A running theme - Week7

     Every story worth its salt needs a good central theme running through the narrative, something to get the reader to care and keep them emotionally invested as the author takes off down numerous other tangents throughout the journey. Last season's central narrative of La Liga was Atlético usurping the Big Two and upsetting all the odds. Yes, all of them. This year, several different narratives are jostling for the main focus of the fans and viewing public. Yet again Barcelona kept a clean sheet (and won), Valencia scored three goals, Málaga had a man sent off, Córdoba didn't pick up three points and Cristiano Ronaldo scored a hattrick. The more things change the more they stay the same. No planes carrying love-notes for CR7 though, sadly. We can only hope they make cameo reappearances through the season.
     The weekend began with Getafe hosting winless and rock-bottom Córdoba at the Coliseum Alfonso Pérez. The away team had only managed to bag three goals in the six games before Friday night, but took the lead towards the end of a pretty poor game when the wonderfully-monikered Patrick Claude Ekeng Ekeng seized on a loose piece of miscontrol and powered into the area in the 78th minute. The defensive midfielder completely ignored Nabil Ghilas - who was

"Motherfuckerrrrrr!!!"

in a far better position than him - and slammed the ball across the 'keeper into the far corner. Los Califas will have to wait a while longer for their first three point haul though after the on-loan Baba Diawara stole in ahead of the defence to capitalise on a lovely volleyed pass from Sergio Escudero. The Córdoba players looked in vain to the linesman for an offside flag, while manager Albert Ferrer lost it on the touchline, slamming his bottle of water to the ground and yelling an obscenity. Frankly, we don't see that enough from managers nowadays if you ask me. 'Arry Redknapp could learn a thing or twelve.
     The biggest game on Saturday saw Atlético visit the Mestalla to take on high-flying Valencia. The reigning champions had yet to lose a game this season as they hunted to stay on the shirttails of the Barcelona juggernaut but they imploded in a big way here. Before the game was a quarter of an hour old Cholo Simeone's troops found themselves 3-0 down. Miranda has scored a large percentage of Atleti's goals this season, but he will be eager to forget about the most recent as he calamitously notched at the wrong end to put los Che 1-0 up in just the sixth minute. A nothing ball towards no-one from Everton reject and World Cup 2014 winner Shkrodan Mustafi was set to be gathered by Atleti 'keeper Miguel Ángel Moyà before Miranda stole in to head past his teammate. It seems Cholo's trained the big Brazilian to score so naturally that he does it at every opportunity; there's really no other explanation for his brainfart otherwise. The capital team went for it straight from the resulting kickoff, but instead found themselves two down within a matter of seconds, André Gomes finishing powerfully through the legs of Moyà after waltzing through various powderpuff challenges. One can only imagine what Cholo would've liked to do to his players after those 120 seconds as the cameras cut to his highly unimpressed fizzog on the touchline, barely-concealed rage bubbling close to the surface. I'll bet his players wished he was still banned from the touchline after they were then undone by one of their own tactics on 13 minutes, Nicolás Otamendi being left completely unmarked to slam home a header from countryman Pablo Piatti's inswinging corner. Mario Mandzukic, now sans mask, pulled back a consolation for Atleti on the half hour mark, nutting the ball in the net after Valencia 'keeper Diego Alves spilled a shot from Tiago in front of the looming striker. The game could've been different had the referee awarded Atleti a penalty for handball soon after,

