Valencia CF 4-1 UD Logrones - Match report

Valencia's second match against UD Logrones was pretty much decided from the previous game, as Valencia held a high 3-0 advantage.
Valencia coach Unai Emery decided to take small portion of the players and also included several youth players in the squad. Those young players were Isco, Paco, Ivan Rubio and of course Feghuoli and Guaita who are already in the first team.
The line-up for Valencia was this:
Guaita; Bruno, Stankevicious, Dealbert, Alba; Pablo, Maduro, Tino Costa, Vicente; Isco, Paco.

The match started in a surprising fashion, as Logrones managed a quick counter attack and scored a very early goal in the 2nd minute of the match.
After that it was all Valencia as there were creating chance after chance, shot after shot, until the 23rd minute when Isco scored a great goal, by pushing a Logrones defender, turning 180 degrees and firing past the goalkeeper.

Vicente scored a goal in the 33rd minute of the match, as the Logrones goalkeeper and defender miscommunication resulted in no one clearing the ball, allowing Vicente to just easily push the ball into the net.

Towards the end of the first half after a Valencia attack and large chaos in front of Logrones penalty box, the ball luckily came to Isco who dribbled past 4 defenders and managed to score his second goal. It was a Maradona style goal or Messi style goal with crazy dribbling going on and just great performance from Isco.

After half time Valencia continued to dominate the game, Emery made his substitutions, by bringing on Feghuoli for Pablo and later on Ivan Rubio for Isco.

The match was over, but Valencia were still attacking and Feghuoli got the ball in a counter attack, run from the center of the field to Logrones penalty box and fired a powerful, but precise shot and the ball went in, it was 4-1 for Valencia.

Technical details:
Goals:
2' 0-1 Osado
23' 1-1 Isco
33' 2-1 Vicente
42' 3-1 Isco
85' 4-1 Feghouli

Substitutions:
59' Feghouli for Pablo
72' Reinares for Pepe
77' Zabala for Óscar Arpón
80' Iván Rubio for Isco
82' Nacho Elias for Adama Guira

Player Ratings:
Guaita 5 - Did not have a great game, could not do much for the first goal, but had several shaky moments and bad reactions. Needs more experience and more confidence.
Bruno 6 - Defended what little Logrones managed, but failed to really help out in attack, although was always available for pass.
Stankevisious 5 - At fault for the first goal, lost his marking and with no communication between him and Dealbert they allowed a goal.
Dealbert 6 - Better than Stankevicious, made few tackles and positioned himself good, but not the best of nights for him.
Alba 6.5 - Constant menace from the left wing and combined well with Vicente.
Pablo 6 - Did not have the most productive of nights, accurate passing and full of running, but lacks vision.
Maduro 6 - Good night, although against Logrones he was attacking more than defending, since there was little attacking from Logrones.
Tino Costa 6.5 - Good passing, positioned himself in threatening attacking spots and combined well with the rest of the team.
Vicente 7.5 - Second best player of the night, had several shots on target denied, combined well with Alba, Isco and Tino and just overall great game from Vicente.
Paco 6 - One of the more invisible player on the field, he run well, had one shot on goal and generally passed well, but didn't have much influence on the game.
Isco 8.5 - Man of the match performance. He was dribbling, passing, shooting, combining with everyone and scored 2 goals, the second of which was amazing. Could have booked some more appearances in the first team.
Subs:
Feghuoli 7 - After a shaky few minutes after coming on, he found his feet and really showed his ability. Had few amazing passes to open him teammates, had great runs on the right and left wing and scored a beautiful goal.
Ivan Rubio N/A - Not enough time.

Valencia CF vs UD Logrones - Match Preview

After a disapointing, but not necesarilly deserved loss to Sevilla on Monday, Valencia will look to demolish Logrones in this match and serve as a preparation for more difficult matches in the Spanish league and in Europe.

Valencia holds a 3-0 lead over Logrones, from the first matchday and will look for a similar result tonight also. With such an advantage Unai Emery is going to field a weaker side for the match and hopefully give some youth players a chance. The one youth player to get a chance will be Isco Alarcon, possibly followed by Paco Alcacer.
Isco actually trained with the first team in wednesday and will be in the team to face Logrones, though Paco is probably not going to be called up in the team. The official squad is not yet known, but its a safe bet who Emery is going to take and start.

Valencia are favorites to advance through this leg of the competition and in the process win this match decisively also, even with weakened team.

Unai Emery actually had a meeting with Valencia president Llorente and technical secretary Braulio. When asked what they talked about, Emery said they talked about the current situation, loosing 12 points in 4 matches and how to overcome it.
This just shows how active Valencia president is and how important it is to him for Valencia to succeed, so hopefully the talks were constructive.

