San Isidro, May 18: Misalignment
Jesús Enrique Colombo at full stretch beside the bull to place banderillas
I’m not sure what today’s crowd in Las Ventas came hoping to see. The atmosphere throughout was decidely flat, the spectators only really coming alive for Jesús Enrique Colombo’s banderillas, even though all but one of his six pairs were placed with the matador beside the bull after the horns had gone past.
I’m not saying the results of today’s corrida should have been any different - there was no complete faena, after all - just that greater appreciation could have been shown towards some of the toreros and some of today’s Pedraza de Yeltes bulls. Perhaps people (and possibly the bulls) were affected by the unseasonably high heat, which is due to increase over the coming days…
Although the Salamancan ganadería has still to achieve a success in Madrid to rank with those it seems to regularly record in France, it provided two excellent bulls today - the second and third - and all the animals were good-looking and made for interesting tercios de varas. It was noticeable that these bulls were coming to faenas with their mouths closed, in contrast to previous days in which tongues would often be out in banderillas.
Domingo López Chaves is a veteran of toreando toros duros and began well with verónicas and a pleasant sequence of capework taking the afternoon’s first bull to the picador. His quite was brief, Javier Cortés’s one of feet-together verónicas longer, and - uncharacteristically for a pedraza - the bull soon tired in the faena following some promising initial derechazos and a couple of decent naturales. López Chaves despatched it with a fine estocada. The tone of the day was set when he came out from the callejón to take saludos and was whistled.
Domingo López Chaves in a derechazo
By the time the fourth bull emerged, any breeze had gone: it was just hot. López Chaves produced a nice quite of slow verónicas after the pedraza had made its own way to the picador. In the faena, the Salamancan persisted in pegging single passes despite one near-cogida. It ended with an estocada in the bull’s side and a division of opinions, the bull taken out to silence. The Salamancan had had misfortune in the sorteo.
Javier Cortés, brought in to replace Diego Carretero (injured in a preparatory tienta) after cutting an ear here on May 10, gave a lovely, calm, studied and stylish faena to his first bull, managing impressive linked series with either hand. Another ear would have been his, but he went on too long, lowering the faena’s tone, delivered a forward estocada trasera and needed two descabellos to finish things. After initially acknowledging the crowd’s applause from the callejón, he was eventually enticed out onto the sand for saludos.
Javier Cortés would have won a 2nd San Isidro ear but for the sword
His second pedraza was a beautiful brown and, after little decorative capework initially, Javier produced an interesting quite of lances given entirely on one hand. The cuadrilla appeared to take fright with this animal, the tercio de banderillas comprising a dispiriting series of single sticks, the crowd whistling its annoyance. The faena took a while to get going, Cortés eventually managing short series of derechazos and naturales. This time, the sword went in to the hilt, although it looked a bit low, and silence followed for both bull and matador.
Jesús Enrique Colombo was confident with the capote
Jesús Enrique Colombo was at his best in quites to Cortes’s bulls, his first a series of chicuelinas ended with an arrogant lance in which the young Venezuelan sent one half of the capote falling to the ground, and his second a tanda of verónicas muy templadas. He failed to make the most of his fine first bull, producing a faena de más a menos and nearly getting impaled in the back in a sequence of bernadinas: an estocada caída led to a division, while the bull won applause. The sixth bull lifted picador and horse high in the first of two lengthy varas. In the faena, Colombo gave the animal series of short naturales but steered clear of attempting anything with his right hand. A desarme found the matador running for the barrera, the bull chasing hard behind. The estocada was in the bull’s shoulder and Colombo was tossed up in the air after he allowed his attention to wander when preparing to descabellar. I wonder if he will ever make the grade - if I was his manager, I’d urge him to abandon his disastrous (albeit crowd-pleasing) banderillas and concentrate on improving his work with muleta and sword.
As usual, the pedrazas provided interest en varas