Article updated: 03/06/2026
Real Unión Club de Irún is one of the founding members of the Spanish League. Unfortunately for them, their golden era came in the decades immediately before the league’s establishment and included four Copa del Rey victories. The club was formed in 1915 following the merger of Irún Sporting Club and Racing Club de Irún. The former was founded in 1902 as Irún Foot-Ball Club, changing its name in 1907, following a split in membership that led to the formation of Racing Club.
Both Racing Club de Irún and Irún Sporting Club had relatively advanced stadiums, featuring covered stands as well as sections of open bleachers and hard standing. Racing played at the Campo de Fútbol de Costorbe, which was located on the present-day Avenida de Iparralde, around 150m west of Real Unión’s present home. The ground opened on 14 September 1911 with a match against Athletic Club, which Racing lost 1-2. The Campo Costorbe had the honour of hosting the 1914 Copa del Rey final, when Athletic Club beat the now-defunct FC Espanya de Barcelona 2-1. Racing had won the Copa del Rey in 1913, beating Athletic Club 1–0 in a replay at Madrid’s Campo de O’Donnell, after the first match was drawn 2-2. Real Unión include this victory in their trophy haul. Sporting played at the Campo de Amute, which was located to the north of Irún, in the village of Hondarribia. The site of the old enclosure was just a short kick from the southern end of the runway at Irún’s airport. The ground opened on 2 January 1910 with a 1-1 draw against Association Sportive Française of Paris. It hosted the 1915 Copa del Rey Final, when Athletic Club retained the trophy with a 5-0 victory over Espanyol.
Upon forming, Real Unión used Irún Sporting’s Campo de Amute at Hondarribia. They went on to win the Copa del Rey on three further occasions over the next nine years. The first came in 1918 when they defeated Real Madrid 2-0 in Madrid’s own Estadio O’Donnell. The second came when Real Madrid was defeated again in a 1-0 victory at Atotxa in 1924. The coach of the team at the time was Steve Bloomer, one of England’s greatest players at the turn of the 20th Century. In 1926, at the peak of their powers, Real Unión moved to the other side of Irun and to their current Stadium Gal. It was built thanks to the generosity of local businessman Salvador Echeandia Gal. His gift of 313,000 pesetas to the local municipality helped purchase 20,000m² of land east of Irun, on the banks of the Rio Bidasoa. The stadium was inaugurated on 19 September 1926 with a match against Barcelona. Real Unión’s third cup victory (or fourth if you include Racing’s 1913 victory) came in 1927 when they beat Arenas Getxo 1-0 at Zaragoza’s Estadio de Torrero.
Real Unión‘s powers had begun to wane by the time the league started up. With their unquestionable pedigree, the club was an obvious choice for the start-up of La Primera, but they finished ninth out of ten in the inaugural season of 1929. There was some improvement over the next couple of seasons with sixth and seventh-placed finishes, but when Real Unión finished tenth and last in 1931-32, it was relegated from La Primera and has never returned. For a period after the Civil War, the stadium was used as a detention camp for Republicans returning from France. Seven seasons either side of the Civil War followed in the second division, before the club dropped to the Tercera. The club made two season-long visits back to La Segunda in 1958-59 & 1964-65, finishing bottom of the table on both occasions.
Looking at photographs of the Stadium Gal on opening day, it could easily pass itself off as English. It featured a single stand with a low, propped roof. The remainder of the enclosure consisted of open terracing, and it would have been one of the most advanced in La Liga when the competition started in February 1929. The traditional layout of the stadium changed in 1950 when the local municipality installed a velodrome around the pitch. To mark the opening of the track, the stadium hosted the end of a stage of the Vuelta de España. The Anglo influence may be the reason the title “stadium” is used. The cycle track fell into disrepair during the 1970s, and upon its removal, the pitch was widened, floodlights were installed and hard-standing added to the arcs behind the goal.
By the mid-nineties, the Stadium Gal was in a sorry state. Major reconstruction took place in 1997, with the new stadium built 50 metres to the north and a smaller annex enclosure constructed at 90 degrees to the southern end of the new ground. The most striking feature of the new Stadium Gal is the modern cantilevered stand on the west side. The seating deck has 1,700 seats and is raised 3 metres above club facilities. It provides an excellent view of the pitch, the Rio Bidasoa, and, of course, the border with France. Opposite the main stand, on the east side, is a covered bank of seats with a capacity of 1,300. This was originally left open, but a roof was added in 2005. There are two narrow terraces at the northern and southern ends, with the southern end having a roof which extends to provide cover to the only stand on the adjacent annex pitch. The revamped Stadium Gal has a capacity of 5,500. In the southwest corner of the ground stands a memorial statue to Pepe Angoso Rojas. He was one of four brothers who played for Irún Sporting Club between 1911-13, He went on to play for Real Union, starting in their cup-winning side of 1918. Angoso sadly passed away in 1928, at the age of 33.
The club experienced a bit of a renaissance in 2008-09. They first beat Real Madrid in the Copa del Rey in November 2008, and continued this form in the league, reaching the playoffs to beat CE Sabadell and AD Alcorcón to secure promotion back to La Segunda for the first time in 44 years. Their adventure in La Segunda was another season-long stay, with the club finishing 21st, some 5 points short of safety. The club missed out on an immediate return to La Segunda, losing to Sevilla Atlético in the 2010-11 play-offs. There followed a decade of fluctuating fortunes in Segunda B, before the restructuring of the Spanish football pyramid in 2021 saw the club reach the new Primera Federación. In July 2021, Unai Emery and his family completed a takeover of the club. Emery was born in Hondarribia, and his father and grandfather played in goal for Real Unión. There followed four seasons of modest returns in the third tier, before a drop to the Segunda Federación in 2025. The Group II title was won at a canter, and with it, Real Unión returned to the third tier in May 2026.
Estadios de España 