Valencia CF official squad:
Goalkeepers: Vicente Guaita, Miguel Ángel Moyà
Defense: Bruno Saltor, Ángel Dealbert, Hedwiges Maduro, Marius Stankevičius, Jordi Alba
Midfield: Iván Rubio, David Albelda, Tino Costa, Pablo Hernández, Sofiane Feghouli, Vicente Rodríguez, Isco Alarcón
Strikers: Paco Alcácer, Roberto Soldado

UD logrones will probably use this match to test their strength and see if they can fight for top spot in their division. I'm sure they have no illusions of going through, though they are likely to fight and try to play a closer match with Valencia and not get demolished.
They also have a new coach former Valencia player Sergio Pellicer. Pellicer replaces the recently sacked Josip Višnjić.

UD Logrones official squad:

Goalkeepers: Manuel Rubio Velasco and Pablo Vicente

Defense: David Garrido, Miguel Ángel Molina, Raúl Torres, José Infantes , Ignacio Fernández, Alejandro, Pérez, Rafael de las Heras and José Izquierdo

Midfield: Adama Guira, Ramón Borriel, Óscar Arpón, Gregory Lionel, Cervero, Aitor Monroy, Mario Gibanel, Iñaki Sáenz and José Manuel López Gaspar

Forward: Adolfo Moyano, Álvaro del Moral and José Antonio García Osado

Valencia CF Technical:
Formation: 4-2-3-1
Line up: Guaita; Bruno, Maduro, Dealbert, Alba; Pablo, Albelda, Tino, Vicente; Isco, Soldado.
Tactics: Low frequency crosses from the wings, positional changes from the 3 attacking midfielders, very high defensive line, low opposing field pressure, high zone defensive midfielder.

With Isco in the line-up Emery will chance his tactics considerably, this match gives him the perfect opportunity for that. We are going to see more direct play with short passing, low number of crosses and center penetration. The defensive midfielder will be positioned much higher, as well as the defensive wall in order to dominate the midfield.

Result prediction:

Valencia CF 4-1 UD Logrones

Valencia will absolutely trash Logroens, they are going to lead with 4 goals to null, will get relaxed too much and concede one goal from the opposition.

Valencia CF third best team in the last decade

Valencia is officially the third best team in the last decade in the Spanish League, as announced by the Spanish research center for analysis and statistics (CIHEFE). The analysis were made by comparing all points in the last ten years, won European competitions, amount of played European competitions and all the trophies won.

In this list of best Spanish teams, the two teams ahead are obviously Barcelona, who came in as first and Real Madrid who came in as second, while behind Valencia are teams such as Atletico Madrid, Sevilla, Villareal and so on...
Fifa also released its results for the best football clubs in this decade and Valencia was titled the best team in the season 2003/04 when Valencia won the La Liga title, Uefa cup title and Europe supercup.

Hopefully we can achieve additional success in this and the seasons coming and be considered a great club in all of Europe as well.

Lets start by winning against UD Logrones tonight in an easy fashion and continue the winning into the Spanish league.

Sevilla FC 2-0 Valencia CF Match Report

The match between Sevilla and Valencia was essentially decided by the referee, by giving out a non existent red card to Mehmet Topal.
Lets be clear, Valencia did not play very good even before the Topal send off, but they were getting better as time was passing and were starting to control the ball more. In fact Sevilla didn't have a chance on goal until the send off. Its impossible to say if we would have won or not, if we played with 11 players, but we certainly would not have been the defeated in the matter we were.
As if the red card wasn't enough, even luck decided to be against us, as Cezar Sanchez was injured few minuted before half time and substituted in the second half.
But even if that wasn't bad enough Unai Emery decided to play with one man down in the same formation and hoping for a miracle win that wasn't going to come.

The match started with Sevilla the better side, they had more control of the ball and were the attacking team, with Valencia threatening from counter attacks, but ultimately loosing the ball too easily to the Sevilla midfield and defense.
Just as we were starting to play better, Topal and Caceres bumped into each other for a 50-50 ball and Caceres acting skills helped make this an easy decision for the referee and give Topal the red card. This was not even a foul and if it was, it probably should have been awarded to us as Topal was previously fouled when he lost the ball and run to recover it, thus clashing with Caceres.
Anyways from there on it was all Sevilla as Valencia lost the midfield and lost the confidence to do anything. Even though Sevilla were attacking constantly they didn't have any clear chance on goal what so ever and were denied quite easily in the first half.
Valencia actually had the most solid chance earlier in the match as Mata received the ball after Cezar's goal-kick shot fly over all Sevilla players and Mata was quicker to respond and make a shot on Sevilla goal, but the goalkeeper denied him.

In the second half Cezar Sanchez was replaced by our young goalkeeper Guaita and his youth and inexperience will show when we receive the two goals.

