Club thriving with only ‘local’ players, DC’s Pogba discovery rights, Champions League preview

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Hello! Can you pick a squad of regional players but still have global success?

On the way:

Local lads: Why Athletic Club have a ‘Basque-only’ rule

Imagine your neighbourhood team reaching the semi-finals of one of Europe’s top club competitions. Kids from round the corner, competing together against the elite. Sounds like a movie.

That’s exactly what happens at Athletic Club, a Spanish side based in the city of Bilbao, who have maintained a strict ‘Basque-only’ policy for more than 100 years.

As Tomas Hill Lopez-Menchero explains, the Basque Country is a historic region of just 3.1million people — around the size of Wales, or Arkansas — which spans the northern end of the Spanish-French border. It has its own language, Euskara, and a distinctive culture and history.

Romantically, the story goes that Athletic were stripped of the Copa del Rey in 1911 for fielding ineligible foreign players. They reacted by never picking another player from outside the Basque Country again.

Athletic players must now have either come through their own academy, have been born in the Basque Country, or graduate from the academy of other Basque clubs.

Do any other clubs do it?

Not really. Athletic’s rivals, Real Sociedad, held a similar policy for almost 30 years, but they broke it by signing the decidedly un-Basque John Aldridge from Liverpool in 1989.

Liga MX team Chivas have a ‘Mexican-only’ policy, while Ecuadorian club El Nacional also only use players from their own country — but those are nations with populations of 130million and 18million.

Athletic take on Manchester United in the Europa League semi-finals on Thursday, a club who themselves have a proud history of academy graduates — they have named a homegrown player in every squad for over 85 years. Nottingham Forest have a similar record.

Both English clubs have struggled to keep up this run in an increasingly globalised football landscape, keeping the streak alive by promoting teenagers who might not have otherwise featured in first-team squads.

Is it working?

Absolutely. With 36 trophies, Athletic are Spain’s third-most successful club, trailing only Real Madrid and Barcelona. Alongside those two, Athletic are the only other club in Spain to have never played outside the top flight.

In recent years, they have developed outstanding players, including Spain internationals Nico Williams, Aymeric Laporte and Unai Simon. Williams remains at the club as Athletic’s outstanding player.

This season, the club are fourth in La Liga and appear set for Champions League qualification.

“The philosophy gives you more,” former Athletic goalkeeper Andoni Zubizarreta told The Athletic in 2023. “When you’re different in a market where everyone does the same, your shirt is surely worth more money, your broadcasts are worth more money, your fans invest more in that merchandise because you’re unique.”

And, well, they must also save money on international scouting.

News round-up

X/@sporttv

• Going to the Arsenal game in London tonight? Mikel Arteta wants you to bring your boots. “Let’s play every ball together,” he says. (OK then… but my corners won’t beat the first man.)

• Pep Guardiola might get a different reaction if he asks Manchester City fans to do the same — they have written an open letter asking him to intervene with the club’s CEO, Ferran Soriano, over ticket prices.

• Marcus Rashford had shown flashes of his best form after being loaned from Manchester United to Aston Villa… but the forward will now miss the rest of the season with a hamstring injury.

Champions League Corner: Tackling the big issues… and big players

We have football’s Final Four. The Champions League semi-finals start tonight with Arsenal hosting Paris Saint-Germain, before Inter travel to Barcelona on Wednesday.

PSG midfielder Joao Neves will have an important role to play tonight: the cherubic 20-year-old is the top tackler in the competition with 45, more than any other player in the last eight seasons.

“The less time they have to breathe, the better for us!” he tells The Athletic in our exclusive interview.

Not that Neves needs tips, but former Germany and Bayern Munich captain Philipp Lahm has been explaining how he would defend the Champions League’s elite wingers: pressure Michael Olise, push Vinicius Jr wide, cut off Bukayo Saka’s supply. He has some pedigree; the precision needed to defend Lionel Messi sounds terrifying.

These are four elite semi-finalists — with four leagues represented — and The Athletic’s writers have been bickering over a combined XI. Give me Jack Lang’s (below). I’d frame that midfield in my living room.

📺 Catch the match: Champions League semi-final first leg: Arsenal vs Paris Saint-Germain, 3pm ET/8pm UK — CBS, Paramount+, Fubo/Amazon Prime.

📲 Our live blog for Arsenal vs PSG is already up and running, too

Nuclear devastation: Chernobyl and the game that was never played

(Richard Sutcliffe/The Athletic; design: Eamonn Dalton)

Saturday marked 39 years since the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster, the repercussions of which killed thousands. Pripyat — previous population 50,000 — was left a ghost town.

The Athletic’s Richard Sutcliffe visited the town’s abandoned stadium, an eerie concrete monolith now lined by tall trees. Floodlights, seating, and even turnstiles still remain.

This was due to be the home of FC Stroitel Pripyat, a club in the fourth tier of Soviet football who initially selected its players from builders helping to construct the nearby power station. By 1986, they were a club on the up, winning three consecutive Kyiv regional championships, investing heavily in their stadium, and facing a regional cup semi-final against Mashinostroitel Borodyanka.

The tie would never be played. The stadium would never be used. That Saturday morning, during a routine safety test, reactor four at Chernobyl exploded.

Around TAFC

(Instagram/darwin_n9; Getty Images)

• Liverpool have won their first Premier League title in front of fans for 35 years — the party was always going to leave some sore heads. It featured cigars, Dire Straits, and a 3am finish…

• There’s only so much celebrating to be done, though. Next season is less than four months away. Who are the early favourites? I went for Arsenal — but, even though it’s far too early to make them, here’s everyone’s predictions.

• FPL: How did you emerge from the double-gameweek? Abdul Rehman has his tips for the run-in, and it’s time to get rid of Cole Palmer.

• Most clicked: How Liverpool won the Premier League, featuring coffee club and one big outburst.
• As well as looking ahead to the Champions League last four, the Totally Football Show also tries to explain what has happened to Inter after a third defeat in a week dealt a huge blow to their Serie A hopes. Listen on Apple or Spotify.

And finally…

With the season winding down, some teams are already ‘on the beach’: checked out mentally, going through the motions, and anticipating the summer ahead. Conor O’Neill took on the brave job of defining what it means. He flicked through paper maps to find each stadium’s proximity to the nearest beach, before calculating whose form historically cratered in the season’s waning days.

Which club is already dipping their toes in the water? Ipswich Town, barely a goal kick from Felixstowe Beach and dreadful at the end of the season.

And one final quiz question (and it’s not even a Friday, you lucky things):  which EFL club is furthest away from a beach?

That would be Coventry City — no sandcastles for Frank Lampard in their push for the Championship play-offs.

(Top photo: Athletic Bilbao’s Oihan Sancet celebrates with Yerai Alvarez. Credit: Ander Gillenea/AFP via Getty Images)

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