Even the ref wants to celebrate with him

but in truth Alves would've probably saved it anyway. He got his chance on the brink of half time though, after the ref relented and decided to help Cholo out with the award of a very dubious pen, for handball against José Gayá. Diego Alves is well known as a penalty specialist, but in truth my nan could've been in goal wearing a blindfold and she'd have had a 50% chance of saving Guilherme Siquera's feeble effort. Nonetheless, Alves has now saved an incredible 13 penalties in La Liga. Another player using his hands on Saturday - to markedly less good effect (less good? worse?) - was Alessio Cerci. The former Championship Manager wunderkind, already on a booking, controlled a ball on his arm to tee himself up for a goal in injury time, then tried scampering away from the referee after his attempt had been chalked off. As always happens, the long arm of the law eventually caught up with the Italian and issued him with his second yellow. Silly, silly boy. I do not envy him whatsoever, judging by the stony set to Cholo's jaw as the official blew the final whistle.
     Red cards are definitely the most prominent feature of Málaga's season this year and Saturday's Derby of eastern Andalucía against Granada was no exception with Marcos Angeleri this time pouring himself an early bath on 73 minutes. Los Boquerones had been a goal behind since the very first minute of the game, when Youssef Al-Arabi pounced on an awful attempted save by Idriss Carlos Kameni to continue his run of scoring against this opposition. He's now got five goals in his last three games against Granada's rival. The Málaga #1 raged at his defence as he retrieved the ball from his net but can only blame himself for what was a very poor imitation of goalkeeping. The hosts equalised through Roque Santa Cruz on the hour mark before former Sunderland man Angeleri received his marching orders following a professional foul 12 minutes later. The 10 men were given a lifeline just over 10 minutes from time when the referee awarded an extremely harsh penalty for handball against former Málaga man Manuel Iturra. Left-back Vitorino Antunes took a short run-up and sent the 'keeper the wrong way. I'd consider that quite a let-off.
     At Vallecas, Barcelona continued their calm dissemination of the league with a 2-0 win over Rayo Vallecano. However, the Catalan giants are obviously relying heavily on certain players to score, with the goals being shared between only six squad members. Messi and Neymar have bagged 13 of the team's 19 goals this season with Pedro, Ivan Rakitic, Sandro and Munir sharing the rest between them. Everything is still rosy at the other end though, with Claudio Bravo setting a new Primera División record in the 21st minute of this game by opening the season

Seems Bravo's gloves do have
magical powers...

without conceding a goal in the first 561 minutes of action. However, he still has some way to go to beat the record for most consecutive minutes without conceding overall, which belongs to Atlético Madrid's Abel Resino, who kept out everything thrown at him for an astonishing 1,275 consecutive minutes of league action during the 1990-91 season. Barcelona's big two up front both scored again on the weekend; the wee Argentine maestro opened the scoring in the 35th minute after chasing on to a typical Barcelona long ball from the back to dink superbly over the 'keeper, a lead that was doubled just seconds later as another long punt picked out Munir, who played in Neymar to saunter into the area and finish diagonally. Keeping up the theme of red cards, Rayo did not help themselves by finishing with nine men on the pitch after Jorge Morcillo and Javier Aquino picked up a pair of yellows each. Messi was unusually profligate during this game, but nonetheless finds himself only two goals from overtaking Telmo Zarra's Primera División all-time goalscoring record of 251. LFP president Javier Tebas aims to honour the occasion when the Flea finally manages this feat - even if that happens to be when Barça take on Real Madrid in the first Clásico of the season at the Bernabéu on October 25. Possibly disregarding Real Madrid fans' obvious feelings on the matter, Tebas said; "Why should we not honour Messi at the Bernabéu? The league cannot overlook Messi. He deserves a tribute, we have to do something (for him)."
     Real Madrid finally moved into the top four on Sunday with a 5-0 demolition of Athletic Bilbao. The visitors are on abject form this season, not helped by the rigours of European football, but such was the dominance of Madrid's attacking talents that most sides would have crumbled in similar fashion. Cristiano Ronaldo scored his third hattrick in the last four La Liga

