Player transfer poll: Negredo

For many fans, the summer transfer season, with all the speculation, new faces, and excitement it can bring, offers almost as much drama and intrigue as the regular season. Historically this has not been the case at Sevilla, where the story is usually about who’s leaving rather than who’s arriving. This season is unfortunately not much different: while the biggest arrival to the first team at the end of the summer will probably be last year’s acquisition Bryan Rabello, at this point the list of possible departures is staggering and a bit frightening: Navas, Negredo, Kondogbia…the list goes on and seems to include every key player. So the question seems not to be if we’ll sell, but whom, and for how much.

To that end, I thought it’d be interesting to get a feel around these parts for how much everyone thinks the club ought to sell some of its biggest stars. Today we start with Negredo, and throughout the next couple of weeks we’ll follow up with other key players. Now, obviously it’d be great if we could sell all of our players for eleventy billion dollars each, and buy a Messi cloning factory with the proceeds (just kidding; have you seen what happens to Messi’s attacking teammates? One Messi per team, guys). This is a poll about the actual amount, bounded by actual reality, you’d be willing to sell these players. So click an option, and share your reasoning in the comments, or suggest who we should buy to replace him, or how you feel about selling him at all…whatever your thoughts.

Sevilla – Sociedad Match Preview

It’s sort of hard to know what to make of Sevilla’s position in the table right now. Don’t get me wrong, I’m excited that we’re (kind of, sort of) in European places, and I hope we can stay. But while Málaga seems pretty likely to remain disqualified from European play this season, somehow it’s hard to feel like we’re really that close. Probably that has something to do with our final three games: today vs Real Sociedad (tied for 4th place on 59 points), the following week away at [who care because we never win away games], and then wrapping up the season with Valencia, the other team tied for the last Champions League spot with 59 points. So…yeah. It’s going to be a very tough road just to keep 8th place, let alone move up to 7th place where we wouldn’t have to await a court’s decision in June to know if we’d play or not.

Fortunately for us, Getafe (currently tied with Sevilla on points) hosts Valencia today, and will host Rayo (still with a hope of playing in Europe), so there’s a decent chance that a win today would buy Sevilla a bit of space in that last European spot. Which, again, we’re going to need since we don’t really have an easy match from here on out.

Missing today will be Fazio who was injured last week, but Reyes (also injured in that game) will be back. Perotti, who was subbed off in what I was guessing was going to be another 6 month injury last week, is back among the active players and is expected to start. In addition we’ll have both Kondo and Medel, so our midfield we’ll be as stable as we can hope.

I think we’ve said this before about La Real, but I really do hope they do well, and I’d be very happy to see them make Champions next year. It’s just…I don’t wish them any success on this particular day. VAMOOOOOOOOOOOO

Malaga – Sevilla Match Comments

Sevilla has two away games left this season: Sunday’s trip to Málaga, and a visit to Pamplona in two weeks to take on Osasuna. It’s strange to say, given Málaga’s generally strong performances this year, but the match with our Andalucían rivals may be our best chance to double our away wins for the year. Málaga had to play Real Madrid at mid-week to free up time for the Copa del Rey, so Sevilla faces a side that lost 2–6 at home while playing 70 minutes with 1 man ejected, and 20 with 2. So Málaga will be without two players (Sergio Sánchez (haha) and Martín Demichelis), and they just played a mid-week game, and they just lost by a wide margin. Is there anything else you need, Emery? Would you like this all delivered on a silver platter?

Meanwhile, on the table, Sevilla are in 9th place, one point from that final presumed ticket to Europe. An away win would give even the biggest doubters among us a pretty credible hope that Sevilla could actually play in Europe next year. A loss would make it hard for even the truest of believers to keep holding out hope. With four matches to go, it’s time for Sevilla to decide how they’ll write the ending of this story.

Sevilla – Espanyol Match Comments

For the entire time I’ve been writing match previews for this site, one of the first things I usually do is check to see where our opponent is on the table, how many points they have, their recent form, etc. As I prepared to write about our match with Espanyol, I thought to myself that it seemed like they’d had a generally poor season. I looked on the table to see if my perceptions bore out in their current position, and sure enough, they’re in 11th place, with 43 points. Pretty bad, but not, I guess, that atypical for Espanyol, a team I more or less associate with consistent mediocrity. “Poor Espanyol, they don’t suck exactly but they’re never great. Sucks to be a sucky mid-table team!”

I thought all of that in the .2 seconds before I saw Sevilla tied with them in the table.

So, could we win this game? Sure. Should we? I don’t know…look at the stats and it’s hard to argue we’re not this team’s equal. Of course if you look at the squad list, you’d think this would be an easy 3 points at home. But you know better than that, because you’ve seen all of these players, these players with great reputations or the constant siren song of potential and future promise, you’ve seen them all season. You know. You know that they’re capable of wonderful things, but all too often you see them underperform, underwhelm. So you, like me, are probably not feeling super confident, and maybe not even especially hopeful. I haven’t checked recently, but I think it’s still mathematically possible to get a European spot. The truth is mathematics is a poor barometer for this team, because math doesn’t have a way to account for indifferent suckitude, although I think Desartes was working on an algorithm for this before he died of pneumonia.

