La Liga’s Good Day, Bad Day - Round 35
Monday 11 May 2009 13:00
GOOD DAY
Valencia
Saturday’s 3-0 win over Real Madrid was shows exactly why, every September, the pea-brained La Liga Loca calls for silence, stands on a chair and tipsily tips Valencia to win the title by 50 points.
Ignore the fact that the Real Madrid players weren’t exactly cranking up the oophm-o-meter on the night - especially Fabio Cannavaro during David Silva’s goal - and just get worked up over the wondrous ways of the front four of Mata, Villa, Silva and Joaquín.
Nor forgetting the excellent Pablo Hernández of course.
Once again, La Liga Loca is going to tip the men from Mestalla for glory next season. Providing someone comes along with a one-billion-euro-sized bag of cash, that is.
Otherwise, it’s Ever Banega and Edu running the show in the upcoming campaign in what is likely to be a more knee-trembling football affair. But in two very different ways.
Silva sees off Real
Luis Fabiano
More often or not, the Sevilla striker’s frequent tumbles in the box result in yellow cards rather than penalties.
But on Saturday, O Fabuloso turned back the clock to last season when he was a bit special, by winning a spot-kick and coming up trumps with Sevilla’s second in the 3-1 win over Mallorca.
Fabiano’s timely return to form to aid the must-be-knackered-by-now Freddie Kanouté may well be enough for Sevilla to hold on to their third placed spot and give potential new coach, Ernesto Valverde, Champions League football next season.
Athletic Bilbao
All 230,000 Athletic fans heading to Mestalla for their match-up against Barcelona on Wednesday night can do so in the warm and snugly knowledge that their safety for another season in la Liga has been assured.
Joaquín Caparrós’ men moved onto the 44-point mark after a 1-0 win over Betis. More remarkably it was a victory achieved using just one first team starter.
Bilbao: Safe for another season
Getafe
In all honesty, the team is still more than a little rubbish with manager Michel admitting that all he can do is try to maintain the spirits in the Coliseum camp for the final matches of the season.
Sunday’s 3-0 win against Osasuna was an awful affair with chances few and far between, the visitors barely trying and the card-happy ref Muñiz Fernandez sending two players off for no good reason. Again.
The most entertainment to be had was to contemplate what would happen if a Benny Hill style slapping was delivered to Vicente del Bosque’s head with the Spain manager sitting just two rows in front of La Liga Loca’s long-limbed reach.
The answer was very little and a heck of a lot less entertaining than had his predecessor, Luis Aragonés, been sitting in the same spot.
90 minutes of “Raúl for Spain!” songs would soon have had his bubbling brains exploding all over the stands.
Deportivo
Sixth. Jesus.
Diego Forlán
It was perfect night for La Liga Loca in Vicente Calderón.
The crowd turning against the Atleti president at 2-0 down. A massively drunk man being propped up in his seat by his less frazzled friends. Watching Carlos Kameni wander past and realising that he could rip your head off with one hand. And another brilliant display from Diego Forlán.
Once again the 27-goal striker saved Atleti’s awful back-four, which was as high as Michael Phelps for 90 minutes, but was on the right side of a lot of dodgy decisions from the flag-wavey linesman.
Atleti’s Champions League future now boils down to another big night in the Calderón next Sunday, this time against a Silva-suspended Valencia.
Business as usual for Diego
BAD DAY
Barcelona
Unfortunately, La Liga Loca must come clean and confess that it has barely seen a minute from this match due to being in transit from the Coliseum to the Vicente Calderón - and nearly ending up in Cordoba, as it happens.
So it is more than happy to believe Pep Guardiola’s claim that “the side didn’t have enough gas” to play all the way to the final whistle in the 3-3 clash with Villarreal.
Sadly for the Camp Nou crowd it looks like the league title will be won at around midnight next Saturday when Madrid are mauled in El Madrigal.
Andrés Iniesta
God is a Chelsea fan, it would appear, after the midfielder is in danger of missing the Champions League final with a muscle tear.
Real Madrid
“When your head says ‘no’, it’s hard for your legs to say ‘yes’" noted Josep Maria Casanovas in Sport.
La Liga Loca suspected that Real Madrid would be running on fumes in their match in Mestalla on Saturday night and predicted a draw.
But it had no idea that the footballing juices in the Bernabeu camp had been squeezed so severely. Juande Ramos has cancelled Monday’s day-off and dragged the players back into training as punishment for a performance against Valencia branded as ‘apathetic’ by El País.
"Well it's obviously not my fault..."
Recreativo, Numancia
Bye-bye
Betis
Good grief, that was truly bad from Betis. “This team deserves to go down,” wrote Tito Gonzalez, a fed-up fan, in AS after the 1-0 defeat by Athletic’s second string.
Racing Santander
The often-sparring halves of La Liga Loca have tried to work out which team it would most like to see go down along with Recreativo and Numancia this season. And for once, the blog came to an agreement.
Sporting must stay up simply because of their fantastic travelling fans. Osasuna are filthy and fighty and worthy of their Primera spot. Betis are just too entertaining off the pitch to lose to la Segunda. Getafe are down the road and Espanyol have a shiny new stadium and Ivan de la Peña.
So, it’s a big sorry to Racing Santander who are being willed by the blog to sink into the second division. But with just two points needed to stay up, it ain’t going to happen.
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About Tim Stannard and Simon Talbot
When he isn't fighting the evil forces of flamenco or attracting libel actions for La Liga Loca,
Tim Stannard is building his media empire in Madrid. As well as contributing to Football365 and doing odd jobs elsewhere, Tim also works in the glamorous world of television as a producer, script writer, news editor, coffee boy and stand-in fluffer.
Simon Talbot? Well, he's a man of mystery.