Villarreal and a Champions League Rant

By: Cesar | May 24th, 2007

My heart dropped during last year’s Champions League semi-finals when Villarreal’s Juan Román Riquelme’s last-minute penalty was saved by Arsenal goalkeeper Jehn Lehmann.

It’s not because I’m a big fan of our state rivals, known as El Submarino Amarillo or “The Yellow Submarine” in English. Nor is it because I’m fond of their stars, players like Uruguayan international Diego Forlan and the above-mentioned Riquelme, who’s since moved back to his native Argentina.

It’s that I sympathized with the plight of the little team, the squad that could, like the little engine making it up the impossible mountain.

Villarreal is a team that plays in a stadium almost as big as the city they represent. The city has 48,000 inhabitants, the stadium, El Madrigal, seats 23,000. It’s said that the town is deserted when Villarreal plays, as almost half of the city fits in the stadium. Not your average European finalists.

Yet there they were, a penalty kick from facing Barcelona in the final. The clock said 2 minutes remained in the game. Riquelme’s face showed a mask of nervousnes, belying the steel needed for these decisive kicks. An awkward stutter preceded a weak shot and Arsenal would have their day in Paris against the Catalans.

Football’s ebbs and flows claimed another victim.

Even though they’re our state rivals, I’m not a hater of Villarreal. I think they play attractive, attacking football, led by coach Chilean Manuel Pellegrini, former skipper of River Plate. They have an involved history with our Valencia, having played us in the UEFA Cup semi-finals in 2004. Their president, Fernando Roig, is the brother of former Valencia president Paco Roig. And they recently bought beloved center back Roberto Ayala, who made his decision to stay in the Valencian community apparent by signing for the yellow-clad squad.

Unlike most derbies, there’s no real vitriol here. Personally, I save that for the Madrid’s and Barcelona’s of the world. It’s like Villarreal is more of a little brother than a mortal enemy, a cousin you want to do well as long as it’s not at your expense.

Sure, it’ll hurt to see Ayala there next season. But so what? As long as it doesn’t affect his play this weekend, I don’t care.

It’s more a celebration of Valencian culture, of Valencian football than a high-stakes bragging rights war for Valencian hearts.

I won’t make any more predictions this season, as I have been wrong about 99% of the time. Suffice to say you know who I’ll be rooting for. And who I’ll be cheering to win the other La Liga games that’ll effect our place in the standings. These are all must-win games, so let’s just get the three points.
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I love the Champions League as much as anyone else.
I thought yesterday’s game had passion, a wonderful back-and-forth and a true sense of history, what with the 2005 Istanbul final fresh in our minds.

But here’s my problem: Do we really want to see the same teams play these huge contests year in and year out?

Look, I’d love to see Valencia win this competition one of these years. And I’m sure they will.
But it seems to me somewhat idiotic to say AC Milan is the best team in Europe.

Point deduction or not, they finished something in the league of 348 points behind Inter Milan this season. They were nearly relegated to Serie B and almost not allowed in this competition to begin with because of the Italian scandal situation.

And now they’re champions of Europe.

Fair or not, that’s how the tournament played out. The best team doesn’t always win.

My main contention is that the same teams seem to be involved every year. In England, it’s the Big Four: Man United, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal. Year in, year out they’re the teams that make the Big Cup tournament.

In Spain, it’s Real Madrid and Barca, then Valencia and some other team that sneaks in there unannounced. This year it was Osasuna. Next year it’ll be Sevilla.

And that’s nice and good and la-dee-da. But there’s no parity. No balance to the situation. It’s the same big clubs, with the huge amounts of money that make it to the Big Dance.

Where are the Cinderellas? The teams that come out of nowhere to surprise?
Every once in a blue moon, a Villarreal pops up and shakes us out of normalcy. But more often than not, it’s an overhyped matchup between two European heavyweights, stodgy old rivals playing again for the 87,000th time.

Maybe I am not making my point here. I’m not editing as I go along. It’s that I’d like to see some parity, some new blood brought into the picture.

Let’s see new UEFA President Michel Platini’s experiment work, where teams from Eastern Europe are afforded more places in the Big Cup tournament. Let’s see some kind of cap on international players installed, so teams look more local. And let’s make the system more balanced towards the true league champions. It’s called the Champions League for a reason, no? Last night’s Final saw the 4th-best in England against the 4th-best in Italy. That’s the best Europe has to offer?

Granted, you’re speaking to a fan of a team who went to two straight Finals without winning their respective League.

But still, let’s make this more about achievement than money.

Or else, this all starts playing out like a money-inflated American Presidential election. And we know how those can go …