Mental health, the enemy of football players too

The case of Pelay Nova, who was a football player for Albacete, Elche, Lugo, Córdoba and Oviedo, and who died on Tuesday when he was run over by a train between Oviedo and Sierra, reminds us that There are several football players throughout history who have decided to end their lives due to circumstances related to depression.. Pelayo Novo himself had already experienced a similar incident during his stay in Albacete, when he fell from the third floor of a hotel in Huesca before a match played in El Alcoraz. In that fall, he suffered injuries that left him in a wheelchair and forced him to retire from football.

According to data published by the National Institute of Statistics, suicides in 2021 in Spain recorded a new highest level in history. More than 4,000 people took their own lives during that year, representing an average of eleven deaths from this cause every day. There were 62 suicides more than twelve months ago, despite the fact that 2020, the year of the coronavirus pandemic, has already set off all the alarms for authorities and health experts after breaking all existing records and seeing autolysis rise by 7.4% on an annual basis. level in the country.

Suicide has been the leading cause of external death — unrelated to disease — in Spain since it first surpassed road accidents in 2008, but has never reached these extremes. Despite having a socially and economically favorable situation in most cases, Football players are also susceptible to the effects of depressionand on some occasions they take the most drastic decisions to put an end to it.

Adrián Quevedo, a sports and health psychologist, explains the reasons that can lead to this fatal outcome: “When a person makes that decision, it is the last one on their list. They cannot solve it and it is their last option. Their thought is to disconnect themselves from life and thereby solve the problem. Everything comes as a result of persistent suffering. He also gives the keys to avoid this situation: «The most important thing is emotional support and accompaniment, but the person must be able to ask for help and communicate. The person helping must have empathy and availability. It is necessary to go to an expert who will reconnect you with that lost sense of well-being.

The case of elite athletes is more shocking because of the comfortable situation they have, a priori, without problems. «Better economic and social conditions help, but are not a guarantee that nothing will happen. Football players also need support and help. People only see money, but the rest can be empty,” explains Adrián Quevedo.

These are some examples of football players who ended their lives suddenly:

Abdon Porte (1893-1918)

Uruguayan Abdon Porte It is the first documented case of suicide of a football player. He played as a right back in historic clubs such as Colón and Club Nacional Football. In the latter, he was the undisputed starter for seven years. In 1918, Club Nacional decided to appoint Alfredo Zibechi as a starter to the detriment of Porte. On March 4, Nacional played a match against Charley. The team won, and Porte played the entire match. After the game, the team met at a party as usual. Porte left the party at one in the morning and went to Great Central Park, the stadium he opened himself in 2011, placed himself in the center of the field and took his own life at the age of 25 with a shot to the heart. . He was found motionless in a field with two letters on his shirt, one addressed to the president of Nacional and the other to his family.

«Dear Doctor José María Delgado. I am asking you and the other colleagues from the Commission to do for me what I have done for you: do for my family and my dear mother. Goodbye dear friend of life ». These are the words he addressed to the club’s first president, in one of the most shocking cases in the history of Uruguayan football.

Robert Enke (1977-2009)

One of the most famous cases in the world of football was that robert enkea German goalkeeper who played for Barcelona and Tenerife, as well as for world-class clubs such as Borussia Mönchengladbach or Benfica.

On November 10, 2009, at the age of 32, Enke threw himself onto the tracks of a moving train in Neustadt am Rübenberge, near the city of Hanover. A few months later, it was learned that Enke suffered from depression after his time at Barça and Fenerbahçe, where he suffered from a great fear of failure. This depression was exacerbated by the death of his two-year-old daughter, who died after cardiac arrest due to an illness she had suffered from since birth.

Gary Speed ​​​​​​(1969-2011)

Gary Speed He is considered one of the best footballers in the history of Wales. Among others, he played for Leeds, Everton and Newcastle, teams in which he made 535 Premier League appearances, and he played 85 times for the Welsh team. After his retirement in 2010, he was the coach of Wales. On November 27, 2011, at the age of 42, Speed ​​​​​​was found dead in his home in the Welsh city of Chester, in a case of suicide by hanging.

Andreas Biermann (1980-2014)

A personal friend of Robert Enke, Andreas Biermann repeated the fate of the German goalkeeper. A defender who was active mainly in Germany’s second division, Biermann announced in 2009 that he was suffering from depression, after attempting suicide a month earlier, and in 2011 he wrote his autobiography entitled Red card to depression. He was psychologically treated, but in the end he took his own life on July 18, 2014 at the age of 34.

Francesc Arnau (1975-2021)

This is one of the latest cases. A goalkeeper who played for Málaga and Barcelona, ​​Arnau was also sporting director for Málaga and Oviedo, with the latter team from 2019 to 2021.

On May 21 of that year, Francesc Arnau threw himself onto the railway tracks in Oviedo, ending his life at the age of 46. Despite being no longer active, he was a nationally recognized footballer who also suffered from the effects of depression, particularly during his last spell at the Asturian club.