Enrique Molina (footballer)

Enrique Molina Soler (4 May 1904 – 15 July 1943) was a Spanish footballer who played as a midfielder for Valencia CF. Apart from football, he also played Basque pelota in Valencia, and was one of the organizers of the Volta a Peu del Mercantil Valenciano.

Early life
Enrique Molina was born on 4 May 1904 in the Russafa neighborhood, which at that time had just been annexed to the city of Valencia, into a conservative and deeply Catholic family. It was a small district surrounded by orchards, in which his family worked and in which he began to play football, a sport that was beginning to enjoy some success in the city of Valencia.

Playing career
From a very young age he stood out as an athlete and for his physical form, so at the age of 16, he joined the ranks of the now-extinct Unión Levantina. He remained there for two seasons, until 1922, when he joined Gimnástico FC, where he played alongside the likes of Silvino and Alfredo Arróniz. While there, he became the most notable midfielder in the city, standing out for his bravery on the field of play and his extraordinary ability to recover balls in the center of the field, pushing the team towards the attack with an energy never seen in those times.

In the summer of 1924, Molina was signed by Valencia CF, which meant greatly weakening its eternal rival, and in fact, they won the following three Campeonato Regional de Valencia, with Molina playing a crucial role in those titles. In his first year, however, his performances were heavily affected by an illness, but he was at his best in the next nine, displaying great pride and consistency that was only interrupted in 1931 due to a knee injury and the enormous impact caused by the death of his wife, whom he had married only a year before. Molina became one of the first great players in the club's history, as he remained in the team for ten seasons, experiencing the first years of the club's professionalization in 1926, the debut in both the Copa del Rey and La Liga in its inaugural season in 1929, and the first promotion to the First Division in 1931, retiring in 1934, shortly before the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936. Together with Cirilo Amorós and Enrique Salvador, Molina formed what was known as the "glorious media", which achieved the first feats in national football. In 1929, with an economic crisis at the club, he agreed to reduce the fee and calmed down an attempted rebellion by the footballers against the coach.

Molina was a very temperamental man; for instance, during his time as a referee, he assaulted a La Correspondencia de Valencia. On another occasion, during a match in Torrero against Iberia, he was attacked with an umbrella by a spectator, and Molina, without flinching, snatched the weapon from him and ended up throwing the fan out of the stadium. He once even drove his car into the Mestalla Stadium to remove a referee who was threatened by the stands.

Admired by critics and caricaturists, Molina received thunderous ovations not only at Mestalla, but also in rival stadiums, notably in his farewell match in a League fixture in Vitoria-Gasteiz, when the entire audience at the Mendizorrotza stood up and paid a resounding tribute to him. In 1933, he was the subject of a tribute match, a friendly match against the Spanish national team in the Mestalla Stadium on 30 April 1933, a team for which he was permanently called up, but with which he unfairly never made his debut. In total, he played 323 games with the Valencia club.

Later life and death
Once he retired, Molina was able to start a small business with the little savings generated by his activity as a player.

A Falangist since before the outbreak of the Civil War, Molina enrolled in the Blue Division as a volunteer, a militia that moved from Spain to provide support to the Army of Nazi Germany in the fight against the Soviet Union during the Second World War. He died after being attacked by cannon fire while transporting two Nazi Germany drivers on a motorcycle with a sidecar during the Siege of Leningrad on 15 July 1943. The chronicles of the time relate that he was hit by a shell and the shrapnel shattered his skull. He was buried in the Mestelevo cemetery.

Molina's case was not the only one of a professional Spanish football player who joined the Blue Division, with Ramón Herrera, a player for Sporting de Gijón and Atlético Madrid, also going to fight in Soviet lands alongside Nazi Germany, but unlike Molina, Herrera had better luck and returned to Spain.

Honours
Valencia Championship:
 * Valencia CF
 * Winners (7) 1925, 1926, 1927, 1931, 1932, 1933, and 1924