Athletic Bilbao beat Mallorca on penalties to win the King’s Cup, ending a 40-year wait for the trophy

Athletic Bilbao ended a run of six consecutive defeats in the Copa del Rey final with a dramatic penalty shootout victory over Mallorca, ending a 40-year wait for a trophy.

It sparked jubilant scenes at the sold-out La Cartuja Stadium and ended Athletic’s recent painful run in the competition, which has seen them lose two finals in as many weeks in 2021.

Dani Rodriguez fired Mallorca – fifteenth in La Liga – into the lead in the twenty first minute after Athletic failed to clear a corner kick.

Athletic, fighting for a top-four finish in La Liga under former Barcelona manager Ernesto Valverde, failed to equalize before the break when Nico Williams’ finish was ruled out for offside.

However, Oihan Sancet equalized shortly after the break, curling in as the influential Williams regained possession and played it through.

Neither side was able to find a winner, with Williams failing to hit the goal in the second period of time beyond regulation and Mallorca’s Vedat Muriqi seeing his header pushed away by Athletic goalkeeper Julen Agirrezabala.

Mallorca, which played in the third league of Spanish football in 2018, wanted to win the Copa del Rey for only the second time in history after its triumph in 2003.

However, in the fortieth Spanish Cup final – the last two of which were lost in April 2021, after the pandemic delayed the 2020 final – it was Athletic who could have fun a long-awaited success.

In the penalty shootout, 23-year-old Agirrezabala saved Manu Morlanes’ spot kick, and Nemanja Radonjic missed the goal, and Athletic’s first 4 penalty takers found the net.

Only Barcelona, ​​with 31 teams, has won the trophy more often than Athletic, Spain’s fourth-oldest club, which maintains a unique philosophy of only fielding players of Basque descent.