Eric Castel
 | |||
| Personal information | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Eric Castel | ||
| Date of birth | Missing required parameter 1=month! Expression error: Unexpected > operator. | ||
| Place of birth | ? , France | ||
| Date of death | Missing required parameter 1=month! Expression error: Unexpected > operator. | ||
| Height | [convert: needs a number] | ||
| Playing position | Forward | ||
| Number | 7 | ||
| Youth career | |||
| 1974 | ZDF team | ||
| 1974-1975 | Barcelona CF | ||
| Senior career* | |||
| Years | Team | Apps | (Gls) |
| -1979 | Inter Milan | ||
| 1979-1984 | Barcelona CF | ||
| 1984-1985 | P.S.G. | ||
| 1985-1989 | Barcelona CF | ||
| 1989 -1992 | LOSC Lille | ||
| * Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only | |||
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Eric Castel (french: Éric Castel) was a fictional footballer created by Belgian comics artists Raymond Reding (1920–1999) and Francoise Hugues and appeared in a eponymous comic strip. He first appeared in the strip in 1979 and last in 1992.
Éric Castel (French: Éric Castel) is a football comic book character created by Belgian comics artists Raymond Reding (1920–1999) and Francoise Hugues. Fifteen comic books were published. The character started as Kai Falke in Germany.
He was the silver-haired striker whose goals propelled Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain to European glory. The character reminded a lot of Italian Robero Bettega.
Creation
Castel’s career flowed through the pencil of Raymond Reding, whose vibrant illustrations captivated a generation of youngsters. The French star was known by different names across Europe – Ronnie Hansen in the Netherlands, Kai Falke in Germany – but he was always brought to life by the hand of Reding, who died in April 1999.
Reding, while also working on other make-believe sporting heroes, spent time working on Belgium’s favorite young adventurer Tintin during the 1950s.
“With Francoise Hugues, Raymond Reding created this character in 1973 with a football player named Max Falk,” football agent and Castel enthusiast Olivier Jouanneaux told CNN.
“He played in a company football team, not as a professional, in Dusseldorf, Germany.
“The Dutch comic magazine Zack ordered Reding to create a comic about football to be published in 1974, the same year Germany hosted the World Cup.”
Characters such as Castel have always been a staple for football fans throughout the years.
English youngsters were held in thrall by the trials and tribulations of Roy Race, the eponymous hero of the “Roy of the Rovers” series who dazzled during decades with the fictional Melchester Rovers club.
Castel’s career began in 1979, the year the real Barca team lifted the European Cup Winners’ Cup, and his story was told across 15 albums running until 1992 – the year the Catalans became champions of Europe for the first time.
“Reding did well in creating a strong relationship between Castel and the ‘Pablitos’ despite their age differences,” says Jouanneaux, who is a FIFA agent.
“Everyone can find himself in this comic. A child can dream to live events like the ‘Pablitos’ did.”
As with all good stories, Castel’s career took a sudden twist in 1984 when the goalscorer signed for PSG.
“As a French citizen, I was happy to see him at a French club,” says Jouanneaux. “That was a big success for the French championship and also the possibility to see French stadiums and teams.
Career
Club
Germany: ZDFI team
The character started as Kai Falke, in 1974. Falke's nationality was not easily definable, not least because he never played for a national team. In all likelihood, he was French, but you could say he had German roots, too.
Falke first made a name for himself in Germany, more precisely in Dusseldorf during June and July of 1974. At that time, he wasn't a professional player but worked as a graphic designer in the advertising department of a big food company called ZDFI, based in Dusseldorf .
While attending a game between Fortuna Dusseldorf and Bayern Munich he accidentally met Bruno Leidel, then working as a scout for Barcelona. He told Leidel that he played football himself, as the player-manager for ZDFI's company team.
Leidel then watched this team take on a strong amateur side called Kickers. Kai Falke scored a hat trick as the ZDFI team came from behind to win 3-2 and Leidel immediately offered him a three-year contract with Barcelona.
Most other fans of the player have never heard of his pre-Barcelona career and assume he suddenly emerged, as if coming from nowhere, as a fully-fledged star five years later, in 1979.[1]
Inter
Eric Castel, according to the script, played starting in 1979 for Barcelona (although previously he is said to have belonged to Inter Milan). An injury at Inter made him seek for a transfer.
Barcelona
From 1979 until 1984 Castel played with Barcelona, becoming a hero and trying to lead them to Euro glory.[2]
In 1979 the player, a lightning-fast right-winger, led Barcelona to a famous first-round win against Cologne in Europe and then also past Kevin Keegan's Hamburg, even though he initially didn't get along with the hot-headed Yugoslav Stefan Stanovic, recently signed from OGC Nice. Eventually, though, the two became best buddies and were the key men in a Barca side soon taken over by the British coach C.B. Kerr, a firm but fair redhead with a crew cut and a moustache.
