Emilio de Justo is tested for the first time in the field: he did it yesterday at Enrique Ponce’s farm

We wrote it in April. And we do it again in August: only those who have suffered an injury as delicate as that of Emilio de Justo know that pain, an unbearable pain at times. The mishap was very serious, although the absence of blood made many forget it too soon: the bullfighter from Extremadura, at the best moment of his career, in full swing, fractured two vertebrae, C1 and C2, known in medicine as atlas and axis, in his solo afternoon on Palm Sunday at Las Ventas. One hundred and fifteen days later, he tested himself for the first time yesterday in the field. He did it in Cetrina, Enrique Ponce’s estate, in a sunset with the most intimate. The man from Extremadura wanted to know his sensations against the bravo. And he was phenomenal, as ABC has learned: three cows (and a half) in which it was seen that his purity is still intact. There was everything: the emotion of being reunited with the animal that gives him life and also the inconvenience, since it is still difficult for him to turn his neck, although in front of the animal the rigidity was forgotten. His mishap was very, very serious. This is how the medical report read then, after he threw himself to kill the first bull in his cage as if there were no tomorrow: «He was examined for intense cervical pain and severe functional limitation of the cervical spine, but without any sensory neurological involvement and motor. An X-ray was performed in which no displacements or dislocations were observed, a CT scan of the cervical spine showed a burst fracture of the left lateral mass of the atlas (C1) and a burst fracture of the right lateral mass of the axis (C2), with no appreciable displacements. An urgent MRI was also performed without medullary involvement or canal-occupying lesions being appreciated, with atlantoodontoid ligamentous injury. The patient is hospitalized pending definitive immobilization. Very serious prognosis. Barely a month later, in the heart of San Isidro, Lances de Futuro, a Garzón company, released the hopeful news of his reappearance on August 21 at the Virgen del Mar Fair in Almería. But the ocean of recovery is immense. And each advance, a struggle against pain. One more step, every day. But the swell of the injury is strong and there are still many waters to navigate. Only he and his family know his struggle up close: setting a goal to return has made him recover at superhuman speed. De Justo smiled again yesterday. Today he will fight in the hall. And tomorrow, again field. And so… Alternate days to try and try with the dream of coming back in August and doing a kind of ‘pre-season’ in Spain before his tour in America. The countdown But Emilio de Justo is also clear from the beginning that the bull and the fans do not understand mishaps and want a one hundred percent bullfighter. His is the decision, a personal decision, in which he must watch over him exclusively. There are still three weeks to go and his sensations will be the best beacon of his evolution and his determination. It is already known that the lights are of a different kind, but if he were not fully recovered, forcing the machine would be crazy. Winter is long, on this and the other side of the Atlantic. The figure of Torrejoncillo deserves a full return in Spain, in style, with a 2023 season in which he should be in all the flashy places, in category posters. And not because of the mishap, no: simply on his own merits, because he has earned it. If bullfighting has memory, he must not forget that a bullfighter fell into the rubber for his heroic challenge at a time when he did not need it. For himself he did it, for his childhood dream in the name of his father. And also for thanking the Fiesta, so ungrateful at times, for what he had given her. Emilio will return to the bullrings with the bull, which is his life, and he will once again announce himself with six bulls in Madrid. And he will do it big. Let no one doubt it.