Welcome back. We are back where we belong, we won the League 2 championship last season and will proudly take our place at the La Liga table next season.
The board have been somewhat kind to me in regards to their expectations for the coming season.
They want us to attempt to avoid relegation and have given us a transfer budget of £12.75 million and a wage budget of £170,000 per week. As nice as that wage budget sounds, we had been given a £140k wage budget last season and with most of our squad having a promotion wage rise clause, this may swallow a large chunk of the budget which means we may need to move some transfer money into the wage budget.
The overall finances of the club are in a decent spot, we have just been notified that we will be receiving £34 million over the course of the season for La Liga TV rights, £17 million of which has been given to us straight away.
The financial projection for the club looks pretty good,
The balance sheet looks set to grow over the next few seasons where, at the end of the 3 year period, we are expected to have almost £53 million in the bank. Turnover is expected to grow slightly with expenditure also likely to increase before reducing in the third year.
With the TV money given our balance a boost, I went to the board to ask for our training and youth facilities to be upgraded.
They said yes to both so we can look forward to improving the infrastructure at the club and reaping the benefits that these upgrades will hopefully provide.
A quick word on the under 19’s, we have a big squad of players, 24 to be exact, but with the exception of one or two of them, the squad is packed with talent and if only 3 or 4 of them go on to deliver what their potential shows then we will be in for a treat.
In my last post I said I wasn’t sure if training at the club or going out on loan for first team football was better for their development, well I’m still not sure but I’m going to loan some of them out as I believe playing competitive football in a first team environment should aid their development and also means the players left behind should get decent game time for the U19’s.
Now, the first team squad is in a pretty good place but there was a few positions I had targeted to bring in some players, if I could.
I didn’t want to go mad with new players, truth be told, I struggled to find many suitable players that A. I could afford and B. wanted to join me once other teams made their interest known. That being said, I’m happy with the additions made to the squad and they should fit in well with the core squad that has been together for a couple of seasons now.
Marc Cucalon joined on a free transfer after being released by Real Madrid, he is a young player with bags of potential and will operate in the DM role. He may play more of a back up role this season but he will get a decent amount of playing time to aid his development. Edu Sanchez also joined on a free transfer after he left Barcelona, like Cucalon, he has bags of potential and will go straight in as our first choice left back.
Iverson has come in on loan for the season from Leicester with an agreement that we sign him permanently at the end of the season for £3.5 million. I needed a new first choice keeper as Lino, who we signed last summer, just didn’t work for us. He played just 9 games last season and conceded 14 goals with a save % of 53%, the third worst in the second division and that simply won’t cut it in La Liga. Iverson has a model professional personality and has good reflexes and looks good at one on ones so fingers crossed I’ve got this one right.
Despite our new signings and the squad we already have, the season preview shows us as second favorites to go straight back down.
The board want us to attempt to avoid relegation and my only aim this season is to avoid relegation. It’s really important that we remain in La Liga so the only aim is to stay in this league.
August & September
Our opening game of the season was a difficult one as we headed to the Estadio Ramon Sanchez-Pizjuan to face fierce local rivals Seville. Nobody gave us a chance but a battling performance saw us come away with a brilliant 2-1 win thanks to goals from Fernandez and Abaida in the first half. It was backs against the wall in the second half but we held firm and started our season off with a brilliant win.
A good performance against Cadiz saw us come out with a 3-1 win as we made it 2 wins from 2 at the start of the season. Old habits reared their ugly heads again as we lost 3-2 against Atletico Madrid – yep you’ve guessed it, we were 2-0 up in this game. Larrubia opened the scoring in the 13th minute with Sangalli adding a second in the 33rd minute, Saul reduced the deficit just 4 minutes later and that’s how it stayed at half time. We were on the back foot for most of the second half and conceded the equaliser, courtesy of a very dubious penalty, in the 81st minute with Depay hitting the winner in the 90th minute.
