Athletic Bilbao is a model of today’s club that still holds on to tradition. In addition to still using the model of ownership of penyas (which still has socios in it), they also still firmly hold the Cantera tradition, which uses the original academy players themselves and also players from Basque, which they have applied since 1912.
The tradition of using native academy players and native Basque players is what makes Athletic Bilbao a club that is rarely hit by financial difficulties, because they do not need to buy expensive players from other European countries. Simply using a player who has played with Athletic Bilbao B for one season, promoting it to the first team, then Bilbao can already compete in La Liga or Europe.
Because it has been going on for several seasons, then, no wonder in this season (2016/2017), this tradition is still continuing. In fact, for this season, Bilbao’s total transfers, counting the number of players coming and going, total up to 0 euros! (reported by Transfermarkt).
As noted above, since 1912 Bilbao has routinely used local players. Local players here are not only players from the Bilbao club academy, but the players from Basque. Many Basque players have defended Bilbao, starting with Iker Muniain, Gorka Iraizoz, Aritz Aduritz and Inaki Williams.
All have received education at the Bilbao academy, or at least players who were born and raised in the Basque region. Born, raised and educated in the Basques, they at least knew about the traditions and identities of the Basque region, as maintained by Iker Muniain.
For the 2016/2017 season, Athletic Bilbao continues the tradition. They bring in players from Basque, or have played for Athletic Bilbao B. Total, for this season, they brought in 13 players, with six players from Athletic Bilbao B, and six other players are Athletic Bilbao players who have finished from the loan period.
In addition to bringing in players, they also released nine players to various clubs from Spain. Because this is Bilbao, then don’t be surprised if the players released by Bilbao are also players from Basque or have played at the Bilbao academy too. Most of them were released to seek experience in a new club, and only one player was released because he decided to retire, namely Carlos Gurpegi.
However, there are other interesting things that happened in the Bilbao transfer this season. They did not spend money and get any money at all. Transfermarkt notes, that Bilbao only spent 0 euros during the 2016 summer transfer window. A pretty fantastic amount!
But, seeing Bilbao’s total transfers over the past few seasons, indeed they have never recorded too much expenditure or income. In the 2015/2016 season, they recorded a total expenditure of 8 million euros (at that time they bought Raul Garcia, who incidentally is also a player from Basque) and 0 euro income.
They received a substantial income in the 2014/2015 season, when they sold Ander Herrera to Manchester United for 35 million euros. The huge buy-out clause they applied was merely a way to prevent the Basque players from moving to other European clubs.
For this season, they can still maintain their tradition of using players from Basque to defend the club, by bringing back players from the Basques they once loaned to the club, while raising players from Athletic Bilbao B. In fact, they did that by not spending any money at all.
This is certainly a good example for other clubs in Europe who are often exposed to the Financial Fair Play case. Using your own players, of course, is one way to preserve the club’s traditions, although even now Bilbao hasn’t won major trophies and more often struggles in the middle of the La Liga.
Seeing what Los Leones is now, it is not impossible that they will carry on this tradition for the next few years. Except, if suddenly there are investors from far away countries, and their target is suddenly pegged to become the European Champions League champion.
Hopefully the club called Athletic Bilbao won’t be like that.