By all accounts, Kerr was a good man-manager, but no tactical wizard. He coached the team to a European quarterfinal victory over Dinamo Bucuresti, but when Barcelona met Nantes in the semifinals, the French coach informed his team that "Kerr is not too keen on strategic finesse." He was proved right, as Nantes knocked out the Catalans on away goals.
In the next European season, Barcelona eliminated AS Monaco and reached the semifinals again, this time against Bayern Munich. But in the build-up to the game, rumours began making the rounds that Falke had an offer from Paris Saint-Germain. And indeed, after a meeting with PSG's president, Francis Borelli, Barca's right-winger decided to leave Catalonia.
He scored the deciding goal in the second leg against Bayern to see Barcelona through to the final. After the game, he was given a moving farewell. The crowd chanted his name and the club president called him "one of the great players who helped increase Barcelona's prestige."
In the other semifinal, PSG defeated Inter Milan and reached the two-legged final -- against Barcelona.
PSG
He signed with Paris Saint-Germain in 1984 ahaead of the CEVA Cup final against Barcelona.
The Catalans won the first leg at Camp Nou 3-2 and were only one step away from avenging the previous season's heartbreaking exit. But now they were without their iconic No. 7. And of course none other than Castel (or Falke) scored a brace in the return leg to win the trophy for his new club.
Castel’s transfer came back to haunt the fictional Barca team in edition eight after he powered PSG to victory in the CEVA Cup, a fictional European competition (hosting clubs from historic European cities), beating the Catalan club in the final. Barça and PSG faced each other in the two-legged final of the CEVA Cup (European Cup of the Art Villas), an imaginary trophy reminiscent of the old Cup of Cities at Fairs and comparable, due to its importance, to the current Champions League.
The title was won by PSG, who overcame the 3-2 defeat at the Camp Nou with a 3-1 win at the Parc des Princes in Paris, with two goals from Eric Castel in both games. The Parisian period would be short, only the eighth and ninth volumes.
Barcelona
His comeback was the stuff of dreams for young Barca and Castel fans. However, somehow Barca were always the player's true love. Although he did well in Paris, he went back to Catalonia in 1985. And not before time. Barcelona had signed the eminently talented but also obstinate and volatile Argentine striker Enrico Nervi from Boca Juniors and Kerr just couldn't get through to him.
It was 1985 when the prodigal son returned home, where he would achieve new laurels with his extraordinary goals, always magnificently drawn. Barcelona's entire season turned on a bizarre off-the-pitch event. Nervi and Castel (Falke) were taken hostage by three bank robbers and managed to escape together. It created a bond between the two and suddenly the Argentine was a different player -- his master class against Cologne saw Barcelona through to the European semis yet again.
Eric Castel resigns with Barca in 1985.
In addition, in 1988 he gave Barça what he had taken from them when he played for PSG, by reaching the first CEVA Cup in Barça's history with the Barça shirt. It was in the twelfth volume of the collection that Barça and Girondins de Bordeaux faced each other in the continental final, again over two legs. At the end of that season, Barca finally won the European trophy that had eluded them for so long, in the final against Girondins de Bordeaux on penalties. Of course the deciding spot kick was converted by Barcelona's prodigal son, their famous No. 7.
In 1988, four years after leaving the Nou Camp, Castel finally fired the club to CEVA Cup success. It was probably the high point of the player's career.
As it could not be otherwise, the excitement reached the limit: 4-3 at the Camp Nou and 4-3 in Bordeaux. Then, goalless extra time and the lottery of penalties, with a new 4-3 in favor of Barça and the last kick converted by Eric Castel, the hero of the final with two goals at the Camp Nou and two more at the Parque Lescure. Thus, in 1988 Eric Castel's Barça were European champions (four years before Wembley 1992).
A year later, Barcelona were knocked out by Lille OSC, also on penalties. Shortly after the game the player announced that he would again leave Barcelona and join, well, Lille.
LOSC
This last stage of the collection includes from the tenth to the fifteenth volume, the last of the series, at the end of which he returns to France, in this case to sign for Lille.
He had a great start at his new club, scoring in a home win over Nantes. However, his first game for Lille was also his last ever. By 1992, it was all over. The player's right-footed strike on 67 minutes which made it 2-0 against Nantes was the last we saw of him.
Raymond Reding, then 72 years old, had lost interest or vigour or both. In any case, he wasn't accountable to anybody. Reding had invented and created the player all those years ago, so he had every right to bury him.
It was precisely in 1992 when the story ended, with our hero again far from the Camp Nou, but in the collective imagination the image of Eric Castel as an FC Barcelona player between 1979 and 1992 will always remain, coincidentally from Basel to Wembley in our real world.
International
Castel didnt feature for any national team.
Comic book
In Germany
The character started as Kai Falke, in 1974.
