these were mostly white, with an occasional red one popping up randomly in the midst of them. The wines we had tasted in the village bars were white, but strong and sometimes slightly oxidised or sherry-ish, and surprisingly pallid in colour.

They were fermented and stored in big-bellied clay urns or vats, which made the cellars of village houses look like a set for Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves The vats were treated inside with a resin derived from pine sap to seal and disinfect the clay, which often gave the wines a hint of the balsamic piney taste you find, much more prominently, in Greek retsina.

There’s a pleasant mental confusion about walking out in the early morning and seeing these tender shoots, feeling the humid air on your face.

The sheep are energised, running this way and that, hardly able to believe these pastures new, this deliciousness right under their muzzles.

The maize hangs in long rows, the dry cobs tied into pairs – a job that has us channelling crabbed old Galician grandmothers as we sit on wooden stools out on the porch. We tear off the dry outer sheaths leaving just enough on either side to twist and tie, shooting the breeze all

PRODUCE: Everything from the maize to olives and fruit gets conserved and potted

the while.

This year’s colours in the cobs’ mosaic patterns are a pastel pink, a drop-dead coral red, dark elegant grey and a dun green that’s almost khaki. As we twist and tie we speculate and joke about the randomness or otherwise of the cobs’ intricate patterning: a message from an alien culture? Some kind of heavenly barcode? Or simply nature in all her meticulous unfathomable beauty?

Insearch of setas

IN the damp afternoon after a rain shower I go to the woods to walk, and also to forage for wild fungi.

PERFECTLY RIPE: Succulent peaches and tasty peppers

OP Puzzle solutions

Quick Crossword

Across: 1 Vienna, 5 Tiddly, 8 Rent-free, 9 Omit, 10 Lily, 11 Yule log, 12 Skid, 14 His, 15 Turn, 17 Gastric, 19 Save, 20 Saga, 21 Overdose, 22 Terror, 23 Sadist.

Down: 2 Ice-pick, 3 Nutty, 4 Array, 5 Trellis, 6 Droplet, 7 Lying, 13 Despair, 14 Harbour, 16 Revises, 17 Glare, 18 Crews, 19 Sided.

The idea was appealing to me: I imagined a link, over huge distances of time and space, between the amphoras of Attica and the clay vats of this village in twenty-first-century Spain.

Mushrooming is a subtle and mysterious art. The mental attitude required is a via negativa, a not-wanting-too-much, a not-look ing-too-hard. Synoptic vision, casting your whole eye over an expanse of ground, ready to pick up the signals, the curve of the cap, the colour a shade or two away from the sur rounding variants of brown, a fun gal aroma your nose detects.

When you see one there’s a tiny charge of pleasure in the brain, like the dopamine hit a new email in your inbox is meant to produce.

It’s a knowing before you even know; a prescience. Or perhaps a reverse déjà vu: you imagine you knew it was there, how could it not have been? The tell-tale way the mushroom has pushed up the leaf lay- er then again, you’ve poked carefully with a stick or your foot at dozens of such tell-tale liftings and found nothing underneath but a tussock of grass

that has pushed through a wodge of dry leaves and raised it slightly, and even as you did so something told you it was a waste of time, so there’s hardly a cast-iron logic there. Yet this time it’s textbook. The hard, round cap the russet brown of a Hovis loaf; the thick bulbous stem white as marble. When your fin- gers reach around that cool, dry pillar, that’s when you know you’ve found your perfect letus edulis. That’s the first satisfaction. The second comes soon after, bundled up with the first. I like them best baked with potato and garlic, with but- tered eggs, a rich tumnal rice with rabbit and pumpkin, and raw in carpaccio-thin slic- es dribbled with olive oil and scattered with

Tonight Nacho makes a salad in the scat- tergun inventive manner of his cooking, and it’s a palpable hit. Peppery rocket and carrot julienne and crisp sweet apple and shavings of raw cep, which imbue the dish with their insinuating perfume; a memory of damp leaf mulch; a whisper from the woods.

O P LIVE RESS The

Late for lunch

A HELICOPTER pilot from Spain’s DGT traffic authority crashed while trying to make a lunch stop a restaurant in Almeria.

Battle ready

A FIVE-DAY course for people wanting to go and fight in Ukraine against Russian forces is being offered by a company in Catalunya’s Lleida for €700.

In vane?

MALAGA’S iconic Caminito del Rey will install a weather station provided by Spain’s Met Office AEMET to display more accurate weather data after it was closed several times for feared high winds that never materialised.

Get on the horn!

MASON MOVES

Greenwood, 21, is granted luxury villa near his new training ground in Madrid

HE is the controversial ‘other’ British footballer who has moved to Madrid this season. Manchester United star Mason Greenwood was unveiled as the new loan signing of La Liga team Getafe this week (just a month after Jude Bellingham at Real Madrid).

In a shock transfer the 21-yearold is moving to Madrid with his girlfriend Harriet Robson, with whom he has a baby son. He has been granted a €10,000-per-month rental allowance to find a villa ‘near to his training ground’ after Manchester United agreed a loan deal.

It comes after charges of attempted rape, assault and controlling and coercive behaviour against him were dropped at the start of this year.

The Olive Press understands he is looking at a number of upmarket barrios to live.

By Laurence Dollimore

They include the exclusive neighbourhood of La Finca, which is just a 20-minute drive from Getafe and has played host to some of the game’s biggest stars, including David Beckham, Cristiano Ronaldo and Gareth Bale.

Safe

Described as a ‘footballer’s paradise’ Spain internationals Fernando Torres and Sergio Ramos are among the current residents in LaFinca, where properties sell for around €15 million and can cost up to €20,000 per month to rent.

A private security firm has agents patrolling its tree-lined streets, while guards are stationed at the entrance 24/7. It has three perimeter fenc-

es to keep out any potential intruders, while scores of security cameras have every corner covered.

It is deemed so safe that many of the homeowners reportedly don’t even bother installing an alarm system.

A spokeswoman from estate agency Promora told the Olive Press: “He will most likely live in either La Finca or La Morajela. Both are a footballer’s paradise because they are very green with wide avenues and

great 24-hour security.

“They have everything with their own shops, supermarkets and cinemas etc, meaning they don’t ever have to leave.”

Getafe hailed their new signing on social media on Monday, posting a video, ‘The MasonMania’, showing fans queuing up for pictures with him. They have already received criticism online from a number of fans unhappy with the signing, one saying they had ‘zero shame’.

A GROUP of bulls managed to successfully block the A3 motorway near Valencia. They managed to escape from their truck after it tipped over. The incident caused tailbacks of two kilometres.

RECORD RIND

A SPANISH cheese has become the most expensive ever sold. The 2.2-kilo fromage, from Cabrales, in Asturias, sold for a record €30,000.

Artisan Ivan Suarez smashed his previous Guinness World Record of €20,500 paid in 2019. Made from cow, goat and sheep milk, it undertakes a ten-month maturation process in a cave 1,400 metres up in the soaring Picos de Europa. Suarez has won the award at the Cabrales Cheese Contest for four years in a row.

"It's my passion for my local area and its cheesemakers that fuels my competitive streak," he insisted.

NEW LIFE: Greenwood hopes for fresh start