In the weeks leading up to the start of the new La Liga season in Spain, much of the talk had focused on the increasing predictability of the Real Madrid and Barcelona duopoly.
After all, last year’s runners up Real had been busy yet again this summer assembling another new look team with their new look manager. Whilst Barcelona, for all their financial woes, had still found room to sign David Villa.
In contrast, third placed Valencia were forced to sell assets like Villa and Silva, Sevilla spent the summer doing little else other than holding onto star striker Luis Fabiano and worst of all fifth placed Real Mallorca entered administration. It was perhaps then a relief for many that when the season did kick off, there were some signs of hope for those looking to end this dominance.
Saturday saw Valencia and Sevilla start their seasons away from home and while it wasn’t always plain sailing for either, both sets of fans were left feeling hopeful for the new campaign.
Valencia had arguably the tougher task, travelling to Malaga. However they made the best possible start, with new signing Aritz Aduriz opening the scoring on ten minutes. Coming fresh from a successful two-year spell at Mallorca, Aduriz is now seen as the main goal threat for Los Che and more of the same will be expected.
Yet Valencia didn’t have it all their own way, with Mallorca equalizing from the penalty spot before half time. However, in the second half the Valencianistas dug deep and eventually scored through Spain’s forgotten man Joaquin, first in the 70th minute and then again four minutes later from the penalty spot. It was a welcome relief for the travelling Valencia fans, who next week kick start their home campaign against Racing Santander.
Sevilla made a poor start to their match at Levante, with the home side scoring from the penalty spot in the 11th minute. However, the goal ultimately provided the impetus Sevilla needed to begin playing again, following a disastrous few weeks that have seen the club lose both the Spanish super cup and miss out on qualification for the Champions’ league group stages. After cancelling out Levante’s opener, Los Palanganas ran out comfortable 4-1 winners with two goals from full back Abdoulay Konko.
The final game of the opening Saturday saw Athletic Bilbao continue their impressive form over from last season, albeit with a 1-0 away win against newly promoted Hercules. A true test of their ability awaits next weekend, in the form of Athletico Madrid. For Hercules, it doesn’t get any easier, with an away trip to Barcelona coming this Saturday. On the other hand they can look forward to new signing David Trezeguet leading the line for them, if Barcelona’s performance on Sunday is anything to go by, it may make little difference.
Against an admittedly average Racing Santander team, Barcelona hit their stride from the very start, with Messi opening the scoring in just three minutes with a sublime chip before Iniesta added a delicate lob just after half an hour.
There was even time for Racing, the home team, to have a penalty saved by Victor Valdes in the first half. In the second period it was the turn of Barcelona’s new signing David Villa to score with the kind of headed goal Guardiola had probably wanted Ibrahimovic to have been delivering on a weekly basis during his unhappy time at the club. A 3 – 0 away victory sent a clear message of intent.
Their cross-town rivals Espanyol also enjoyed a healthy win, with a 3-1 home victory against Getafe. Elsewhere, arguably the shock of the weekend’s fixtures saw newly promoted Real Sociedad defeat Villarreal, in a result that is sure to give encouragement to the likes of Hercules.
However, whilst goalless draws between Deportivo and Zaragoza, as well as Osasuna and Almeria offered little to the neutral, it was Sunday’s late kick off in Mallorca which arguably offered the biggest signs of encouragement to the league as a whole.
Mallorca had missed out on Champions league football last season before being forced into administration and missing out on European football altogether. Having had to sell the majority of their star players, the team went into Sunday’s fixture at home to Real Madrid with little expectation.
Much of the pre-match hype focused on the potential impact of new Madrid signings like Mezut Ozil alongside Ronaldo. However, the resultant match boiled down to two rather surprising notions: firstly that Mallorca played very well considering their situation and secondly that Madrid looked out of sorts as a team, when considering theirs.
While Mourinho deflected much of the post match criticism of the team’s performance by arguing that they needed time to adjust, fans were left wondering just how long this process would take and how far ahead would Barcelona be by then.
It’s hard to believe that just one game into the season we are talking about giving a manager time, but such is the lack of patience within the Spanish capital that many believe the season could, like last year, boil down to a handful of points. Losing any at this stage to a team like Mallorca is nothing short of disaster in their books. Suddenly next week’s home encounter with Osasuna is already being labelled a must win.
The final game of the week came on Monday and highlighted the topsy-turvy nature of football in Madrid with the original Jekyll and Hyde of football Athletico. Things are certainly looking up in this side of Madrid following their Europa League and European Super Cup victories. The game saw a brace from Diego Forlan as well as goals from Simao and the now departed Jurado, which helped to see off a weak Sporting Gijon team in front of a packed 45,000 crowd. Athletico are now top of the league, whilst Real are already playing catch up.