The Prince of Asturias Cup (, ) was an inter-regional football competition contested by the regional selections of Spain – selections of players from clubs from the region in question, meaning that players did not need to be native to the region. The tournament was created in 1913 by the FECF (Federación Española de Clubs de Football), a forerunner of the RFEF, in honour of the donator of the trophy, don Alfonso, Prince of Asturias, the first-born son of King Alfonso XIII and Prince of Asturias. After that, there have been seven tournaments for the Prince of Asturias Cup under the umbrella of the national committee of the RFEF (Spanish FA), the first of which was organized in 1915.
The first editions (1914 to 1918) of the competition were held in Madrid and the registration of the regional federations was voluntary. At the end of the fourth edition, the competition was stopped due to a lack of interest, and the trophy was awarded to the Centro federation for winning two editions (1917 & 1918). In July 1922 it was agreed to introduce a new trophy called the Interregional Championship, which would be held on the road and with the mandatory participation of all regional federations associated with the Spanish FA. The high economic costs of travel again led to the disappearance of the competition, with a final tournament being played in 1926 with the aim of awarding ownership of the second trophy in dispute, and the champion was Catalonia.
The Prince of Asturias Cup is among the oldest Spanish football competitions along with the Copa de la Coronación and the Copa del Rey. Notable figures of this tournament are Santiago Bernabéu, Pichichi, Ricardo Zamora, Josep Samitier and Paulino Alcántara.
History FECF Prince of Asturias Cup (1913) The competition was originally created in 1913 by the Federación Española de Clubs de Football (FECF), a forerunner of the RFEF, in honour of the donator of the trophy, don Alfonso, Prince of Asturias, the first-born son of King Alfonso XIII and Prince of Asturias. This took place when Juan Padrós Rubio (the 2nd official President of Real Madrid) held the FECF presidency. Coincidence or not, just as Juan Padrós Rubio was the driving force behind the Prince of Asturias Cup, his brother, Carlos Padrós Rubio, was the driving force behind the Copa del Rey.
The squads were selected by the clubs of each region, rather than by regional federations like in the next RFEF tournaments. The teams registered were the Center team (made up of players from Madrid FC, Gimnástica de Madrid and Español), the North team (made up solely by Racing de Irún) and the Military Academies (made up of the Infantry Academy), the latter withdrawing before the start of the tournament.
The tournament was held in Madrid during the anniversary of the Prince of Asturias on 11 and 12 May 1913. The first leg was won by the North team . The North won the second leg too, but in a controversial way. With only ten minutes played, it started hailing hard, so the match was temporarily stopped, and when the referee ordered to resume it, the Center players did not return to the pitch, so the North team scored an empty net goal and the match ended.
Subsequently, the FECF Assembly agreed to repeat the second leg, ordering the two teams to fix a date and place. At the end of June there was still no date fixed. At the beginning of July it was reported that the match would take place at the end of that same month in Irun. Besides the Center team would travel accompanied by Ricardo Ruiz Ferry, the then president of the FECF. In fact Ruiz Ferry went to Guipuzkoa in August, but only to meet in San Sebastián with representatives of the Real Union Española de Clubs de Football (RUECF), a split from the FECF, and negotiate with them the merge of the two federations. The presidents of these two entities, Ruiz Ferry and Julián Olave, eventually reached an agreement in September, which culminated in the creation of the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF).
RFEF tournaments (1914–26) After its foundation on 1 September 1913, one of the first initiatives taken by the Royal Spanish Football Federation, was to promote the creation of a regional team championship that would serve as the first major "showcase" of Spanish football: To help spot the best players of the moment and consequently assemble a group of the players that made the best impression throughout the tournament to establish the bases for the formation of a Spanish team that could compete with other international teams.
The tournament was officially established by the Ordinary Assembly of the RFEF in 1914.
Prince of Asturias Cup I The first edition of this competition was held from 10 to 14 May 1915 in Madrid, and more specifically in the fenced field that Atlético Madrid had between the streets of Narváez and O'Donnell. The new competition pitted the regional teams of Catalonia (which encompassed Barcelona, Lleida and Tarragona), Castile — under the denomination of the Centro team (which encompassed Madrid and the wider Castile region) — and Basque Country — under the denomination of Norte team (which encompassed Basque Country and Cantabria). The opening match between the Catalans and the Castilians was held on 10 May 1915, and was attended by his Majesty King Alfonso XIII, who chatted with the players during the break. The author of the competition's first-ever goal was Catalonia's Paulino Alcántara, who was only 18 years old at the time, and although Centro fought back and found an equalizer through René Petit, it was Catalonia who found the winner via Antonio Baró to beat the Centro team 2–1, with all the goals coming in the first half.
