Dale fans fund first trip for Jesús Sánchez to see club play

Jesús Sánchez

Dale fans have rallied together to fund the trip of a lifetime for Spanish supporter Jesús Sánchez - bringing him to the UK to see the club play for the first time ever.

The idea came from Jonny Beckett and Darren Roy, two fellow Rochdale fans who had been chatting with Jesús.

The fan, under the moniker ‘Spanish Dale’, became a supporter of the team after he chose to play as Rochdale on a Fifa game. Jesús is such a fan of the team, he had a shirt specially made last season with his username on it.

Jonny, who lives in Bamford, said: “We got more and more involved with Jesús and we thought it would be a good idea to bring him over to see them play.

“We went on the forum to see what the vibe would be and everyone was saying they were well up for it. More came on board after we went to a quiz at The Flying Horse in Rochdale.

“Originally, we were going to surprise him, but someone shared a post. He was proper overwhelmed. I’m going to put him up when he comes over. He just needs to pick a Saturday after he gets a passport sorted out and we’ll pay for his flights. The club are aware and he’ll have the chance to meet the players.”

Jesús said: “It’s not easy to explain how I feel, it's a mix between happiness and shyness. Happiness because this is something which I’ve dreamt about a lot of time and shyness because many people are giving money.

“There aren’t many people who do things like this, that’s why I feel so grateful to everybody and I love this club and these fans more, not because they’ve donated, but because of all the messages of love I’ve read everywhere.”

Speaking about how he came to support Rochdale, the Spanish fan commented: “It may sound strange but It was due to a Fifa game. I wanted to play with a team from the last league in the UK, go up to Premier and win everything. Since that day, every Fifa I choose Rochdale at least once and I’ve followed the team on the internet. In 2014. I thought 'I’m going to look for it on Twitter' and I found they went up to League One; from then I’ve followed everything of Rochdale.

“Two years ago I decided to run a Twitter account of Dale from Spain. Now I love to write there and speak with everybody. I never thought that with this account some day this could happen."

In less than 24 hours, fans had managed to raise £325 towards the young Spanish fan’s flights- smashing the initial £200 target. The total currently stands at £420.

Frances Fielding, sales and marketing manager at Rochdale AFC, said: “We are looking forward to welcoming Jesús Sánchez (aka Spanish Dale) to Rochdale and will make sure he receives the VIP treatment. It has been his dream to come and watch the Dale and our supporters raised the money to pay for the cost of his flights in under two hours which is incredible. It goes to show what truly magnificent fans we have at Rochdale Football Club.”

To donate towards Jesús’ trip, visit:

https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/darren-roy