VALDEMORILLO 06/02/2015 – PRIMERA DE ABONO

The view from the sofa, my thoughts on corridas I have watched on TV.

Albarreal (1^st, 2^nd, 4^th & 6^th) and JP Domecq (3^rd & 5^th) novillos for Ángel Jiménez, Martín Escudero & Borja Jiménez.

 Although the most senior in age, Ángel Jiménez is the novillero with the least amount of experience on the bill. He drew an unfortunate lot. The first bull was immobile and disinterested; Ángel spent a long time in front of it without extracting any toreo of note. His second was uncomfortable when it charged, but, more often than not, it displayed no desire to move whatsoever. Both his faenas were long and he displayed a competent knowledge of taurine technique. However, I am left with the doubt as to whether he will develop into anything greater than one of the countless toreros that have learnt a solid technique in school but are unable to parlay this into performing toreo with a message; his novillos poor, certainly, but Ángel did not display, on this occasion, any qualities that made me want to see him with better cattle.   

Martín Escudero opted for a quite by saltilleras as an opening gambit to show his desire to please; these were clean, but lacked emotion and thus were accompanied by a stonily silence from the crowd. The novillo was not yet defined by the time Escudero took the muleta. It was noble and mobile, yes, but what would determine the ultimate result would be whether it was able to combine this with a brave desire to charge. Escudero’s first couple of series, with the right hand, were clean and long, but the bull had the defect of losing interest between each muletazo.  This theme continued with the left hand, although, above all, the impression was that Escudero had properly sized up his opponent and was in complete command. As the bull’s mobility lessened and its charge shortened, Escudero was able to keep the bull fully focussed between each pass, which led to the best couple of series of derechazos – although the faena as a whole was entirely correct, these two series, especially the first, were the only truly emotive moments. The token bernadinas gave way to a full sword that might have been sufficient to kill the bull but for the unfortunate intervention of the puntillero which turned what might have been an oreja by numbers into a well-deserved ovation.

The faena to the fifth novillo started with a spectacular voltereta – Escudero wanted to begin through estatuarios, he did not produce a toque at all and the novillo headed straight to the body. The young novillero dusted himself off and opted to repeat the pass, which, happily had a cleaner execution at the second time of asking. The novillo was bordering on weak, but its charge was buoyant enough to allow for meaningful toreo en redondo. This was an utterly dominant faena from Martín: he was in control of the bull at all times and used his developed technique to give the novillo what it needed at each stage of the faena. Due to its weakness, he was not able to lower the hand immediately, but as the faena developed, he increased the intensity and what began as clean, well linked series, became intense and emotive toreo. It was a long faena, but measured at the same time, each pass was well conceived as a part of the whole. A pity that the bull did not have an extra measure of strength, which would have in turn added intensity and vigour to its charge. As such, following a full estocada, the faena only merited one ear, which was duly granted.

It was pleasing to find Borja Jiménez on the cartel, he was one of the stand out novilleros of 2014, along with José Garrido, of course. The faena to his first novillo began with the pendulum in the centre of the ring. While it may seem like a cheap way to try to grab the crowd’s attention, Borja executed it with aplomb and used it to take the novillo to the centre of the ring immediately. The early part of the faena was perfectly structured: the spectacular start, a first series of derechazos giving the bull distance and allowing it to find its rhythm, followed by a very good series of derechazos taking the bull long through the pass, linking each muletazo seamlessly and concluding with a martinete, molinete and chest pass. The crowd was entirely engaged in the faena and Borja swapped hands to execute an equally pleasing series of naturales; Borja recognised that the bull’s class was not accompanied with the greatest strength and he was careful to alleviate it with a mid-height muleta, an ideal recourse that allowed him to perform this well linked series. As the bull’s vigour lessened so did the intensity of the faena, nevertheless, Borja showed his undoubted quality – he gives his toreo a freshness that engages the crowd without descending into prosaic populism. A low estocada took the sheen off his performance, but it did not prevent him from being awarded an ear.

The final novillo was the weakest of the lot and prevented any attempt at a serious faena; it spent far too long on its knees, and Borja spent far too long trying to extract toreo from this vacant animal. The lidia had begun brightly enough with a couple of cheerful larga de rodillas, but when the novillo became rajado half way through the saludo, all signs pointed to the novillada concluding with a damp squib.

I would like to conclude with some words on the disappointing behaviour and presentation of the novillos. We aficionados are often disheartened by the standardised charges we encounter each afternoon from Domecq ranches. However, the Albarreales did not even reach such low expectations. The JP Domecq novillos, as befits their bloodline, did at least reach the expected standard; but this is, of course, below the desired level that we, ideally, would like to see. However, the presentation of the JP Domecq novillos was ridiculous, they seemed like big erales rather than novillos being lidiados in the Comunidad de Madrid. Although better, the presentation of the Albarreales was also poor.