Two days later the North team entered the fray, and defeated Catalonia with a solitary late goal from Juan Legarreta, even though Catalonia played better. Finally, the teams from the Center and the North met for the decisive game, and the Basques, who were playing without their biggest star Pichichi, managed to go ahead after the break with a goal from Patricio, but the hosts fought back and equalized shortly after courtesy of Santiago Bernabéu. René Petit then missed a penalty, which was attributed to the fact that the field was not grass. In any case, the game was formidable and the draw was enough for the Basques to win the cup, although according to the press, they were not the best team. As for the top scorers, there was a six-fold tie at one goal as six different players scored all the goals of this first edition of the tournament. These accolades were also distributed among the three teams, as they all finished tied at two goals each.
Results
Norte's line-up: Eizaguirre, Carrasco, Hurtado, Artola, Belauste I, Peña, Legarreta, Patricio, Belauste II, Pagaza and Echevarría (Pedro Barturen). 4 of these players, Belauste I, Belauste II and Echevarría, played for Athletic Bilbao at the 1915 Copa del Rey Final.
Centro's line-up: Pelous, Carruana, Beguiristain, Eulogio Aranguren, Feliciano Rey, Machimbarrena, Quintana, René Petit, Álvarez, Montero, Sotero Aranguren (Bernabéu).
Catalonia's line-up: Luis Bru, Reguera (Santiago Massana), Miguel Matifoll (Casellas), Torralba, Alfredo Massana, Alcántara, Monistrol, Mallorquí, Baró, Peris and Martínez (Kinké).
Prince of Asturias Cup II The following year the competition was held in Madrid again, but this time it did not reach the sporting success and brilliance of the previous one. The title holders, the North Team, did not participate because they were unable to gather all their members due to disagreements that occurred within their own regional federation. Thus, the title was contested only by the Catalan and Central teams, even though the triangular format was kept until the last moment. This new edition was played on the same venue as the previous one, with a double confrontation (due to the absence of the Basques) between both teams, the first of which was played on 11 May 1916 with a Catalan victory by 6–3, after showing total superiority over a disappointing local team. The star of the game was Francisco Cabedo, who scored the competition's first-ever (and only) hat-trick when he netted 4 goals past Centro's goalkeeper Juan de Cárcer, who was thus replaced by Joaquín Pascual for the second leg, which was much more competitive and with a slight local superiority since it found themselves 2–0 up with 20 minute to go, knowing that this win would force a play-off for the title, but Kinké wrecked Centro's hopes with a quick late brace that salvaged a 2–2 draw to the Catalans. Catalonia thus won the Prince of Asturias Cup for the first time in their history.
Results
Because of the absence of the Northern team, a second match was played between Catalonia and Centro, elucidating the title to a two-legged final.
Catalonia's line-up was exactly the same for both games: Gibert; Pakán, Sampere, Salvó I; Casellas, Prat, Kinké, Monistrol; Cabedo, López and Raich. Four of these players, Gibert, Pakán, Sampere and López, played for Espanyol at the 1915 Copa del Rey Final.
Centro's line-ups: Cárcer (Pascual); Erice (La Serna), Carruana; E. Aranguren (Tejedor), René Petit (Castell), Quintana; Álvarez, Santiago Bernabéu, E. Uribarri (Pelous), Larrañaga and De Miguel. Four of these players, Erice, Petit, Álvarez and De Miguel, played for Madrid FC at the 1917 Copa del Rey final.
Top Scorers Rank Player Team Goals 1 Francisco Cabedo 4 2 Kinké 3 3 Larrañaga Centro 2
Prince of Asturias Cup III The third edition of the tournament suffered again the absence of the Northern Team, whose Basque Football Federation was going through a convulsive period between the teams from Biscay and Gipuzkoa, culminating in a pivotal championship match between Athletic Bilbao (Biscay) and Real Sociedad (Gipuzkoa) being abandoned, and so, the recently created Federation of Cantabria took advantage of the absence of the Northern Team that was still in internal disputes, and sent its representation to Madrid to compete with Centro and Catalonia. The 1917 edition was wrapped in controversy because it was allowed to be played on the same day as the final of the 1917 Copa del Rey between Madrid FC and Arenas de Getxo, which prevented the Central Team from having the players of Madrid FC, and thus, in order to assemble a team which could compete, they had to call-up the players from Athletic Madrid and Racing de Madrid, meaning they sent a weaker team with lesser-known players such as Racing's Pascual, Buylla, Zabala and Pablo De Miguel (the brother of Antonio, who had played and scored in the previous edition); and Atlético's Yañez, Miguel Mieg, Quintana, Agüero, and Saturno Villaverde, with the captain of this team being Madrid FC's only representative, José María Castell, and yet, against all odds, the "second options" managed to win the tournament for the first time in the team's history.