Without that knowledge, though, we’ll have to learn our grim future one crappy game at a time. Best of luck, fellow Sevillista travelers.

Betis – Sevilla Match Comments

So, it’s time for the best derbi in Spain. Because the people who run La Liga are geniuses, the game is on a Friday after we played on a Monday the week before, but that doesn’t matter, because it’s the derbi sevillano. Sure, we have the worst away record in La Liga, but that doesn’t matter, because it’s the derbi sevillano. Granted, there’s a chance they might let Navarro play, but that doesn’t matter, because it’s the derbi sevillano. Obviously, things are getting pretty dire in the table with very little time left to make up ground, but that doesn’t matter, because it’s the derbi sevillano. It’s a good bet that Negredo will miss some sitters, but that doesn’t matter, because it’s the derbi sevillano.

It’s the derbi sevillano

It’s the derbi sevillano

It’s the derbi sevillano

Table Watch, Week 28

Hey, it’s the international break! Sounds like a great time for another edition of Table Watch! When we last looked in on the table, a series of fortunate results in week 24 had conspired to move Sevilla up to 10th, improbably close to European positions despite a season of mediocre performances and even a mid-season coaching change. Today we’ll examine how things looks today, and take a look at our next string of games to see if any likely results or trends present themselves.

But first! A couple stats to note as we peruse the table. First of all, Sevilla’s 4–0 result on Sunday gives them their best goal differential in recent memory at +3. This positive goal differential of course feels good, but it also could come in handy at the end of the season, as Sevilla is the only team outside the top six with a positive goal differential. Obviously a +3 GD is almost not positive at all, and knowing this team it could well be −6 in a week’s time. But for now it’s a nice little stat to see.

Another intersting stat: only the top three teams (Barcelona, Real Madrid, and Atletico) have a better home record than Sevilla’s 10 wins. That’s pretty cool! Way to go, Sevilla! Unfortunately the companion to that stat is that only lowly, last-place Deportivo has a worse record on the road than us, having yet to manage a victory away from home (Sevilla: 1 away win this season). I guess when you average those two stats you’d expect to see Sevilla in the middle of the table, which is perhaps not coincidentally exactly where you find them today. So then let’s take a closer look at the table this week:

Sevilla – Zaragoza Match Preview

In the aftermath of last week’s failure at Mallorca, one particular stat began making the rounds which in retrospect probably should have seemed a prescient and foreboding warning in the face of our unbridled enthusiasm and optimism: Sevilla have managed exactly one away win all season, a 2–0 victory at Depor all the way back in September. Not exactly the kind of stat that portends great things for a mid-table side struggling to find its form. There are probably a lot of interesting theories as to what might be causing this problem away from home (which by the way makes Sevilla the third worst away team in La Liga), but the simple fact is that that kind of away form is likely incompatible with a bid for Europe next season, no matter how many teams above us get disqualified from continental competition. We have eleven more games left this season, five of which are away. We need to find a way to get a sizable portion of those 15 points, or what we do with the remaining six home matches likely won’t matter.

Fortunately, we don’t have to figure any of that out this week, because this weekend we host the humble Tharagothans, themselves struggling mightily to exit the relegation conversation by getting some distance between themselves and suddenly resurgent Mallorca (who, by the way, got their first consecutive win of the season last week when they beat us). They’re currently 2 points out of the relegation zone, and with just 11 games left in the season, they’ll see every game as a huge priority. In this case, I imagine they’ll be very happy to leave the RSP with a point, a result which Sevillistas would rightly see as disastrous. Last week’s loss sees us fall back to 12th, and if we enter the next block of games with less than 38 points, it’s going to be hard for even the most optimistic of us to have any hope for a spot in Europe next season.

The good news is that other than our 3 long-standing injuries and Cicinho (who received his 5th yellow last week), the whole squad is available to Unai, so we should be able to put together a winning side, and then…win. But of course it’s never that simple, so we’ll see how things go. Use the comments section to tell Unai which XI to start, and in what formation, and hopefully on Sunday we’ll find that he’s taken our advice.

VAMOOOOOOOOOOOOO

El Día Después

So. That was heartbreaking/frustrating/disastrous/(fill in negative adjective here). Sevilla lost a very important match which cost them a spot in a final, a guaranteed spot in Europe, AND the several million euros Europe would’ve brought, all in one game. It was frustrating for those reasons, but it was also really terrible because I think we’re all getting to a place where we really hate those colchoneros. And finally it was frustrating because the game seemed so damn winnable, and it felt like if we’d just played slightly less error-prone defense and if our finishing had been even a little bit sharper, we’d be celebrating a pretty comfortable win today. It’s not so much a bitter pill as an entire meal of bitter chewable pills.

