During the aurresku of honor, before El Juli paraded all his glories, blood and silent defeats of the 50 afternoons and 25 years in this his talisman square of Bilbao. Four large doors and 31 ears they looked at him from an impressive curriculum carved from his presentation at the age of 16, back in the General Bullfights of 1999, when he fell on his feet in Vista Alegre. He had to say goodbye a quarter of a century later.
Roca Rey, a few meters behind, looked at the dancer and the teacher with the intimate and obvious sensation of witnessing his own accession to the throne, as if it had not already happened. And the audience applauded in awe of watching the changing of the guard at Westminster. A historic generational change has just officially taken place in Bilbao. That it was not finished consummating this Saturday, when we all thought that it had already happened in some way on August 25, 2022 with the homeric epic of the Peruvian star, also, like this Saturday, with Juli and bulls from Victoriano del Río. But the young prince did not finish killing the retreating old king…
The emotion with which the fans would raise a monumental ovation when the paseíllo was undone exceeded the aurresku moment by far. That emotion was also reflected in the eyes of the veteran figure, whose hat in hand crossed the stripes of the tercio as the border of a goodbye.
The sentimental charge of the afternoon found a response in El Juli with the striking mark, throughout his long career at the top, of intelligence, of proverbial cleverness. He did not get the corresponding round result – a single ear – because of the sword. That when the bull rises, its effectiveness decreases, 25 years later… And that evidence was verified before the first bull, salinero -Sardo said the program by mistake-, with a serious expression, long and loose meat, from the cinqueña and good bullfight (without endings) by Victoriano. In addition to the evidence that JL was emasculated by the sword, wisdom was also proven. To enhance the virtues -fixity, nobility and good beginnings- on the fringes of the onslaught -one last humiliated step and rhythm is missing-. Juli gave it to him, the rhythm I say, on his fibrillated right hand, which was the hand of the bull, and that firm touch and the push of the voice: «Let’s go ahead, bull!». Armed with the task and certain success, he disarmed it with steel, precipitating the use of pithing.
Juli’s cleverness, wrapped up in inalienable ambition, took full advantage of an easy room that was released with tame wickers and, therefore, opened up a lot. He rained with airs of melancholy. Juli didn’t let him escape, she brought him and took him, soaked him; he fought him at will with his left hand and also with his right, leaving with him. And when it seemed to slow down, he made up his mind not to stop, without letting go. Between the beginning in the flag and the end by luquecinas, those populist winks, of cleverness, of being fresh -hell, more than Roca Rey at this point- had put people in their pockets when the bull was already asking for arnica. A prick did not come between the retreating master and the parting ear.