Ronaldo - honk honk

games and in so doing moved level with legends Alfredo di Stéfano and Telmo Zarra in scoring three or more Primera División goals on 22 occasions. The third was slightly fortunate as the ball appeared to strike the Portuguese's elbow to wrongfoot Gorka Iraizoz, but CR7 wheeled away to celebrate regardless by pretending to honk the tits of a 10-foot tall giantess as he periodically does. The other two were scored by Karim Benzema, and a couple were set up once more by newly-anointed Welsh Footballer of the Year 2014 Gareth Bale, the fourth time he has picked up the gong in the past five years - which sees him overtake clueless manager Mark Hughes and Yossi Benayoun enthusiast John Hartson in one fell swoop. Iker Casillas retained his position betwixt the sticks for this game, but debates about his suitability as #1 are taking place on a national as well as club level, with many calling on David de Gea to be given the gloves for La Furia Roja. San Iker has shouldered a lot of the blame for Spain's shock 2-1 defeat against Slovakia after he was deceived by the slightest movement in the air for the first goal, although what gets quickly forgotten is that he pulled off an amazing save just minutes before that disaster, throwing out a paw to bat away a close-range shot when he was going the other way. Such is the thankless life of the goalkeeper, I suppose.
     Deportivo remain stone bottom of the league after travelling the length of the country only to be schooled 4-1 at the Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán by Sevilla. Coconut-headed emotional basketcase Stéphane Mbia even managed to bag a brace - and you know things aren't going your way if that happens against you. The man with the smallest waist in Spanish football marked both by going into some sort of fit - either that or it was some idiot savant kind of attempt at the Macarena. Whatever, the man needs to work out his celebrations if he's going to keep scoring while he's in

Mbia - haring off to celebrate with
awful 'moves'

Spain. You don't get anywhere with half-hearted attempts. Thanking God/Allah/Buddah/Sepp Blatter? That's just fine. Cartoonishly groping giant invisible womens' breasts? Knock yerself out. Having every member of your team walk the entire length of the pitch to pat you on the head? Hm, I'll allow it, Barca, but must. work. harder. Haris Medunjanin ensured his beard got another weekend's airing in the match highlights by equalising through a nicely crafted free kick on the half hour before Carlos Bacca stopped running the wrong way just long enough to drill the ball home before the first half came to a close. Mbia's second attempt at dancing then followed just before the hour mark, before Vitolo nearly managed to miss even though no-one was near him and the 'keeper was already on his arse in the goalmouth. Still, at least his miscued blast went in, unlike Carlos Bacca's weak-ass penalty a few minutes later which, although placed low and towards the corner of the goal, was saved by the Argentinean Germán Lux.
     In the rest of the games, there were some 1,000 empty seats (about a fifth of the stadium) for the riproaring 3-3 draw between Eibar and Levante which the home team levelled in the very last minute through the endeavour of Federico Piovaccari after conceding in just the second minute. In pissing down conditions, the game also saw clearly the best goal of the weekend and an early contender for goal of the season, Saúl smashing home on the volley from the edge of the area after being teed up from a free kick. Staying in the north, Celta Vigo had the first loss of the season imposed on them by Villarreal at Balaídos, Moi Gómez scoring two in two first half minutes just after the half hour. Vigo pulled one back through Joaquín Larrivey but had Andreu Fontas sent off before Mario wrapped the game up with a tap-in in injury time. The only thing to note from the 2-2 draw between Almería and Elche was the awful decision-making on show; from the defenders, the goalkeepers and the ref. Really, 'twas quite amateur.
     There now follows a week's break while the players go and meet up with their friends for international footballings. I myself shall be using this time to jet to Warsaw to take in the Poland games against Germany and Scotchland. I've assured the missus there should be no trouble in the first game - after all, it's not as if Poland and Germany have any history, is it?

Footballer Cockney Rhyming Slang

Rodney (Marsh):
meaning;   cruel, disagreeable, severe
example;  "The ref game him a second yellow for his goal celebration? That's well Rodney."

Damien (Duff):
meaning;   incubating a child for nine months
example;  "I told him to use protection but he didn't listen and now he's got her up the Damien."

Goals. Lots and lots of lovely goals.

Plush. As. Fuck.

     Ok, ok, I missed the start of the season by a long shot, but I've been busy. I've been doing stuff etc. I even went on a reconnaissance mission (holiday) to Málaga and rocked up at La Rosaleda. Pity it was the day after they'd played. And pity the game had been away at Valencia in any case. But they do sell nice beach towels there - I mean, I didn't buy one but they seemed soft enough. I suppose that's the kind of thing that happens to your club when big money comes in; branded beach towels suddenly become much more important than supporters had previously realised. When I used to live in Málaga I never saw such plush team beach towels on sale. Ah well, progress of a sort I suppose someone will argue.
     So to recap the first few weeks in La Liga very quickly, Barcelona won every week by scoring more goals than the opposition. In fact, they still at time of writing haven't conceded even one. Stingy gits. Ivan Rakitic has of course started like a cat on fire (or something like that, I can't think of a better simile at the moment) and Neymar has managed to pick himself off the floor following his exertions single-handedly dragging his country through the World Cup all those months ago. Messi is Messi of course, but so far has been changing games more through method of assist than goal, though he scored two in the opening day 3-0 victory over Elche. It does rather look like his team are already geared towards Luis Suárez starting up front, with Messi playing more of a support role than previously.