The first goal for Sevilla came when Caceres made a 30 meters run without being marked by any Valencia player, he shot at goal, Guaita reflected the ball and Miguel as usual was slow to react, allowing Negredo to move swiftly and shooting, the ball getting through between Guaita's legs.
While it wasn't directly Guaita's fault and more Miguel's fault, he could have done better if he had more experience, I'm sure it would not have been a goal if Cezar was on goal.

After this early goal the winner was basically decided, there was almost no chance Valencia to come back with man down and will lead to Sevilla victory. Emery decided to gamble, as he did not reinforce the midfield and try to have more control of the ball, but he replaced Mathieu with Alba, a good move in a 11 vs 11 match, since Alba is essentially a left wing and more dangerous in attack, but would be confined to defense most of the match.

After some time Luis Fabiano would have had a lucky goal, when he just barely touched the ball, but went towards the goal, just barely hitting the bar and not going in the net.

For the second goal, Dabo would cross the ball into Valencia's penalty area and Alfaro unmarked by Navarro would easily head the ball in the net. Again not really Guaita's fault, but rather Navarro's fault, but I can't but think Cezar would have position himself better and punch the ball in the air and clear the danger.

Anyways it was basically two defensive mistakes that allowed Sevilla to score the goals and beat Valencia, so every good defensive clearance, tackle or whatever Navarro and Miguel did was neglected.

The match ended 2-0 in favor of Sevilla and this puts Valencia into a really difficult position going forward. Things are not going to easily get better and we need hard work, more consistence and better judgement by Unai Emery to start winning and get on winning terms again.


Technical details:

10th matchday La Liga, 2010/11

Sevilla FC 2: Javi Varas; Dabo, Cáceres, Alexis, F. Navarro (Escudé, min. 85); Perotti (Alfaro, min. 73), Romaric (Negredo, min. 52), Renato, Capel; Luis Fabiano and Kanuté.

Valencia CF 0: César (Guaita, min. 46); Miguel, Navarro, Ricardo Costa, Mathieu (Jordi Alba, min. 68); Topal, Fernandes, Mata, Joaquín (Pablo Hernández, min. 80); Aduriz and Soldado.

Goals:
1-0 Negredo (min. 53),
2-0 Alfaro (min. 76).

Player ratings:
Cezar 7 - Always a calming presence in defense and someone to rely upon when our defense fails.
Miguel 5 - Had a pretty good night all round, but one huge mistake and allowed Negredo to score a goal.
Navarro 5 - Same as Miguel, was quite good for most of the match, but one huge mistake and Sevilla scored the second goal.
R. Costa 6 - Can't fault him for anything, the defense didn't have enough cover from midfield as Topal was send off.
Mathieu 6 - Also can't fault him, he had hard time defending, but with Mata not helping out in defense its not a surprise.
Joaquin 6 - Dribbled and run forward well, but didn't have many option to combine with, defended admirably and stopped a Sevilla counter attack in a dangerous position.
Topal 5.5 - Did not have a terrific start to the game, but started to grow into the game, unfortunately wrongly dismissed in what wasn't even a foul.
Fernandes 5.5 - Terrible before the Topal dismissal, lost many balls, but surprisingly improved after that. Run a lot more, covered a lot more ground and generally made himself available for passing, still lost too much balls though.
Mata 4 - Tried to make something in the first half, but his inability to help out in defense in such a match weighs heavily.
Soldado 4.5 - Missed a sitter in the second half to get Valencia back into the game as he only managed to fire at the Sevilla keeper. Had a quite game overall.
Aduriz 4.5 - Mostly invisible, came further back to receive the ball and helped out somewhat in midfield, but he is not a player who can hold his own in the middle.
Subs:
Guaita 5.5 - Not a terrible performance by any means, but could have done a tiny bit more for both goals.
Alba 6 - Defended decently and had a good forward run that seemed convincing at the time, but ultimately couldn't do anything with it.
Pablo N/A - Not enough time.

Sevilla FC vs Valencia CF Match preview

Valencia will take on Sevilla today in what will be a match to get back on the right track for both teams and confirm they are contenders for the top spots. With both teams not really playing continuously good and having frequent ups and downs, this will be an opportunity to get their seasons in order.
Both teams need consistency and this will be the match where they will search for it and hope its the turning point in the campaign.

Sevilla has been the least consistent team from the two, in one match playing great and the next playing terrible, they were knocked off the Champions League in the qualification rounds by Braga and have not even been performing well in the Europa League with mixed results. They changed coaches and Antonio Alvarez was replaced by former Mallorca coach Gregorio Manzano in order to put Sevilla back to winning ways.
In the Spanish league they come from a demoralizing 4-0 loss to Barcelona and will look to kick-start their campaign anew and fight for top spots.
Sevilla last game was actually a huge 4-0 win over Karpaty and they will feel somewhat good after that victory, but that team is way weaker than Barcelona or any of the top Spanish teams.

