This is how you come to Madrid, Manuel Diosleguarde

Manuel Diosleguarde is a bullfighter from Salamanca who took the alternative on July 23, 2022, and a month later suffered a tremendous 25-centimeter goring in his right thigh that miraculously did not kill him. He reappeared eight months later, and since then he has been calling the Madrid company for his confirmation.

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It took three years for him to get the yes, and today, May 16, 2026, he made the paseíllo in a do-or-die situation. Today, Diosleguarde was risking his life before the bull and before himself. If nothing happens today, the bullfighter’s name would have been erased forever from the entrepreneurs’ agendas.

What merit these men have who dress in lights and risk everything on one card, life, vocation, dreams… How lucky you have to be, moreover, so that on this day, at the precise time, you are lucid enough not to disappoint yourself; and what a miracle that a bull, unaware of your problem, empathizes with you.

Manuel Diosleguarde arrived at Las Ventas convinced that today, no matter what, he had to change his life, and he has shown it in the ring with an excessive commitment, with a desire to be a bullfighter, with courage, determination, boldness, class, and command. Sometimes, nerves surfaced, which is logical, but he told everyone who wanted to hear that he has good manners, that he has taste, that he wants to bullfight with depth…

Four verónicas of quality were his calling card when receiving the bull of his confirmation. He was seen accelerated in the final third before a bull with a disorderly charge and always with its head high, but he showed his gallantry.

When the sixth came out, he had already shone in respective quites in Lorenzo’s bulls with tafalleras the first, and tight chicuelinas the second; but when the sixth came out, he had left the nerves in the alley and received it with tempered cape passes, took the muleta, planted his feet, challenged his unbred opponent, and earned the respect and admiration of the stands with a brave attitude, enduring rushes and hooks, and tracing, some better than others, muletazos of great substance.

This is how you have to come to Madrid to call the company’s office again or for Messrs. Garrido and Casas to call a bullfighter and announce a repeat. Diosleguarde did not finish the work, he stabbed, heard a warning, and needed three descabellos. No one is perfect, but on the Las Ventas ring remained the commitment of someone who deserves other opportunities.

This was not the case for Álvaro Lorenzo, also in need of a triumph to glimpse the professional horizon with hope. It was not because he preferred not to leave his comfort zone, sad, dull, without apparent desire, as bland as the bulls he was assigned. He was not seen with the cape, and, muleta in hand, he insisted on giving muletazos that only conveyed boredom to the stands. This is not how you should come to Madrid.

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The circumstances of El Cid are completely different. He is retiring, without a doubt, and what he came to say is that the left, his left, is no longer what it was. The current El Cid is an insecure bullfighter, who bullfights detached and mechanically, who does not seem to feel what he does, who transmits boredom or incapacity. He also did not have bulls for show, but yes to be better than he was; because he was not good. What is clear is that El Cid is a beloved bullfighter in Madrid, because he deserved a boo and was bid farewell with respectful silence.