The Last Bastion of Optimism

OK guys.  This season has been….  rough.  Jeremy served up the sobering reminder of who we are as Sevilla fans and what expectations are reasonable.  And then, with some help from the officiating, Real Madrid helped to reinforce that reminder.

And yet, this week actually went better than we could have possibly expected.  We never realistically could have expected more than a loss away at RM.  And yet every team above us with whom we are competing for a Europa spot, dropped points.  Forget about Levante, Malaga, and Valencia.  What we need is to finish in the top 7 (or ideally 6).

To finish seventh, we have to pass two of the following 3 teams: Bilbao, Atletico, or Osasuna.  That is still very possible.

Look at the remaining games for each team (home games in caps):

• Atletico (49 pts): SOCIEDAD, MALAGA, Villareal
• Bilbao (48 pts): REAL MADRID, GETAFE, Levante
• Osasuna (48 pts): Valencia, SOCIEDAD, Santander
• Sevilla (46 pts): BETIS, RAYO, Espanyol

Of all these teams, we probably have the easiest schedule.  Additionally, Bilbao and Atletico are playing each other in the Europa final AND Bilbao is in the Copa del Rey final.

I’m also curious on what happens if Atletico wins Europa, but Bilbao wins CdR.  Does anyone know exactly how all these scenarios could play out?  Is it possible to finish 8th and get a Europa spot?

Anyway, the bottom line is that the critical week is actually next weekend while Osasuna goes up against Valencia who are fighting hard for 3rd, and Bilbao host Real Madrid who have nothing else left to focus on (hahaha).  If they both lose and we win, then we’d at least be in 7th.

This season isn’t over yet.  We still have a LOT to play for and I truly believe that we could still pull this off.

Put your guesses for the top 9 spots in the comments.

Keep the faith.  Vamos mi Sevilla!

La Recta Final: Sevilla and the Tightrope Between Success and Failure

We’ve arrived at the final stretch of the season, with four games left, and if not “everything” to play for, there’s certainly a lot on the table for Sevilla. As we approach the end of the season, I thought it’d be a good time to revisit the comments Del Nido made at this exact point in the first half of the season, before that rather unfortunate 2-6 drubbing we endured at home to Real Madrid. At the time, Del Nido was giving a speech for the Junta General de Accionistas, and he touched on various topics regarding the cub, offering many insights into how he runs the club, and why he makes some of the decisions he makes. The whole thing is worth a read, but I’ll just bring this quote over:

We close the sporting year 2010/2011 on the basis of what we can once again consider to be an economic, social, and sporting success. In broad numbers, for the ninth consecutive season the financial figures of the Administrative Counsel over which I preside show postive numbers in the most difficult season and environment in which we have directed the club. With a budget of close to 100 million euros, the unexpected elimination from the Champion League left us on the edge of the economic abyss, with expected losses in August 2010 of 30 million euros, which was the amount of money we’d expected to get from Champions or Champions and Europa League play.

Only the sales of Adriano…Konko, Zokora, Squillaci, Sergio Sánchez, and the last of the fees for Dani Alves and Marti, along with an improved TV contract…allowed us to close the financial year with a net gain of more than 400,000 euros. I can assure you that the majority of management’s efforts has been focused on recovering the economic loss of elimination from the Champions League. [...] That was our obligation as managers for having taken on so much risk, and fortunately we have been able to do it.

He then makes a couple key points, including that (and I’m quoting the other post here) normally we operate with a budget that assumes income of 55-60 million euros. If we have a good year like in 08/09, with CL, we add 20-25 million euros. Europa adds 8-15 million, depending on how far we go. Further, he states that if we’re not in a European competition, the goal is to land between 5-10th place. Again, the whole article is worth reading, it’s a great reminder of who and what this club is, what our limits are, and where we’re trying to be.

Sevilla – Levante

Although his fixture was demoted from El Clásico After Party to El Clásico After Thought last week, the importance of this match for both teams cannot be understated. We know this is true, of course, as every match at the end of the season is “important,” so this feels a bit like holding up a dead horse for you to see again.

“Yup, still dead!”

Nevertheless! Storylines:

1. Koné still sits on 13 goals, 3 shy of his the magical number of 16, which will prompt Sevilla to re-buy this summer. Could the Ivorian make us loathe our selling spree last year even more than we already have?

2. Personnel: Reyes is back. Will he be who he was for us during our 3-match (and 3+ goals each) winning streak? Spahic is still out, so last week’s mostly-permeable back four should be the same. Varas will be behind them once more, as Andrés Gandalf is trying to put his 38 year-old body back together again to ride this season into the sunset. Varas wasn’t much to blame for last week’s whipping, but one wonders if it’s possible to have worse comparative recent results: Palop (2 goals let in over the previous 6 matches), Varas (5 goals let in over previous 90′).

3. The talk around Nervión for the last 3 weeks has been Michel’s possible reign-taking for next season. Oddly, that talk has died down in the last four days. He’s remarked on it briefly, saying: “My renewal is not the clubs preoccupation right now,” and “If the team that showed up in Getafe shows up this weekend, it’d be better to just forget about the future altogether.” I like the straight talk. Let’s get it done. A win would put us level on points with Levante, but our destroyed GD from last week is now only +2.

4. Luis Alberto and Babá made an impression this week, following the Getafe barf-fest, at a friendly in Warsaw. Little Luis had an assist and Babá scored both goals in the 0-2 victory. Could we see more Babá this weekend? If trends continue, probably not unless we’re losing at the 60′ mark.

