family, partner, career, origins, social networks and studies

Unai Simon He is an example of an athlete who not only cares about his professional career, but also prepares for a possible future away from the green of the stadiums. He is he present and future of the goal Athletic Club of Bilbao and key piece of the Spain national team. Sober and elegant goal, it stands out for its great reflexes and stretching capacity thanks to its size, which allows it to reach the most unexpected balls. He was once the European Under-21 champion and a starter during Euro 2020 and the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. One of the regulars in the calls with the Spanish team. He is living his sixth season in Athletic’s first team, in which he has already played more than 150 games, making great saves. He is another of the great goalkeepers trained in Lezama, where he arrived in the 2011-2012 season.

In this article, we want to offer you all the interesting data and details about Unai Simón, both for Athletic Bilbao fans and for sports lovers in general, highlighting his evolution and contribution to his team and the Spanish National Team.

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Profile of Unai Simón

Unai Simón, a family of order

Unai Simón’s birthplace is located in the Basque town of Murgia. However, his first encounters with the world of football took place in the Zamora town of Saint Martial of Wine. His paternal family lived in this town. His father left this Zamorano town to move to the Vascongadas due to his assignment as a member of the Civil Guard. It was there where he met his mother, who worked at the Ertzaintza, in her new destination. This has earned him insults and humiliation from the mad ultras of rival teams in places like the Vascongadas and Navarra.

During his adolescence, Unai used to visit his father’s Zamorano town in the summers. In that place, he adopted the custom of hitting the front of the town square with balls. He also played as a soccer goalkeeper for San Marcial del Vino. At the time, young people participated in spontaneous meetings.

However, Unai’s life is a set of circumstances. The place of origin of the cyclist Mikel Landa is also Murgia, in Álava, where he was born. Unai Simón became interested in the sport of climbing due to his career as a climber who won the mountain jersey in the Giro d’Italia. One of his brothers developed his passion for cycling, while the current goalkeeper of the Spanish soccer team chose to dedicate himself to soccer.

Unai Simón and his private sentimental life

One of the most unknown players on the team is Unai Simón, the national team’s goalkeeper. He is not very extroverted and prefers not to participate in social networks. His name is a secret, although he has a girlfriend.

Unai Simón is a 24-year-old introvert who is not present on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram and has no tattoos on his skin. In the same interview, he revealed that he does not have any tattoos and does not appreciate gold like some of his peers.

The goalkeeper is a calm, firm and serious person who concentrates on what he is passionate about. The Athletic Club player affirms that he maintains lifelong friendships despite the success in his professional career. “On the field I don’t laugh but I enjoy it at home or in the locker room, I don’t cry when I make a mistake nor do I get too happy when playing a good game, I just take it seriously,” he says.

Although his paternal family has Zamoran roots, Unai Simón was born in Murguía, in Álava. When he was a child, he spent summers in a small town called San Marcial.

Furthermore, he has claimed that he has a girlfriend, but no one knows who she is. On occasion, he has expressed that he has a group of very healthy friends, to whom he can communicate any problem, he has a partner and has a large number of people who support him.

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Unai Simón and his sporting career

Unai Simón began his sporting career, in a series, in the Aurrera Sports Clubfrom Vitoria, a club of which he was part of the lower categories until he was 14 years old, drawing the attention of observers of the Athletic Bilbao for his height and for his qualities under the sticks. He then entered the Lezama school as a cadet, and had to leave his town in Álava to go live in Bilbao, where he lived with a married couple.

The Bilbao team was responsible for paying for Unai Simón’s studies, and when he finished high school he enrolled in Physiotherapy. However, it took him a short time to realize that this was not what he wanted, starting a career in Business Administration and Management, a career that he continues studying.

His arrival in the Athletic first team seemed really complicated as he was fighting for the position with Kepa Arrizabalaga, Iago Herrerín and Alex Remiro. They all surpassed Unai Simón in terms of seniority and experience and that made him think about leaving the club. But at 21 years old he got the opportunity to play on loan in the Elche.

However, a series of linked circumstances led Unai Simón back to Bilbao. Kepa’s departure for England, the injury of the one called to replace him, Herrerín, and Remiro’s departure to Real Sociedad led to his return. He took advantage of his opportunity and became the undisputed starter to this day.

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Unai Simón and his origins

The fact that Unai Simón managed to put on goalkeeper gloves It wasn’t a preconceived plan., but, as on many other occasions, it was the result of chance. Although he lived with his family in the town of Murcia, in Vitoria, where his father had been assigned, he went to spend his holidays in his father’s town, San Marcial del Vino, in Zamora, and there he played with his friends. endless games, but in the forward position. The fact is that due to his height, as also happens on many occasions, A coach friend told him to try out as a goalkeeper.something that didn’t please him too much, but that would end up changing his life definitively.

At the age of 15, his father videotaped all his matches to analyze and study every detail to improve. The goalkeeper is the pride of San Marcial del Vino.

Aurrera de Vitoria was his first serious team, and from there to Athletic de Bilbao, where he had to go live alone, without his family, but where his father went every weekend to see his son, and to He took advantage of and recorded all the matches on video, which he later used to analyze and study every detail and improve day by day.

This ended up turning a good goalkeeper into a great goalkeeper, starting in his team and in the Spanish national team, while his father continues to watch his son from the El Cruce bar, in San Marcial del Vino, after playing a game of mus.

Unai Simón, the university goalkeeper with a phobia of social networks

Unai Simón’s success in football contrasts greatly with his personality and his reserved private life. The Athletic Club goalkeeper is one of the few footballers who does not use social networks, as he prefers to stay away from them: “I protect my privacy better than the goal”, he assured in an interview with a sports newspaper. “I’m on the sidelines, I don’t find any benefit from them. I don’t like to expose myself to the media. I’m not a very extroverted person. I would rather expose myself to 60,000 people in a field than to 10 journalists”he explained.

Another of Unai Simón’s great secrets is that, apart from his sporting career, he is one of the few professional footballers who has decided to continue studying, just like Xabi Alonso. It was during confinement when he chose to focus on his university studies: “It’s something that you can’t attend to as much as you want when you have training. This course I enrolled in ADE because I wanted to continue studying and because it is also a good way to spend the afternoon.” Confinement due to the coronavirus crisis was an opportunity for Unai Simón, who took advantage of the time at home to focus on his university studies. “It’s something that you can’t attend to as much as you want when you have training. This course I enrolled in ADE because I wanted to continue studying and because it is also a good way to spend the afternoon.”

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