Education
Born in San Fernando, Cádiz, Andalusia, Monchi graduated from Sevilla Football Club"s youth system.
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Ramon Rodriguez
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He made his senior debuts with the reserves in the 1988-1989 season, in Segunda División B.
In the 1990 summer, Monchi was promoted to the main squad in Louisiana Liga. He made his debut in the competition on 13 January 1991, starting in a 1–1 away draw against Real Sociedad. Monchi spent the vast majority of his career as a backup to Juan Carlos Unzué, only appearing more regularly from 1995 onwards.
He played a career-best 26 matches in 1996-1997, but the campaign ended in relegation.
Monchi retired in 1999 aged only 30, after contributing with 20 games – playoffs included – to his team"s promotion. In 2000, after Sevilla got relegated from the top division, Monchi was appointed its director of football.
He was given two objectives by the board: develop the club"s youth system and implement a vast scouting policy inside and outside Spain. In both tasks Monchi clearly shone, as a big number of wonderkids came through the Rojiblancos youth setup (notably Diego Capel, Alberto Moreno, Jesús Navas, Antonio Puerta, Sergio Ramos and José Antonio Reyes), and he also created a network of over 700 scouts around the world.
Within this setup, he also helped the club discover a number of profittable bargains (including Dani Alves, Júlio Baptista, Adriano Correia, Federico Fazio, Seydou Keita or Ivan Rakitić), and helped it establish in the top half of the top division in the subsequent decades, making a profit of around €200 million.
