Bodega Tamerán – what Manchester City’s David Silva did next

David Silva – ‘El Mago’ – was an extraordinarily talented footballer: a World Cup and twice European Championship winner with Spain, four times Premier League title winner with Manchester City and one of the first names on the team sheet in the late 2010s when City were, arguably, the best football team in the world.

And now, in glory-coated retirement from the beautiful game, a winemaker? Don’t bet against it.

In 2019, Silva bought the vineyard property on Gran Canaria – the Canary island on which he was born and raised – that is now Bodega Tamerán. Guided by his friend Jonatan García Lima, owner of Suertes del Marqués – the first winery to rise to fine wine prominence in Tenerife – Silva launched Tamerán from the 2020 vintage, with García installed as winemaker.

On the terraces

Surrounded by towering mountains and plunging ravines in a semi-arid volcanic landscape dotted with giant cacti and balsam spurges, Tamerán is located in a rugged valley at 700m in central Gran Canaria.

Indigenous white varieties Baboso Blanco, Listán Blanco, Malvasía Volcánica, Marmajuelo, Verdello and Vijariego Blanco are planted on their own rootstocks in separate terraced parcels for the flagship varietal whites; Listán Negro is sourced from trusted growers at more than 1,200m further north for two recently introduced reds.

García is very much Tamerán’s guiding force for now, but Silva is taking more than a passing interest in the technical side of things. His love of wine developed when he was playing football in England and struck up a friendship with Joan Valencia, owner of Cuvée 3000, Spain’s leading natural and artisan wine distributor.

‘He started to send me different wines and I started to discover different areas – France, Italy, the Canary Islands…’ Silva explains. One of the wines that impressed him the most was the Suertes del Marqués, El Ciruelo Listán Negro 2016 (since renamed Las Suertes).

He contacted García to congratulate him on the wine and they hit it off. Silva’s knowledge developed quickly.

As well as familiarising himself with the best wines and winemakers of the Canary Islands, he loves the whites of Rías Baixas and has learned a lot from winemaker friends in Galicia, including Rodrigo Méndez. He has a particular taste for Burgundy and Barolo – tastes he shares with García.

‘One day I would like to make the wine. Every year I do more in the cellar’

David Silva

A different league

Although Tamerán’s focus is on scintillating local-variety whites, Silva is also excited by the potential of Gran Canaria reds. Tamerán’s two impressively elegant single-vineyard reds use Listán Negro from Vega de San Mateo, a high-elevation vineyard area close to Pico de las Nieves, the stratovolcano that forms the island’s highest peak.

Having now retired from football (forced to in 2023 by an anterior cruciate ligament injury), Silva is fully focused on Tamerán and very much hands-on.

‘Since I retired I’m there all the time,’ he says. ‘One day I would like to make the wine. It’s not easy, but I will try. Every year I am doing more things in the cellar.’

Now having got into their stride with Tamerán, both he and García are particularly excited about recent vintages. They think that cooler years in 2024 and 2025, along with better work in the vineyard and greater precision in the cellar, have produced the best wines yet.

The 2025 vintage was also the first with Burgundy barrels (they started the project with new Stockinger foudres and 500L barrels). It was Silva who suggested they try smaller-format Burgundy oak; the 2025s will be the first for which they’re trialling 300L François Frères.

‘I like whites with a little bit of oak, because in white, for me, with the acidity, it’s nice. But in reds, I don’t like the oak too much. I prefer reds with more fruit, more freshness,’ he says.

‘Now sometimes people do more [to emphasise] the acidity, but then you don’t have the complexity and the volume in the mouth. I prefer that kind of balance [of acidity and volume]. It’s not easy to do it here, but we are trying.’

Bodegas Tamerán: The essential six wines

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