No less than 21 matadors - three more than in 2023 - have been selected to take part in this year’s enlarged Copa Chenel certamen. The competition will take place between March and July over 23 corridas - seven opening rounds, a three-corrida second stage, four semifinals, a final with three toreros and a grand final with two matadors performing mano a mano. A total of 29 ganaderías will provide toros bravos.

The organisers have persisted with the grand final format despite last year’s mano a mano turning into a single torero encerrona after one of the finalists was caught on his opening bull. But the practice of deducting performance points for each aviso given is, thankfully, no more after Borja Jiménez was prevented from being a grand finalist last year when a president forgot to signal for avisos to be given to Juan del Álamo after the appropriate time had elapsed.

So, who amongst the field of 27 stands a good chance of being the competition’s winner? If your money is on the matadors with most experience, you would plump for one of Alejandro Marcos, Antonio Puerta, the Mexican Luis David Adame, Mario Sotos, Rafael Rodríguez Escribano Rafael de Julia (the veteran in the pack, his alternativa dating back to 2001), the French torero Thomas Joubert or the Peruvian Alfonso Simpson Alfonso de Lima, who will be in his 16th full season as a matador de toros. If, on the other hand, you fancy the chances of one of the new up-and-coming matadors, then you would probably choose between Alejandro Fermín, Christian Parejo and Victor Hernández (each of whom is also set to confirm his alternativa in this year’s Feria de San Isidro), Manuel Diosleguarde, or Álvaro Alarcón, Diego García or Cristian Pérez, the last three having taken the alternativa last season.

The remaining participants - the Portuguese Manuel Dias Gomes and Miguel Ángel Pacheco, Ángel Jiménez El Astigitano, Javier Moreno Lagartijo, Antonio Grande, José Fernando Molina and Rubén Sanz (who took the alternativa in 2009, but made no appearances from 2016 to 2020) - must be considered long shots at this stage, but the competition has sprung surprises before and could well do so again.

The certamen has a good track record, with Fernando Adrián, Francisco de Manuel and Isaac Fonseca being the triunfadores to date. All the corridas (the first of which will be held on March 2) will be televised and streamed live by free-to-view Telemadrid, which should prove some interesting additional viewing on top of the 100+ corridas programmed for 2024 by pay-per-view OneToro.