Leganés’ cucumber-shaped Pepino de Oro makes a splash with humour and history | OneFootball

Leganés, a Spanish second-tier club, is set to award its eighth Pepino de Oro, a cucumber-shaped trophy that has lit up social media and boosted the club’s pre-season showpiece on 8 August.

According to L'Équipe, the award was introduced in 2018 to honour the winner of the Villa de Leganés Trophy, now in its 46th edition. The vegetable-shaped prize quickly went viral as many online chose to see a phallic object.

The city on Madrid’s outskirts was once famed for cucumber and gherkin farming in the mid-20th century. Since the 1970s it has grown into a major suburb with 190,000 residents and a club that moves between the first and second divisions. That heritage lives on in the nickname los pepineros for locals, players and fans.

Club communications staffer José Bermejo says it is a cucumber and they let imaginations run, noting the idea began as a 2016 joke on X before they thought, why not, knowing it would amuse supporters. He adds that, with heavy competition in Madrid, the aim was to stand out with humour and history.

The fixture has become one of the club’s biggest events of the year, with simple posts of a gold cucumber for the winner and silver for the loser drawing millions of people on their channels. Last year, opponents Levante even promoted their desire to add it to their honours, and it is gaining a touch of prestige. For now, the approach is working.

Source: L'Équipe

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