{"id":735453,"date":"2026-02-01T15:26:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-01T15:26:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/735453\/"},"modified":"2026-02-01T15:26:11","modified_gmt":"2026-02-01T15:26:11","slug":"two-malaga-born-rugby-stars-in-spain-squad-for-european-championship-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/735453\/","title":{"rendered":"Two Malaga-born rugby stars in Spain squad for European Championship opener"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"v-mdl-ath__p v-mdl-ath__p--6\">\nSunday, 1 February 2026, 14:52<\/p>\n<p class=\"v-p\">Spain\u2019s rugby XV side have included two Malaga-born players in their squad for the opening match of the 2026 European Championship, with Alberto Carmona and Hugo Gonz\u00e1lez selected for the tournament curtain-raiser on 7 February.<\/p>\n<p class=\"v-p\">Head coach Pablo Bouza named the pair for the first call-up of the competition, which also covers a week-long training camp in Madrid, which started on Sunday, 1 February.<\/p>\n<p class=\"v-p\">Carmona, the more experienced of the two, has been a regular in recent squads and currently plays in France, having moved from Toulon to Colomiers. The full-back was part of the side that secured qualification for the 2027 World Cup.<\/p>\n<p class=\"v-p\">Gonz\u00e1lez, meanwhile, is the new face from Malaga. The prop plays for Aviron Bayonnais and is continuing his early steps at senior international level after progressing through Spain\u2019s youth teams.<\/p>\n<p class=\"v-p\">The European Championship features eight teams, with the final phase scheduled for March in Madrid. Spain begin their Group A campaign away to the Netherlands in Amsterdam, with Switzerland and holders Georgia also in the section.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sunday, 1 February 2026, 14:52 Spain\u2019s rugby XV side have included two Malaga-born players in their squad for&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":735454,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5312],"tags":[9030,2000,299,5187,3576,218178,104919,4151,104,46031,5636,12451],"class_list":{"0":"post-735453","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-spain","8":"tag-championship","9":"tag-eu","10":"tag-europe","11":"tag-european","12":"tag-for","13":"tag-malagaborn","14":"tag-opener","15":"tag-rugby","16":"tag-spain","17":"tag-squad","18":"tag-stars","19":"tag-two"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115996077807898523","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=735453"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/735453\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/735454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=735453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=735453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=735453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}