We almost threw away a 3 goal lead against rivals Granada but came out with a 3-2 win. Monte, Yates and Villodres gave us a 3-0 lead going into the 90th minute when the team switched off allowing Granada to score in the 90th minute and again in the 93rd minute to make it a nervy final few minutes but we held on. We were highly fortunate to pick up a point against Real Sociedad, it needed a 92nd minute penalty from Sangalli to equalise for us as the game ended 1-1. We were second best for most of the game and didn’t create a great deal of chances, Sociedad can feel a little hard done by.
We suffered defeat against high flying Rayo Vallecano 2-1, Sangalli opened the scoring for us with a 24th minute penalty before they equalised in the 27th minute. Simon Perez was sent off in the 35th minute and they took the lead in first half injury time and that’s how it ended.
We faced Valencia next and took took a 2-1 lead in the 89th minute thanks to Loiodice and I thought that was that but Valencia had other ideas and forced a 92nd minute goal as the game ended 2-2. A dominant performance against Celta Vigo ended 4-0 to us as Loiodice earned player of the match for his goal and 2 assists as he showed exactly why we signed him. Our final game in September before the international break was a 2-1 win over Alves, we came from a goal down to win this one with Larubbia scoring an 86th minute penalty to earn us the win.
8 games in and 14 points achieved which is a fantastic start for us, we have a 9 point gap between us and the final relegation place. Plenty of games still to play but we’ve made a really positive start.
October & November
October opened with a good 2-1 win over Alaves thanks to a 86th minute winner from the penalty spot from Larrubia. A disappointing 2-2 draw against Almeria followed before a crazy 5-5 draw away to Villareal. We held a 5-3 lead heading into the 89th minute when they scored to reduce the deficit by 1 and they then equalised in 2nd minute of injury time to earn a point. I’ve lost count the amount of times we have thrown away a 2 goal advantage!
We picked up our first win in 2 games against Real Betis courtesy of a 3-1 win before we played brilliantly against Gijon in a 2-0 win. An extremely difficult game against Real Madrid ended in a 2-0 defeat at home. We played well for spells during the match but in the end their superior quality shone through, we can take plenty of positives from the game though. We faced Atletico Pamplona in our final match in November and came away with a disappointing 2-2 draw as once again, we conceded a late goal to deny us all 3 points.
15 games played and we sit in the final Champions League place, I don’t think for a second that we will stay there. The only aim for this season was to not be relegated and with a gap of 14 points between us and Bilbao in the final relegation place, we look like we will be ok.
December
Another game where we couldn’t hold onto a lead as we drew 3-3 with Bilbao, Sangalli gave us a 3-2 lead in the 92nd minute and it looked like we would pick up the 3 points but straight from kick off Marin scored to earn his side an unlikely point. We lost 2-0 to Barcelona but made them work hard for the points, Yates was sent off in the 8th minute for a reckless tackle and from then on it was backs against the wall. We held out until the 84th minute before Lewandowski scored before Olmo secured the points in the 96th minute.
It was 2 defeats in a row as we somehow lost 2-0 at home to Levante, we dominated the game and created plenty of chances which we didn’t take and where punished for it. Our final game in December was the first round of the Spanish Cup as we faced Spanish Federation side Beasain. It was a one sided game as we came away with a good 3-0 win to round off the year.
A couple of defeats in December but we still sit in the European places which would be a great achievement for us if we can maintain it. I still think we will drop down the table as the season progresses but we should have the quality to steer clear of the relegation places.
We also got our first look at this years youth players who will join us in April.
It looks like we have a few excellent prospects on our hands but we will see what they look like when they join the U19’s in April.
That wraps up the first half of what has been a brilliant season for us so far, we are well and truly in the mix for a European place as things stand. I don’t have any plans for the January transfer window, I’m happy with the squad and don’t really have the funds to go out and make any big improvements.
Thanks for taking the time to read the blog, I hope you are enjoying the story so far? If you’re interested in anything else I’ve written, please feel free to take a look here and follow me on X to keep up to date with the latest blog release and ask any questions or give any advice or tips.
Until Next Time.
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