In Spain
The new weekly presents Super As a twenty-eight format on twenty-one centimeter of fifty-two pages Eric and Pablitos to follow for nine weeks. On the green cover of no.3218 September 1979 The character appears in the foreground accompanied by thumbnail of Julie Wood of Jean Graton and The Gentlemen of Ferdinando Tacconi and Alfredo Castelli. It is in this issue published the second adventure Leg! To follow until no. 39. Blow! Is the latest in this weekly tournament no. 6827 May 1980 eight numbers.
The comic book was a huge success in Spain. His transfer to PSG brough the sales down and the hero returned soon to Barcelona. Castel fans were outraged. The character had never won the CEVA Cup with Barca and now he had extinguished his former club’s hopes.
“The whole affair led to outrage among followers of the series, who were devastated by Reding and Hugues’ decision to transfer Castel to Paris Saint-Germain,” said Barca’s official website.
“Not only that, but to also have him participate in the defeat of Barça in the most important club competition in Europe.” Having spent issues eight and nine in the French capital, and after Barca lowered their financial demands, Castel made an emotional return to the Catalan club.
Barça's defeat increased the anger of a lot of Barça fans for the decision of Raymond Reding and Françoise Hugues to transfer Eric Castel to Paris Saint-Germain. Many considered it inconceivable that their fictional idol would be able to change colors and that to make matters worse he would win the top continental title playing against his former team. The publisher that published the comic was flooded with hundreds of letters of protest and album sales suffered a significant decline, so the only possible solution had to be the return of Eric Castel to Barça.
“I liked so much the moment when Barça wins the final of CEVA with a penalty from Eric in the 12th album 12,” says Garcia. “In the 1980s Barça had never won the Champions League. It was a great time to be a Barca supporter.
In Belgium
Éric Castel is a Franco-Belgian football comic series created by author Raymond Reding for the new weekly Super As in February 1979 before being released as an album by Fleurus in April 1979.
The comic book was a huge success in Belgium as the comics artists Raymond Reding (1920–1999) and Francoise Hugues were Belgians.
In Greece
In Greece, some of Eric Castel's stories were published by the publishing company STAR COMICS, as well as the magazines Blek and Agori. On December 17, 2017, it was announced that Eric Castel was returning with a reprint of all his stories, as well as his unpublished ones, a total of 15 issues and the collector's issue #0 by Mikros Iros Publishing in collaboration with Ethnos Tis Kyriakis.
Style of play
Castel played as a winger and he was known for his ability to influence the game.
Legacy
On 7 February 2023, the french sofoot.com website ranked him 45th in the Top100 of the best fictional footballers of all time (including cartoons).[3]
Former Barcelona president Joan Laporta called Castel the club’s greatest ever signing, while current Barca playmaker Xavi is among his legion of loyal fans.[4]
Spanish filmaker Uri Garcia considers him as the best comic footballer he ever read. “Nothing sounds better for a younger Barca supporter than a comic hero who wears the shirt of his team and lives so many adventures,” says filmmaker Uri Garcia, who is hoping to produce a documentary about Castel.
“On the other hand, as seen in the comics, the drawing style of Reding is very realistic and is very well documented. “I live in Barcelona, and during my childhood I lived next to the Camp Nou. For me, as well as for many fans of Catalonia, it was very exciting and special to see your city and your football club drawn as well in a comic.” While his exploits on the pitch excited readers, it was Castel’s friendship with a group of young boys which was central to his appeal. “My favorite moment could be when Castel meets Pablito and the juniors in Tossa de Mar in the first album,” recalls Garcia, referring to the Catalonia municipality, which is north of Barcelona.
“Castel trains with the guys in the middle of the street but they don’t know that he is the new star of Barca.” Reding’s portrayal of the relationship between Castel and Pablito Varela and his friends, the “Pablitos”, allowed every young child to imagine what it would be like to befriend a soccer superstar.
Catalan historian Dr. Ramon Usall has written an entire book about the role he played for Barcelona and for Catalan identity.
On 17 December 2017 the sombrero.gr website named as the best comic footballer of all time.[5]
Personal life
Castel, a wealthy footballer, surprisingly he was hanging out with little boys (called Pablitos after their leader Pablo) in Barcelona with whom he experienced many advendures.
Besides he had many beatiful women on his side like blonde bombshell Diane Chapuis.
Honours
Note that all records are fictional, and only date as far as 1992, the last completed season of the comic strip.
League
Cups
European
- C.E.V.A. Cup:
- Winners: 1985, 1988
International
See also
References
- ↑ The fantastical tale of a Barcelona footballer who played with character - ESPN
- ↑ Eric Castel, entre Barça y PSG - fcbarcelonanoticias.blogspot.com
- ↑ Top 100 : Footballeurs fictifs (de 50 à 41) - sofoot.com
- ↑ Meet football’s answer to Tintin: Barcelona and PSG’s comic hero - edition.cnn.com
- ↑ Ο φανταστικός Έρικ Καστέλ - sombrero.gr
