{"id":114918,"date":"2026-03-20T19:11:36","date_gmt":"2026-03-20T23:11:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/sin-categoria\/valverde-leaves-athletic-end-of-a-golden-era-at-san-mames\/"},"modified":"2026-03-20T19:11:36","modified_gmt":"2026-03-20T23:11:36","slug":"valverde-leaves-athletic-end-of-a-golden-era-at-san-mames","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/nationals\/valverde-leaves-athletic-end-of-a-golden-era-at-san-mames\/","title":{"rendered":"Valverde Leaves Athletic: End of a Golden Era at San Mam\u00e9s"},"content":{"rendered":"BILBAO, SPAIN \u2013 Coach Ernesto Valverde announced that he will not continue at the helm of Athletic Club at the end of the current season. The decision was made by mutual agreement with the club&#8217;s board of directors.\n\nValverde, who holds the record for most matches managed in the club&#8217;s history with 494 matches, announced his decision through an official video. The coach explained that it is a decision &#8220;matured over time&#8221; and previously discussed with the board.\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>I wanted to share that I will not be the coach of Athletic next season. It&#8217;s a decision I&#8217;ve been considering for some time.<\/p><cite>Ernesto Valverde<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\nThe 62-year-old coach is in his third spell on the San Mam\u00e9s bench (2022-2026), completing a total of ten years, adding his periods between 2003-2005 and 2013-2017.\n\nDuring his management, Athletic Club achieved significant successes, including the Spanish Super Cup 2015 and the Copa del Rey 2024. This last title broke a 40-year drought without lifting the trophy.\n\nFurthermore, under his management, the club qualified twice for the Champions League and maintained a prominent position in LaLiga, consistently competing in the top positions.\n\nValverde also had an outstanding career as an Athletic footballer between 1990 and 1996, playing 188 matches and scoring 50 goals, establishing himself as an emblematic figure.\n\nThe club announced that Valverde&#8217;s official farewell will take place at the end of the season, marking the end of one of the most successful periods in the recent history of the Basque team.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BILBAO, SPAIN \u2013 Coach Ernesto Valverde announced that he will not continue at the helm of Athletic Club at the end of the current season. The decision was made by mutual agreement with the club&#8217;s board of directors. Valverde, who holds the record for most matches managed in the club&#8217;s history with 494 matches, announced [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":114919,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[997],"tags":[1087,718,12384,168],"class_list":{"0":"post-114918","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nationals","8":"tag-athletic-club","9":"tag-coach","10":"tag-ernesto-valverde","11":"tag-retirement"},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114918","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114918"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114918\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114919"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}