Sevilla, May 3: Maximum effort, duly rewarded

The wind at the start of today’s corrida

A subject for discussion after this corrida was had we ever seen such a poor string of victorinos?

It took various people some five minutes to encourage the first bull (beautifully presented) out of the toril, after which it just stood, impervious to the peones’ attempts to get it to charge. Juan Sierra, to his credit, eventually went up to it, and then found, once in the capote, it was very hard to get rid of! His matador, El Cid, had a similar experience. Come las varas, the bull simply refused to charge to the picador until the horse was moved further towards the toril. The picador left to applause whilst the banderilleros took their turn and suffered. And then El Cid, troubled too by today’s strong wind, found the bull, with its hesitant but rapid charge, impossible in the faena. He killed it with three pinchazos and an estocada to pitos en arrastre and silence.

I haven’t seen Manuel Jesús have an unsuccessful afternoon since his comeback, so there were still hopes when the fourth victorino emerged. However, the bull’s quick turning meant the 51-year-old sevillano got into trouble with his capework, and, although there were some individual classy naturales and derechazos, he struggled to maintain tandas in the faena, particularly as the bull’s charges shortened. There was a desarme near the faena’s end and this time it took El Cid three pinchazos, a one-third sword, an aviso and a descabello to kill his foe. There was a division over the bull (one couldn’t help wondering how Emilio de Justo, denied this corrida by the empresa, would have dealt with it) and further silence for its matador.

Today’s victorinada featured a ‘gesture’ by Daniel Luque in appearing with the renowned ganadería. By the corrida’s end, faced with a manso and an alimaña, the gesture had been completed, albeit with little to show for it. He had brought the crowd to its feet with his capework to his opening bull, recovering from a near desarme with some one-handed capotazos and then fine verónicas and a media, and managed some decent naturales in the faena (including one exceptionally slow one), but struggled to retain control, receiving a number of warnings from his animal. A good estocada trasera was followed by a borderline petition which today’s new presidenta, Macarena de Pablo Romero, rightly turned down. If his first victorino, given three varas, was difficult, his second was even more so - it went well to the horse (more applause for the picador), but retreated at the start of the third pair of banderillas and was dangerously defensive in the final tercio, almost catching its matador a number of times. Luque sensibly opted to cut things short for an estocada and descabello, receiving an ovation.

Amidst this chaos and disappointment, Manuel Escribano, in his first of three Feria de Abril appearances, was the hero of the evening, exuding total commitment throughout his lidias whatever challenges were posed. His first victorino was another animal reluctant to charge, especially to the horse. After some verónicas from Escribano and a brief quite by Luque, there was a lengthy tercio de banderillas, much of it spent trying to position the bull for Escribano’s pairs of sticks (why did Luis Francisco Esplá not pass on his knowledge of how to banderillar without help from the peones?). The crowd nevertheless roared its approval at the tercio’s end. The faena that followed was excellent, Manuel finding things tricky on the right horn at first, but then discovering the bull had a sweet left horn. After teaching his opponent to follow the cloth in naturales, when Escribano returned to derechazos, the bull’s behaviour had improved, Manuel keeping the cloth low in impressive series, crowned with chest passes, before returning the muleta to the left hand for more excellent naturales. The estoque de muerte collected, Escribano found the bull couldn’t take another series and so lined it up for the kill. A pinchazo and estocada trasera lost him an ear at least and brought him an aviso. There was a great ovation as the sevillano, wearing an unattractive but likely crowd-pleasing traje with an image of the Giralda on each leg and the Giraldillo on the back of the jacket, took saludos, while the bull was dispatched to pitos.

Come the end of that evening, Escribano was to regret that lost ear. The fifth victorino was the exception to the rest of today’s string - it charged into the ring strongly (met by a botched pase cambiado de rodillas a portagayola) and had sufficient neck to lower its head in passes. Back on his feet, Manuel gave it verónicas, a media verónica and a revolera, only to lose the capote at the end of the series. The bull, ‘Mosquetón’, went well to the horse, the picador’s mount collapsing in the second vara, only for it to rise from the ground, its rider continuing piccing and earning applause. The next two tercios were a further example of maximum effort from Escribano. He received a standing ovation for his banderillas, the final pair delivered in a close al quiebro by the fence. Manuel dedicated to the public. Although there was desarme early on, the matador having used three muletas by the faena’s end, Escribano extracted excellent series of naturales and derechazos from an animal that was humillando and keen to charge at the cloth. At the end of each tanda, the effort that the sevillano was putting in to this performance, and his satisfaction with how things were going, clearly showed. This time, there was no mistaking the estocada, placed hasta la bola en la cruz, and the public duly demanded, and got, two ears for the matador - slightly generous, I thought, for this showing, but a just reward for his overall commitment today, which had been terrific all evening. The crowd chanted “Torero! Torero!” as they petitioned; the president decided to give ‘Mosquetón’ a vuelta too (the bull having prevented damage to the ganadería’s reputation) and the hats rained down as Escribano circled the arena. Can he go one step further and achieve an exit through the Puerta del Príncipe when he appears with commercial animals here in the Santiago Domecq corrida on Tuesday?