Txantrea and Athletic Club: Fifty years of fruitful collaboration

This Thursday, Athletic Club and U.D.C Txantrea will celebrate 50 years a close and fruitful collaboration between Los Rojiblancos and Navarre outfit.

This partnership was established in 1973 and is set to continue until 2028. Txantrea is key club for Athletic in Navarre, where we also have agreements with C.D. Pamplona, C.D Tudelano, C.D. Oberena, C.D Falcesino, Mulier FCN, C.A. Cirbonero and C.D Asdefor.

José Luis Nagore, president of the Navarrese club, and his counterpart at Athletic Club, Jon Uriarte, will attend a special event at Txantrea's facilities this Thursday at 18:00 CET.

Moreover, first team players Iker Muniain and Beñat Prados, both of whom have spent time with the Navarrese side, will also be present, along with a large number of former Txantrea stars such as Miguel Sola, Mikel San José and Gorka Iraizoz. Miguel Ángel Amezketa, the first player to come to Lezama following the agreement between the two clubs, will also be there.

Half a century, side by side

In this half century of working together, many players have represented Athletic after first wearing the Txantrea shirt. Iker Muniain, current captain and second in the Club's all-time appearance ranking, and Beñat Prados, are the two current Txantrea representatives in our senior squad.

Before them, several more great players also came to Lezama from Txantrea, such as Miguel Sola, LaLiga champion in 1983 and domestic treble winner in 1984. More recently, we had Mikel San José and Gorka Iraizoz, both of whom made almost 400 appearances as Lions.

Borja Ekiza, Iñigo Pérez, David Cuellar, Crescencio Cuellar and Adrien Goñi complete the list of players from Txantrea who made turned out for Athletic.

Many others never made official appearances for Athletic, but have gone on to have great careers after their time at Txantrea and Lezama. This is the case with players like Javi Gracia, Anaitz Arbilla, Iñigo Eguaras and Vicente Uriz.

At the moment there are two youth players from Txantrea at Lezama: Adrián Lekuna (Under-18s) and Raúl Sadaba (Under-16s).