Former soccer player Pelayo Novo, who played for Albacete, Oviedo, and Elche, among other teams, died on Tuesday at the age of 32 after being hit by a train on the outskirts of the Asturian capital. As EL PAÍS has learned, the former soccer player threw himself onto the road as the convoy passed. Both the Football Federation and the teams in which he played have published messages of condolence on the death of the player, who was confined to a wheelchair in 2018 after falling from the third floor of a hotel in Huesca, where he was going to play a match. with Albacete.
Real Oviedo, the club where Novo was trained as a player and where he played in Second B and whose foundation he was linked to, has mourned the death of the player, who was born in the city in 1990. “We are heartbroken. We deeply regret the death of Pelayo Novo, captain of our Foundation. Family and friends, we are with you”, writes the Oviedista club on its Twitter account.
The former player returned to the city after the accident that left him confined to a wheelchair. After passing through the center for paraplegics in Toledo, Novo returned to sports, as a wheelchair tennis player. In fact, he was part of the board of directors of the Asturian Tennis Federation and had returned to compete for thanks to this sport.
As a footballer, in the 2012-13 season, he moved from Oviedo to Elche, the club with which he made the leap to the second division. In addition to Elche, in the second he played with Córdoba, Lugo, and Albacete, which also regretted the loss of the player.
“In a short time you managed to win the affection of a whole hobby that now mourns your terrible loss,” wrote Albacete, seconding the statement also issued by Lugo, in which the Lugo entity described the pain for the loss of Novo as “indescribable ”.
Likewise, the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) has lamented the death of Pelayo Novo through a tweet in which it has written: “We will always remember his smile despite the difficulties experienced. A heartfelt hug to his family and friends ”.
He signed up for Albacete in 2017 and was a member of this club when, on Saturday, March 31, 2018, he suffered an accident that left him in a wheelchair. In a concentration hotel in Huesca, where his team was going to play that afternoon against the local club, he fell from a third floor. Urgently admitted to Zaragoza, he spent nearly two months in the hospital, and in October his retirement from football was confirmed. He dedicated himself to wheelchair tennis, becoming an example of self-improvement. He was part of the board of directors of the Asturian Tennis Federation as a member of Nuevas Disciplinas and competed in many events of the specialty, in which he was ranked 12th in the Spanish ranking, according to the Spanish Tennis Federation.
Novo was very loved in the Asturian community and since the news of his death, there have been many expressions of pain in the city, where he ran a dog grooming salon with his partner.
“I give tremendous value to details, because it is not easy for people to hold you in this way in their hearts, and that is something that fills me with pride and gratitude,” Novo himself commented just a year ago when He received the Herrerita Award that Oviedism grants to his figures.
