Reader Comments

By: Cesar | October 7th, 2007

I didn’t watch the game against Espanyol yesterday (surprise, huh?).
Domestic duties in upstate New York kept me from meeting up with reader Daniel at our local football pub.
But I’m kind of happy I didn’t see this latest debacle at the Mestalla.

The readers are what make this blog go. So I figured I’d spotlight some of the comments emanating from the blogosphere and various Internet sites mixed with my own comments in this blog post about our beloved, slowly losing their grip on their vaulted reputation.
First off, reader Ali from the United Arab Emirates had this to say after the game:

‘We just lost 2-1 against Espanyol. Just finished watchin the game…
-All our players did was play from the sides with high high shots from the left mostly and i’m sure Espanyol’s goalkeeper (isma’el.. i think) is thanking Angulo and Arizmendi for the practice they gave him…’

Really, what was coach Quique Sanchez Flores (known as QQ from here forward) thinking benching Joaquin and David Silva for the tag team champions of Arizmendi (isn’t he a striker?) and Angulo? Ok, we did have a Champions League match against Chelsea 3 days ago and some of the team is quite tired. But we’re trying to gain some traction after a tough loss, no?
Was he resting the lads so they’d be fresh for the Spanish squad? Doing national team coach Luis Aragones a favor?
Was he applying the rotation system often used by old gaff Rafa Benitez? What? Because I don’t really understand it.
I say this because Valencia’s system is so utterly predictable: No creativity in the midfield, all balls thrown into the wings and balls lofted into the box for 8-foot-tall Zigic to bring down or diminutive Villa to latch on to.

The play these days is so inept and unsurprising.

More from Ali:

-the second goal was exactly the same goal villarreal scored… our defense were watchin the game (just as if they were spectators) and Luis garcia sneaked between Alexis and Raul Abiol and they left hildebrand in a position not a lot of goalkeepers wish to be put in.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: We sure miss Ayala. How inept is our defense these days? Miguel looked like he stayed out too late last night, Albiol must have joined him in celebrating his national team call-up and Alexis still hasn’t fully adapted. Awful.

Poster Mestalla from forum Xtratime.com sums up the defense well:

You’d think Albiol, Alexis, Helguera and Marchena are enough. It’s not the defenders, it’s Quique’s tactics and positioning on defence. Benitez used to have five different styles of defending. With Lola Flores everything looks random.

*Sigh*

Poster Emil had this to say about my blog posts:

… you very rarely see anything positive.
You mostly talk about “Quique, vete ya” and those sort of things. OK, we haven’t been playing superb football for 90 minutes in any game yet. But we were undefeated in the whole of September and actually played amazingly the first half against Getafe and we were very good against Schalke 04.
Continue blogging because you’re doing a great job. But please, try to be more positive sometimes.
You’re a great writer and that’s why I read everything you write but I often get depressed afterwards.

I guess it’s nice to know I have an effect on readers, huh?
Look, I love this club. As reader Ali said in response to Emil, I have ‘high expectations’ for the squad. We’re pretty good, yes. But don’t you guys think we should be doing better with the squad at hand? We have world-class players and are scraping together wins against the likes of Almeria and Getafe and getting squashed by Chelsea and Espanyol.

We should be better. There’s nothing more to say than this.

I understand the crowd’s reaction (watch the video here) to QQ’s managing style. They’re screaming ‘QQ VETE YA!’ because they’re as angry as I am. They’re upset at a lack of organization, passion and ruthless killer instinct. You know, things shown by Chelsea and Espanyol at the Mestalla this week. If my opinion or the opinion of the Mestalla faithful makes some people angry, so be it. We anticipate better results. And we’re angry …

Oh, there’s better news. This, from the newswires:

Striker David Villa is out of Spain’s Euro 2008 qualifier against Denmark on Oct. 13 after straining his left ankle during Valencia’s 2-1 defeat at home to Espanyol in the Primera Liga on Saturday.
Valencia said a scan on Sunday had confirmed that Villa had suffered an intermediate ligament strain which would put him out of action for between two and three weeks.
They added that the 25-year-old was no longer required to hook up with the national side on Monday when they meet to prepare for the Denmark match in Aarhus and a subsequent friendly against Finland.
Spain are second in Group F, level on 19 points with leaders Sweden who have played a game less. Northern Ireland are third with 16 points and Denmark, who have a game in hand, are fourth with 14.

Villa out for a few weeks. Now, we all saw Zigic play last night (well, I didn’t. But, ya know …).
I’m giving the lad time. He’s going to be fine. But yesterday, he looked awful. As reader Polo from Xtratime said, ‘You can’t grade Zigic’s performance today when he played ONLY 15 minutes with Villa….the game plan totally broke down when Villa got injured, I am sure Zigic thought he was going to play alongside Villa for the whole game.’
And it’s not like he got efficient service from Arizmendi and Angulo. Fair enough. We let him adapt to the style (whatever style it is that QQ implements) and give him the benefit of the doubt.

But not having Villa around will be a problem. He’s such an important part of the team. Just look at this wonderful video of the game ‘highlights’ and note Villa’s near goal in the first half. Wonderful run, great dekes, good shot on goal. He’s such class and his loss will be felt in the upcoming games against Deportivo and Sevilla.

A few more comments to round out the post.

First, BigSoccer.com poster DavidVilla7 summed it up well:

It was just one of those days..
Marchena was dreadful, everything he touched went to waste.
Arizmendi and Zigic…. they would have been better off blind folded.
Villa was second best player on the pitch and he only lasted 17 mins….
Baraja had his moments and was about the only promising thing of the night.
Joaquin didnt do much expect for throwing his body onto the floor everytime the opposition came within a meter of him.
Miguel ran out of steam after 35 mins.
As for Morientes, well i would rather that Zigic came off and El Moro stayed on the bench as well, and we played with 10 men.
Maybe I’m being a bit harsh. After all we did have a tough Champions league match week only 3 days ago, but at this level, its just not good enough…

You’re right. It’s not good enough.

And one last one, from the man of the hour, QQ himself. Take it away, maestro!!

Valencia manager QQ was disappointed (ya? Is he?) with their 2-1 loss against Espanyol at the Mestalla stadium on Saturday, but told reporters that he feels his team still have room for improvement. (Room for improvement?? C’mon! That was 3 years ago, not now!)

“Our perspective is that there are many things to improve on. We haven’t played to our full potential so far this season, we have played poorly, and at this moment things aren’t going our way,” Quique explained to reporters.

The manager feels that Valencia have been extremely vulnerable this season, particularly in defense, and their inconsistency has really affected them.

According to Quique one of their main problems is that after they go ahead, like on Saturday against Espanyol, they fall asleep, and this allows their opponents to turn around the result afterwards.

“I like the team when the fans like the team,” said Quique. “If the fans protest, I also protest, I see the same things as them.” (So you mean, you want to fire yourself?)

The manager told reporters that he will not look for any excuses for his team’s poor showing, and added that when his team lose or play badly he feels he is the main person who is responsible for this. (Let me make this clear: You are responsible for this!)

Well, that’s it for now.
Thanks for the comments and let’s hope we get out of this rut. QQ or not, we’ll survive. AMUNT!