Anyway, I woke up this morning wondering where we sit now, what goals we should now have for the season, and what we learned. Here are a few of my thoughts, and I’d love to hear yours:

• Antonio Reyes is worse than just awful; he’s wildly inconsistent and offers a fleeting glimpse of brilliance just often enough to merit inclusion in important matches. If he didn’t play well every 8 matches he’d never get on the field so he could flippantly lose possession all the time. I would prefer this–I would prefer he always sucked. It’s gotten to the point that I’ll probably resent him for playing well the next time he has an outstanding game sometime next month or whatever.

• Similarly, I can’t imagine why we’d ever need to play Navarro at left back again, barring perhaps Alberto being run over by a train. The kid has proven himself in games big and small, so play him. Case closed.

• Speaking of injuries and defensive personnel decisions, Spahic’s loan exit sure looked very suspect last night as we watched our CBs give up two goals by foolish mistakes in the first half hour of a game in which we absolutely could not concede. I know Del Nido said he left in part because he wanted to leave, but we must be down to whatever pesos we can still find in the couch cushions to make that move at this point in the season, with so much to play for and so much required to get it. An injury to any of our three remaining CBs means we don’t have the luxury of sitting whichever defensive liability looks to be the most disastrous on a particular week, and they haven’t looked especially inspiring, so that option is one I suspect we’ll miss at some point before the season’s over.

• And on the subject of what’s left for the season, our path to Europe is now only through the top end of the table. I’m not clear what the dual conditions of both CdR finalists qualifying for CL and Malaga’s disqualification from Europe will mean for qualifying for Europa. Usually the former scenario means that 7th place gets to go to Europa, but if Malaga finishes in the top 7, will their situation mean the last Europa spot is 8th? Regardless, the team clearly has some work to do, as there’s probably not going to be a scenario that sees 12th place doing anything but selling players all summer.

• Which brings me to my final point, which I was trying to make last week: we need to win these next three games against three bottom-dwelling squads. We need the points, we need the positive results, and we need the momentum.

Anyway, what do you guys think? Any takeaways from yesterday? What are your expectations and hopes for next season? Show the world your undying optimism or brutal realism in the comments below!

Sevilla – Atletico Match Comments

Sevilla emerged from the weekend’s big visit with the major objectives intact: nearly every key player rested, no injuries among those that played, and no red cards. This may seem like trying to find the silver lining in the cloud of losing a tough away match we had the opportunity to win, but if the results had been reversed and we’d won but not rested players, or had gotten cards, or injuries…well, those three points wouldn’t seem like much of a silver lining at all as we enter the week.

Because of course this week we play what I feel like I can safely say is the biggest match currently on the calendar. It’s big because we play what I’d say is our biggest rival in La Liga, the Liga team closest to our Copa and Europa success and a side with whom we share lot of animosity. It’s big because it’s the home return leg of a semifinal in which the team needs to turn around a 2–1 loss. It’s big because this one game represents an opportunity to earn several million euros by qualifying to the Europa League. It’s big because this is our best (only) chance to win silver this year. And so on. This is, as I was saying, the biggest match of the year.

Sevilla faces an Atleti side having a pretty incredible year, 4 points ahead of Real Madrid and in 2nd place, and if the recent elimination from the Europa was a downer for them, the ability to focus on the riches to be found in the CL next year will be more than enough consolation. But of course the loss of European competition means that this Copa semifinal is also their last chance for a trophy, and it seems very likely they’ll be as focused and motivated as the home team (perhaps moreso, as their absolutely shambolic finances mean they probably need the money more desperately than Del Nido does).

But in a game of such intense rivalry and of such magnitude for both teams, “focus” and “motivation” shouldn’t even be a talking point. At last, after games of rotations and saving players for cards or to avoid injuries, here is a match between to roughly equally talented teams playing in one game they both unreservedly want a result from. If you can, stop by to experience this hopefully fantastic match with your brothers here at Monchi’s Men. It’ll probably be the best way to enjoy the game (unless, of course, you’re going with messioronolado, in which case enjoy the game, and also I kind of hate you).

Vamooooooooooos!!!!!!!!!

Table Watch: Week 24

Look, every time Sevilla wins, it’s good. It feels like a minor miracle. There should maybe be parades. But Friday’s win was particularly great because of a bunch of other results involving teams above them on the table. First, Levante drew with Sociedad, which is great because they’re both ahead of us on the table, and both dropped points. And Rayo lost to Real Madrid, which is also great because Rayo is one of the teams between us and Europa. And THEN Betis went and lost to Espanyol, which is great because ditto the whole Europa thing but also: BETIS LOST. Mmm, it’s delicious every time I say it. Anyway, all those results mean we moved up to 10th today, and that got me thinking about our status on the table, and before I knew it I was conjecturing, imagining, dreaming, and guessing about a LOT of things. And then I had a big old post. So if you enjoy reading lots of mostly baseless speculation in order to arrive at the conclusion that Sevilla would do well to win points from the games they play, WELL THEN READ ON!