The horrors of war and boarding school in the USSR, the triumph with the «Torpedo» and the recruitment of the NKVD , terrible torture and the version of death from Simonyan. Sport tells the powerful story of Torpedo legend Agustín Gomez.
He was in his fifteenth year when the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) broke out. The rebellion was led by the future dictator Francisco Franco, who enjoyed the support of Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler. His supporters were opposed by the defenders of the republican system, as well as the national minorities of Spain — the Catalans, Basques and others.
The Soviet Union took an active part in the conflict, providing military and financial assistance to the Republicans. The USSR sheltered 2,985 Spanish boys and girls whose parents did not want their children to face the horrors of war. Among them was Agustin Gomez. A network of boarding schools was opened for Spanish children in the Soviet Union. In 1937, the future football star was assigned to Odessa. There he crossed paths with Ruperto Sagasti, who was later taken by Spartak Moscow.
In the same 1937, a match between Soviet pioneers and a team of young Spaniards was held at the Dynamo stadium in Moscow. Before the start of the meeting, representatives of both teams made a welcoming speech. On behalf of the Spaniards, Gomez, who was appointed captain, spoke out: «Our fiery pioneer greetings to the Soviet pioneers! We are happy that we are in the Soviet country. Viva, Stalin!» The match, which brought together more than 60 thousand people in the stands, ended with a score of 2:1 in favor of the pioneers. One of the Spanish newspapers wrote that Gomez was the best on the field.
In Moscow, Gomez played for the children's and youth teams of the House of Spanish Youth. In the future, the stocky 169-centimeter defender joined the team of the Red Rose Factory, whose colors he defended from 1940 to 1941. During the Great Patriotic War, on the basis of the aircraft factory number 30, a team of Spanish football players was founded, including Gomez. The game of the left back attracted the attention of the coach of the Moscow «Wings of the Soviets» Abram Dangulov, in 1944 he invited him to the club.
"In 1946 he came to Moscow from Sukhumi to "Wings of the Soviets". Agustin Gomez immediately took patronage over me: he had lived in the capital for about ten years, he knew his way around here perfectly, had many friends, ”said Nikita Simonyan. — All this helped me a lot at first to adapt in the city, and our relationship with Agustin grew into friendship. br>In 1947, having played two seasons in the «Wings of the Soviets» Gomez joined the Moscow «Torpedo». Two years later, the defender helped the club take the first big trophy in history — the USSR Cup.In 1951, Gomez became the captain, a little later — the Honored Master of Sports of the USSR. His former teammate Yuri Zolotov recalled that, as a defender, he saved the team from crazy fans. Lost 1:2. The match was judged by Belov. Fans considered him the culprit of the defeat and rushed to the field. Gomez instantly got his bearings, made sure that our whole team surrounded the judges and escorted them to the locker room,» Zolotov said.
In 1952, the head coach of the USSR Olympic team Boris Arkadiev included Gomez in the team for the Olympic Games in Melbourne. However, the Basque did not make his debut for the Soviet Union national team, having played two matches in reserve. In the same year, the captain of «Torpedo» raised the second Cup of the USSR for the team over his head. Gomez was included in the list of 33 best football players of the 1952 season: in total, he got on his list five times. A year later, his “Torpedo” won the bronze of the championship.
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«The pillow was stained with pus and blood»
The 1954 season flew past Agustin Gomez: the Basque did not play a single match in a Torpedo jersey. Football was prevented by the Basque's second job, which few people knew about. While playing for Torpedo, Gomez simultaneously made illegal business trips to Spain as an agent of the local communist party. And shortly before the end of the Great Patriotic War, the Basque recruited the NKVD.In 1956, Gomez left the «Torpedo» and returned to Spain after an amnesty for the supporters of the Republic. For seven seasons, the defender played 185 matches as part of the Avtozavodsk team. He was taken to Atletico Madrid, but after only one friendly match, he finished football at the age of 34. Gomez concentrated on coaching, which became an excellent cover for illegal party affairs. The former football player led the youth team of his native province of Gipuzkoa, combining the post of coach with the leadership of the communist cell of the region, and then of the entire Basque Country.
In February 1960, Gomez was arrested on suspicion of espionage. He was tortured for several weeks.
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"At night I felt severe pain in my ear, the pillow was stained with pus and blood. Most of the body is like a huge black spot,» Gomez admitted.
Valuable information was not knocked out of him. The ex-footballer was thrown into prison — so he became a national hero of the Basque Country. In the Soviet Union, they organized a campaign in defense of the ex-captain of the Torpedo. The workers of the Likhachev plant went to rallies under the slogan «Freedom to Agustin Gomez!» activities as a KGB agent. Then he was elected a member of the central committee of the Communist Party of Spain, and then the executive committee. In the future, Gomez was engaged in agency work in Latin America. On November 16, 1975, Agustin Gomez died, he died two days before his 53rd birthday.
«The consequences of severe head injuries received during interrogations and tortures,» suggested Nikita Simonyan.
Gomez was buried at the Donskoy cemetery, where dozens of Torpedo fans and veterans come every year.
