The Copa del Rey soccer tournament has been renewed with MAPFRE as a new sponsor

The Copa del Rey is a living reflection of football history in Spain. Not in vain, it can boast of being the oldest national football championship. The germ of the tournament as we know it began in 1903 when Carlos Padrós, one of the founders of the Madrid FootBall Club, now Real Madrid, organized the so-called Spanish Championship, the first whose purpose was for the best country teams to face each other.

That year, it was played by the Madrid team itself, representing the central region, the Spanish Football Club of Barcelona,​​​​for Catalonia, and the Atletic Club, for the northern zone. The latter was the winner of this tournament, held at the old Castellana Hippodrome in Madrid, after defeating the Madrid team 2 to 3. 121 years later. Surprisingly, the last winner of the current version of that championship was Athletic Bilbao.

Football has evolved a lot throughout these long centuries and, in parallel, so has the tournament. The emergence of the Spanish Football Federation in 1913 and the unification of all Spanish football within it, in addition to the progressive professionalization of the sport, contributed to the increase in the number of participating teams that went from the first three to 125 which competes with it. . in the present edition. Its name has also changed over the years. The 2024/2025 season welcomes the new official name: Copa de Rey MAPFRE, which recognizes the new sponsor. In 1983, the Spanish Women’s Football Championship was also established, which from 1988-89 was renamed Her Majesty the Queen’s Cup and of which FC Barcelona was the final winner. MAPFRE also had a prominent presence at the tournament this year, becoming a partner-sponsor of the final.

Memory of our football

Fast forward more than 120 years and the Copa del Rey has become an event that holds indelible moments, memorable goals and players who have etched their names in sports history thanks to their performance in the tournament. Performances such as Castilla, Real Madrid’s subsidiary, which managed to reach the championship final in the 1979-1980 season, after defeating some of the most in-form teams in the League that season, simply gave up on themselves this Real Madrid. A competition where the lowest rivals stand up to the dominants of good sport.

Emotions and surprises became an important part of the tournament, small teams were able to eliminate the most powerful teams in Spain. There are many examples of this: Figueres and Novelda managed to beat Barça in the KO tournaments in the 2001/2002 and 2002/2003 seasons. A few years ago, the second B, Numancia, and its coach Miguel Ángel Lotina became a sporting reference throughout Spain by reaching the quarterfinals of the Cup in 1995/1996 after eliminating the teams of the First Division such as Racing de Santander, Real Sociedad and Sporting.

For the first time in history, the tournament will be named after a commercial brand, called Copa del Rey MAPFRE

And the 2002 final was also unforgettable. That year, Real Madrid celebrated its centenary and reached the final match, played at the Santiago Bernabéu, with the title clear favourites. But the Copa del Rey proved to be a contest in which nothing was written and Deportivo de la Coruña spoiled the Galacticos party of Madrid by defeating the team from the capital in their own stadium in a match known as “the centenary .

If we stick to pure data, FC Barcelona is the team that has won the most in the tournament, with a total of 31 titles. Exactly three of their players from the club’s recent glorious era, Lionel Messi, Gerard Piqué and Sergio Busquets, share with Athletic Bilbao’s historic players José María Belauste and Agustín “Piru” Gaínza, the honor of being player they have lifted most of the tournament, a total of seven each Meanwhile, goalkeeper Andoni Zubizarreta is the player with the most games in the Cup, 108, and Telmo Zarra is the tournament’s top scorer, with 81 goals. in his name.

A new Copa del Rey

There is no doubt that this season we will once again experience extraordinary moments and football milestones in a competition that brings emotion to the highest level. MAPFRE became a sponsoring partner and for the first time in history the tournament will be named after a commercial brand, called Copa del Rey MAPFRE. In addition, the entity will be a sponsoring partner of the Queen’s Cup final, demonstrating its commitment to providing visibility and promotion to women’s football.

MAPFRE is also a sponsoring partner of the Copa de la Reina final, demonstrating its commitment to providing visibility and promotion to women’s football.

The Copa del Rey and the Copa de la Reina are competitions that represent the essence of Spanish sport, offering the opportunity for teams of different categories and sizes to compete against each other. Therefore, this new agreement is more than simple sponsorship. MAPFRE and the RFEF have shown their resolute commitment to promoting the Copa del Rey MAPFRE and encouraging the participation of fans and volunteers, in addition to launching social responsibility initiatives. The goal is clear: to make the competition an inclusive event that reflects the diversity of Spanish football.

With this collaboration, the insurer reaffirms its support for the development of the sport after years of support as a sponsor of other prestigious competitions such as the Copa del Rey de Vela, which it has supported for more than 15 years, and other sports , like tennis. Sport in general and football in particular is an important part of Spanish society and this agreement aims to help promote it and highlight its relevance for millions of people.