Atletico and Sevilla set to end season with the cheap-as-chips cup final
Wednesday 19 May 2010 17:08
Thanks to Merciful Zeus Himself, the Copa del Rey - the barnacle on
the bottom of the good ship la Liga - comes to an end in the Camp Nou
on Wednesday night.
And if you think that LLL is being a tad
disrespectful to a tournament that is little more than a cheap-as-chips
chance for losers such as Athletic Bilbao and Getafe to sneak into
Europe on the sly, then that’s nothing compared to how the trophy is
treated by the suits in Spain.
The original date for the final
that was decided upon by some clueless clot at the Spanish FA was the
26th May, a full week-and-a-half after the end of the Primera season
and bang in the middle of the international preparations for the World
Cup.
Had the eventual finalists been some international-less
no-hopers like Espanyol and Almería then the original date would not
have mattered a jot.
But as the Camp Nou clash features
Atlético Madrid and Sevilla, the date and venue has been constantly
moved to fit in with the Rojiblancos’ surprisingly busy end-of-season
agenda.
Neither side has had to break into too much of a sweat
to reach the final with the competition rigged to give the easiest
possible draws to the Big Clubs in the opening round and the home
advantage in the two-legged ties for the remaining games.
This
left Atlético only having to squeeze past Marbella, Recreativo, Celta
and Racing to win the chance of a second trophy, this season.
To
be fair to Sevilla, the Andalusian club did have to defeat Barcelona
along with Atlético Ciudad, Deportivo and Xerez on their slog to the
Catalan capital.
Although bookies in Spain see the tie has
fairly evenly matched, Sevilla president José Maria del Nido begs to
disagree. “The league table says that we are fourth and Atlético Madrid
are below us in ninth” blustered the balding boss.
Del Nido
also sees the Sevilla fans has being another point in his team’s favour
at the Camp Nou claiming that “there will be 32,000 there and if we
count every Sevillano as three then we are 96,000.”
Ironically,
it is this kind of multiple-counting and creative interpretation of
figures that sees the Sevilla boss on trial at the moment for
corruption and facing a 13 year sentence, the punishment requested by
the Spanish Fiscalía should the former lawyer for Jesús Gil be found
guilty.
On a footballing front, Sevilla have been handed an
enormous amount of outrageous and very dubious luck with Alvaro
Negredo’s red card from last Saturday being turned into a
suspension-cancelling yellow despite the potty-mouthed forward telling
the assistant referee that he wanted to s*** on his whore mother.
Lovely stuff.
This let-off is a good thing too for the
fourth-placed finishing side considering Luis Fabiano has interpreted
Wednesday’s battle as interfering with his World Cup plans and has
claimed some kind of leg muscle injury that sees him missing the clash.
Atlético will be that little bit fresher going into the game
having done a Wolves - but without the controversy - by resting pretty
much every decent player they have for last Saturday’s Getafe clash, a
move that has not caused an ounce of controversy in la Liga.
AS
are doing their duty for King and country - quite literally - by
featuring the final on the front pages of Wednesday’s edition. However
Marca have shoved the clash to page 18 as an afterthought. Instead the
paper leads with a lengthy chat between director, Eduardo Inda, and a
truly shameless José Mourinho who leaves readers in doubt as to his
summertime plans.
“I want to manage Real Madrid 100%” says a
man who is supposed to be preparing for a certain Champions League
clash on Saturday. “If I leave {Inter} it’s with a clear conscience
after having transformed the club” claimed modest Mou.
La Liga
Loca is cheering Sevilla all the way in the final, simply because it
does not want its precious sleep interpreted for a second week in
succession by drunken Atleti fans tooting their horns or banging on
bins.
But in the end the blog doesn’t really give two hoots about the tournament. But then again, nor do those who are running it.
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About Tim Stannard
La Liga Loca is the playground for the evil, more childish half of Tim Stannard’s psyche to be let loose. The other 50% is a contributor to FourFourTwo magazine, Football365, Sabotage Times as well as other publications such as UEFA Champions Magazine and When Saturday Comes. He is also a regular guest on Real Madrid TV’s Extra Time show and works as a TV producer extraordinaire for hire. To contact Tim directly email laligaloca@yahoo.co.uk