After the final whistle of Rayo Vallecano’s 3-0 Conference League quarter-final first leg win over AEK Athens on April 9, almost the entire crowd of 14,000 stayed behind in the stands for over 15 minutes to sing and celebrate together.

Rayo’s players and coaches remained on the pitch to share a joyful connection with fans whose support had helped the team overwhelm their Greek opponents.

Most of those present eventually headed home, or to the many neighbourhood bars in the working-class Madrid suburb of Vallecas that gives the club its name. But others stayed behind to form queues outside the stadium, with some fans camping out overnight to secure a ticket for the second leg.

That was because Rayo do not, ever, sell tickets online. The only way to attend any game, home or away, is to come to the stadium and buy them in person. It is a unique situation among Spanish professional clubs — as if the internet or mobile phones had never been invented.

For former club goalkeeper Alberto Garcia, it “showed how much Rayo means for many people”.

“Many of those people, without having slept, had to go to work the next day,” he tells The Athletic. “Families or groups of friends who took turns during the night to make sure they got their ticket, for what it meant, to be able to attend that game.

“Rayo is a rebel club. When they face adversity, they take a step forward, do what it takes. That’s the DNA of the Vallecas neighbourhood, and Rayo’s fans.”

AEK dominated the second leg on April 16 and had levelled the tie 3-3 on aggregate by the 51st minute. Then came another example of how the communion between Rayo and their fans is driving one of La Liga’s smallest clubs, and probably its strangest, towards something historic this season.

“I was in the stands in Athens when Rayo went 3-0 down,” says Rayo fan and journalist Carlos Sanchez Blas. “The fans had fear in their bodies, it was all slipping away. Then in one moment, 1,500 supporters started to all sing together ‘In Vallecas, we never give in’.

“Rayo had not got out of their half for about 30 minutes. But everyone started to push, and that moment of connection reached the players. Five minutes later, Isi (Palazon) scored, and for me it was everyone coming together to keep this historic moment alive.”

Isi’s goal changed the momentum of the game completely, and Rayo defended stoutly to see out a 4-3 aggregate victory and set up their semi-final against Ligue 1 side Strasbourg, the first leg of which is tonight in Vallecas.

This is only Rayo’s second ever campaign of European football, and their first for 25 years. They have spent much of the intervening period in Spain’s second division, with strife between the club’s left-leaning fanbase and conservative ownership a constant tension.

Rayo were set to compete in the 2013-14 Europa League, but were unable to secure a UEFA licence due to unpaid debts. This time around, there was uncertainty over whether their rickety old stadium would be able to stage European games, due to a row between Rayo president Raul Martin Presa and local authorities over who pays for maintenance and improvements at the municipal ground.

UEFA did grant a licence this time, but the facilities remain basic. Not selling tickets online is just one of the club’s out-of-date practices. For Rayo’s Conference League play-off second leg against Belarusian side Neman Grodno in August, neither the desks for the media (a triviality) nor the toilets for disabled supporters (a disgrace) had been finished in time.

European rivals have been left bemused. In December, Lech Poznan’s social media team filmed a video showing the cramped and decrepit away dressing rooms.

Szybki tour po naszej szatni 👀 pic.twitter.com/AbS0tQqRCG

— Lech Poznań (@LechPoznan) November 5, 2025

Such conditions have long been suffered by everyone at Rayo. But the club’s particular nature has also helped a unique bond develop between supporters and a core of players who have been through much together.

Captain Isi, midfielders Oscar Valentin and Oscar Trejo and winger Alvaro were team-mates when Garcia kept goal as Rayo yo-yoed between Spain’s top two divisions between 2017 and 2021.

“When you sign for Rayo Vallecano, the fans make you understand that you are one of them,” says Garcia, now a DAZN pundit.

“You’re all in the same boat together: fans, staff, players, coaches. At Rayo, you don’t live in a bubble. Before every game, you park your car on the street and walk through the supporters. You quickly realise it is a different club, with that sense of belonging and communion.”

Few of Rayo’s players have any European experience, and this season has been a completely new adventure for their fanbase, bringing trips to countries such as North Macedonia, Sweden, Slovakia and Turkey.

“People are finding all kinds of incredible ways to make the trips,” Sanchez Blas says, “Three or four connecting flights, trains, buses, car journeys of more than a day across Europe. They are skipping work, skipping medical appointments, for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Some are going right to the limit financially, but the excitement has become something unstoppable.”

Rayo fans show their support from the stands during August’s home match against Neman Grodno (Florencia Tan Jun/Getty Images)

The challenges keep coming. In early February, a La Liga game at home to Real Oviedo was postponed at short notice as the Vallecas pitch was unplayable. The surface has improved in recent months, but it remains so bumpy that AEK coach Marko Nikolic complained about an “unbelievable pitch at this level” after his team’s quarter-final first leg.

The awful state of the infrastructure at the stadium was also evident again during that game.

“Fix the f****** scoreboard, Presa,” shouted one happy fan to laughter from fans around the press area after Isi’s penalty put Rayo 3-0 ahead late on. After the match, The Athletic asked Rayo coach Inigo Perez whether he and his team were aware of just how special their European run was.

“We could say no, but that would be fooling ourselves,” the 38-year-old replied. “La Liga is our daily lives, our survival, the stress of keeping ourselves above water. The Conference is different. We can all feel it, that energy and enthusiasm, that feeling of freedom, as if it was a type of catharsis for the players, and above all for the fans, who have so many difficulties. We could say it is a stage of liberation.”

Victory over AEK set up a huge contrast in the semi-finals. Strasbourg are 99.97 per cent owned by Chelsea owners BlueCo, the consortium led by Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital.

Much of Strasbourg’s squad are young players in which BlueCo or other clubs have made investments. Nineteen-year-old goalkeeper Mike Penders, 20-year-old defender Aaron Anselmino and 23-year-old striker David Datro Fofana are on loan from Chelsea. Captain and striker Emmanuel Emegha, a Netherlands international, is joining Chelsea for next season.

“It’s like two worlds colliding,” Garcia says. “Most of the Strasburg team are youngsters taking an intermediate step in their careers, who will end up either at Chelsea or be sold to another elite club. Many of the Rayo players are in the middle or towards the end of their careers, and have fought so hard to be doing what they are doing now.”

Rayo’s left-wing fans would strongly resist the idea of becoming a satellite club owned by a big investment fund. But there is some envy around Rayo at the facilities and professionalism shown by BlueCo, who have funded a high-tech €160million (£138.6m; $187.1m) renovation of Strasburg’s Stade de la Meinau.

One thing will unite both sets of supporters in the tie. Many Strasbourg fans are unhappy with what their club has become, and ‘BlueCo out’ is often heard at their Stade de la Meinau. There are also sure to be chants of ‘Presa ve te ya’ (Presa, go now) during tonight’s match in Vallecas.

But the main feeling around Rayo is one of excitement at their incredible voyage in Europe this season, against the odds.

“All the fans have been swept up by the Conference League, the tickets are sold out, even with them being much more expensive than normal,” Sanchez Blas says.

“There is a historic atmosphere. The stadium will be boiling. It is the opportunity of a lifetime for the people of Vallecas to reach a European final.”