Sevilla FC squad:
Goalkeepers: Andrés Palop, Javi Varas
Defense: Dani Jiménez, Mouhamadou Dabo, Fernando Navarro, Martín Cáceres, Alexis Ruano, Julien Escudé
Midfield: Didier Zokora, Renato, Luca Cigarini, Romaric, Alejandro Alfaro, Lautaro Acosta, Diego Capel, Diego Perotti
Strikers: Luís Fabiano, Frédéric Kanouté, Álvaro Negredo

Valencia on the other hand have been somewhat more consistent, though they had few bad results in the league recently, although Valencia did play good and beat Rangers 3-0 in the Champions League match.
Numerous Valencia players have said they they are going to Sevilla to win and to break the historic record in the past few seasons that Valencia can't beat any top team in the Spanish league. Navarro said "records are there to be broken and we are going to Sevilla to break that record and win".
Unai Emery also stressed that they are going into the match with the intention of winning and that would be possible if the team does not repeat the mistakes in some of the previous matches.
Ultimately this will be a chance for Valencia to show their credentials and strength and if not a win, even a draw would be great, just not a loss as that would put us back into a bad position.
Valencia had one blow-back prior to this match, as Ever Banega got injured and will not be featured in the squad, this is terrible news as he was just starting to play well for us.

Valencia CF squad:
Goalkeepers: César Sánchez, Vicente Guaita
Defense: Bruno Saltor, Miguel Brito, David Navarro, Ricardo Costa, Hedwiges Maduro, Jérémy Manthieu, Jordi Alba
Midfield: David Albelda, Tino Costa, Mehmet Topal, Manuel Fernandes, Pablo Hernández, Joaquín Sánchez, Juan Mata
Strikers: Aritz Aduriz, Roberto Soldado

Ever Banega was injured in the last training session and although its a minor injury Emery will not risk him, Chori Dominguez is also reportedly injured, Feghuoli seems to still be recovering and Stankevicious, Dealbert, Vicente and Moya were left out of the squad by coach Unai Emery.

Valencia CF Technical:
Formation: 4-4-2
Line up: Cezar; Miguel, Navarro, R. Costa, Mathieu; Joaquin, Albelda, Tino, Mata, Soldado; Aduriz.
Tactics: High frequency crosses from the wings, positional changes from the 3 attacking midfielders, medium defensive line, high opposing field pressure, deep zone defensive midfielder.

Can't see anything changing about the tactics except from some few small details like not too high defensive line, in order to defend quicker from any counter attack, while keeping more pressure in the midfield so that Sevilla loose more balls there. I can see positional changes from the wings especially Mata and one of the strikers coming wider to help out with crosses or build-up.

Result prediction:
Sevilla FC 2-2 Valencia CF
I think there will be goals on both sides, neither defense is too sturdy and solid and both sides can pack a punch in attack if circumstances are right. I can't see Valencia winning since we are playing an awat match, but a draw is very much in the cards. The most important battles will be in the defense though and whoever defense is better may determine the winner is there is one.

Mata new contract will have him stay in Valencia untill 2015

Mata contract saga is set to end in a few days, most likely the day after the match with Sevilla. Mata is currently one of the least payed Valencia players and his agent, who is also his father Mata senior, has been in talks with Valencia's president Manuel Llorente for more than a month now over an improved contract.

The news started that Mata wanted an improved contract, but president Llorente was opposed to it, as there would be no financial or sporting reasons for such a thing, though he knew Mata's salary needed improvement so he suggested a new contract that would see Mata also increase his stay and the release fee also increased.

Now the contract is done and there are just few tiny bit that need to be sorted out, the new and improved contract would have Mata stay in Valencia until year 2015 and the reported salary is around 3 million euros.

This is surely to motivate Mata for the next match Valencia play against Sevilla.

Chori Dominguez to leave in January?

Chori Dominguez is reportedly the target of 3 teams, that would like to purchase the striker in the January transfer window. Chori hasn't really fit in the Valencia squad, last season he sat most of his matches on the bench and when given a chance as a sub, didn't really grab it.
This season Valencia coach Unai Emery has given his more chance to prove himself, but so far there's been so-so performances and seems like he is slowly falling out with the coach.
The reported teams are Greek Panathinaikos, Chori's previous club Rubin Kazan and the third team is reportedly from Spain.
Chori Transfer price is around 1.5 million euros currently, though if he improves it may go up a bit.

Chori's agent will meet with Valencia's sporting director and coach to talk about the players future. If this is true, and I think it is, then the report about Hugo Almeida makes sense.
With Chori Dominguez sold, we would take a decent 1.5 million euros and open up space for the signing of Hugo Almeida.