If you’re not asleep or too suicidal after the kids’ birthday party at 1pm, stick around for this We’reStillHere Clash of Might-ans.

Getafe – Sevilla Match Comments

Barring any exciting news developments in Madrid or Barcelona, Sevilla will play Getafe at 8pm local time tonight. There is buzz around Marca’s office that Kaka woke up with eye crusties this morning, though, so if a press conference addressing this breaking story is called, the game may be postponed. We’ll keep you updated.

Assuming things go as planned, though, Sevilla plays a game of enormous importance this evening. Since every non-EE team above Sevilla lost this week, and all the teams below and within a game of them won, Sevilla can either fall back with the pack of teams tied on points just outside of European contention or they can move into a tie for 5th place with Levante (whom they’d play next week, with a CL-qualifying 4th place spot potentially on the line). So there’s a pretty big divide between success and failure; let’s hope we sleep in European places tonight (while obviously EXPECTING failure).

I’m still too busy for in-depth previews, so feel free to post injury reports, player availability, and predictions/analysis in the comments.

LFP’s Sevilla-Levante Debacle

Francisco de Goya, clearly anticipating April 13th, 2012, etched an etching. It was a terrifying etching. A sleeping man is devoured by a swarm of creatures of the night. The admonition reads: “El sueño de la razón produce monstruos.”

The world is full of wonders.

Sevilla – Zaragoza Match Comments

Five years after starting its latest (and hopefully last) academic endeavor, the staff at the Chicago offices of Monchi’s Men will be graduating next month. As such, there are a few loose ends to tie up, and as a result of that, the time available for writing match previews is a little short right now. So if there were more time, this preview would touch on:

• Kanouté, our club’s legend, standard-bearer, and one of the last remnants of our recent glory years, sustaining an injury that will likely mean he never wears a Sevilla jersey again (other than the testimonial that I sincerely hope he plays). There’d be several long, moving paragraphs about the first time I saw Big Freddi play, his best goals, etc etc etc.
• Koné scoring his 13th league goal (15th in all competitions), leaving him just three goals shy of the total that will see him automatically come back to Sevilla as per the loan agreement with Levante. There would be intense hand-wringing about WHY CAN’T HE EVER SCORE WITH US?!? and probably some hypotheticals about what Sevilla would do if he gets there–sell him? Loan him? Keep him, but leave him on the bench? Keep him and play him so Baba never plays?
• And then there’d be a bit about why we’ll lose to Zaragoza today. But I’d probably eventually start talking about how really, this is a super winnable game and how the table is once again set for us since Atleti, Levante, Getafe and Espanyol lost, Bilbao drew, and we play the last fixture of the week so we’ll know exactly what’s at stake when we take the field. I’d probably also point out that a quarter of the league (seriously five teams) is currently tied with Sevilla at 42 points, so putting three points between us and them would be great. Finally: Zaragoza is one of the worst teams in the league this year, so PLEASE SEVILLA DON’T LET ME DOWN.

There. That’s the review you’d have. Imagine it. Savor it!!!

Bilbao – Sevilla Match Preview and Comments

Sevilla enter their match Sunday with a fantastic and, of late, familiar opportunity to continue their incredible rise up the table in recent weeks: from 12th place just four weeks ago, the team will begin the match in 8th with a chance to move even higher. 6th place Osasuna lost in fantastically lopsided fashion to Rayo today, and 5th place Levante hosts 7th place Atlético in the early game Sunday. The Osasuna loss plus basically any Levante-Atleti result and a Sevilla win would see los Nervionses move into European spots, a feat which seemed impossible (or possible, but entirely improbable) just a month ago. These are the benefits of the mediocrity of La Liga in 2012, I guess.

Of course, Sevilla didn’t get on this hot streak by talking about how great it’d be to win. No, they’re winning because this blog has been successfully engaging in reverse psychology with Fate herself. So, to our old friend Fate, I say we can’t possibly win this game. Behold:

• Bilbao is playing some very impressive soccer right now as they storm through the Europa, and hardly had to expend themselves at all at midweek to dispatch Schalke 04. They’ll be fresh and full of momentum.
• We’re visiting one of the more hostile stadia in Spain.
• Bielsa! Llorente! Iraola! OH MY!
• Perotti’s season of misery, injury, and rarely playing stepped up a notch with yesterday’s announcement that he’s going to have back surgery for a herniated disk, so he’s obviously out.
• What’s that you say? “No problem, Reyes has been great lately”? Well, to your optimism I say: STRAINED ADDUCTOR. Not playing tomorrow! Don’t even ask about Spahic (still out injured) or Baba (still inexplicably disappeared from the face of the earth). I’m not sure what these injuries will mean in terms of lineup, but if I had to guess I’d say the only dangerous creative players on the field at the start tomorrow will be Negredo, Navas, and Manu.

So…yeah. All doomsaying aside, this is a legitimately difficult match. The last three games (Racing, Granada, Mallorca) were all games we SHOULD have won, and were particularly delightful simply because we have so often fallen apart against lesser opposition this year. Sunday’s match AT Bilbao is an entirely different beast (a lion, for example). Athletic have (in my opinion) a world-class coach, several world-class players, and are a team on the rise whose position in the table (12) is more an indication of how badly they need this game than their quality this year. I would obviously be ecstatic to see our recent run of wins continue, but would realistically be totally content with a tie, and certainly won’t be covering my head in ashes if we lose.

WHICH WE DEFINITELY WILL, RIGHT GUYS?!?