Xavi Cencillo has taken a brave step forward. Last July, the young Catalan player publicly announced that he was leaving football at the age of 21, alluding to health problems and without wanting to specify more details from his surroundings. Months later, and advised by doctors who have worked with him since then, Cencillo has confessed that the health problems that pushed him to hang up his boots had a mental origin. “Some have left it for the heart, knees or ankles. You have been touched by the head,” said the doctor. Cencillo has explained his case with great integrity in an interview in ‘Primera Plana’, the Sunday supplement of Mark.
Cencillo was one of the signings of the subsidiary in the summer of 2019 along with others who are still in the discipline such as Rafa Camacho or Alberto García. He was supported by the 20 goals he scored in 2018/19 between Sabadell B and Real Avilés, already in the Third Division. He had a good preseason, and he made his official debut at Los Manantiales against Alhaurín de la Torre, but the problem with the first team chips had a domino effect on Malagueño, and Cencillo ended up on loan at Lorca de Pandiani. In between, the trigger for his early withdrawal took place.
It was the day after playing 25 minutes in a friendly against Melilla. “Nobody expected it, not myself. On August 9, 2019, in the sports city of Malaga, in El Viso, I had a psychotic break. It was not diagnosed until February 2020, so I was playing ill for part of the preseason at Malaga and at Lorca, and I put my life at risk, “says Cencillo crudely, who deepens:”The disease is preceded by events from my childhood, that I was abused by someone outside of my environment”. The former player was then seven years old.
“I had it as a taboo subject, but the doctors recommended that I share it so that it becomes known and also help other people. When I was 16, I started with these mental problems. I endured a lot and they asked me to tell my story openly and on television, and I was delighted and I will do it as many times as necessary. I want to help kids who go through situations similar to mine. I want to help everyone I can, to be able to tell my story to the world of football and help them to be better, ”continues Cencillo in a shocking story.
The former player, who has settled in his native Barcelona to start over, falls apart in praise for Málaga, “the best club I’ve ever been to”, and to which he arrived thanks to his strength to overcome problems, he acknowledges. “I stay with the first two weeks in Malaga, where I performed in training and in games. I’ll stick with that ”, he concludes.
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