Ray D'Arcy

A bit of distraction.

I was wondering why the most read story in the Irish Times was about the Matador.

Did you read this?

José Antonio Marante, known as the Marante de la Puebla, the greatest living Matador.

And he's in the news because he came out of retirement over the weekend and he was doing what matadors do.

And the bull got the better of him, as they'd say down in the country.

The bull got the better of him.

So the bull's horn punctured José Antonio Morante's buttock.

before colleagues drew the animal away from him by distracting it with their capes.

That's what they do.

So initially, Morante thought it was very serious.

He had a perforated rectum.

He said it was the most painful goring I've ever suffered in my career.

I felt enormous pain and I was very scared because I could tell that the bull had gored me and I thought I was bleeding a lot.

He said after realising he was in fact not bleeding profusely, he relaxed quite a bit, despite being in pain.

His biographer has described José Antonio Marante, Marante de la Puebla.

I think that's Marante of the people.

He treads on more dangerous ground than anyone.

That perfect hybrid of the most powerful, bravest and most aesthetically pleasing bullfighter placed Marante out of this world.

Now, they did research in Spain last year and they found that 77% of the people surveyed were against bullfighting.