Understated celebration - Arda Turan

     Defending champions Atlético Madrid endured a messy opening day across town at Rayo Vallecano, dropping two points in a scoreless draw, but picked up to narrowly beat Eibar 2-1 before deservedly sweeping aside Real Madrid more convincingly, albeit by the same scoreline. Their main source of goals, now Diego Costa has left for pastures Chelsea, has been set piece deliveries won by one of their impressive defenders. Up front, Mario Mandzukic will need a bit of time to find his feet (not an easy task when you're as tall as he is), but conversely, the team will have to learn an entirely new system of playing to their striker's strengths, which are different from their departed Spaniard/Brazilian.
     European champions Real Madrid started in disarray, and although it seems ridiculous to say mere months after delivering La Décima that the entire club has been craving, Ancelotti and his enthusiastic eyebrow find themselves under pressure already. And he's not the only one. Iker Casillas has been whistled, booed and jeered by sections of his own supporters, and his form seems to have deserted him. Keylor Navas continues to wait in the wings and his shadow only looms larger over San Iker. One gets the feeling that were Casillas to lose his place there might be a very long road back ahead of him, if at all. Before last weekend, Real had conceded the highest number of goals in the Primera División, so although CR7 is leading the Pichichi race as usual, with a barely conceivable nine goals in just four games, his team have dropped as many points as they've gained. A tight 2-0 win over Córdoba was followed by a staggering 4-2 reverse at Real Sociedad - a game in which they'd been cruising and 2-0 up after 11 minutes, only to later implode spectacularly. And all while wearing that haemmorage-inducing pink kit as well. Gawd help us.

Goalscorer Bacca, looking remarkably
like he's playing for Cardiff

     Sevilla are sitting pretty in the Champions League places, their only dropped points coming in the first week against Valencia and even then only due to an 88th minute equaliser from Lucas Orbán on his debut. Carlos 'wacky' Bacca is still hot on the goals trail and continues making defences up and down the country paranoid, as well as lazy and a bit peckish. Los Che, meanwhile, are also hanging onto the tails of leaders Barcelona after scoring three goals in three successive games following the stalemate at the Ramón Sánchez Pizjuán, new Spain striker Paco Alcácer proving their version of Carlos Bacca.
     Of the promoted clubs, everyone's favourite minnows Eibar are enjoying life in La Liga for the first time and are ensconced in the top half, los Armeros having recorded two wins and two losses so far. Deportivo La Coruña sit in 13th, their only victory so far having come against Eibar, while Córdoba find themselves second from bottom with just 2 points. Levante prop everyone else up following one draw (0-0 at Málaga) out of their opening four games, with no goals scored.

Gameweek 4

Lots and LOTS of these over the weekend

     If you were bored on the weekend and looking for goals, La Liga was the place to find 'em. A total of 42 of the little blighters were counted across the ten games, at an average (I'd like to showcase my astounding powers of mathematics here) of 4.2 per game. There were no 0-0s whatsoever - the closest we came to one was Granada beating Athletic Bilbao at the new San Mamés 1-0 through the gleefully misspelt Jhon Córdoba. Some games were close (Atleti 2-2 Celta de Vigo, with two goals for the big men from the back for the reigning champions), and some were not so close (Córdoba 1-3 Sevilla). There were mad comebacks from behind (Villarreal 4-2 Rayo, with el Submarino Amarillo coming back from 2-0 down inside the opening half hour) and some last minute drama (Espanyol 2-2 Málaga, with Espanyol retaking the lead in the 88th minute through Christian Stuani before los Boquerones levelled through a 93rd minute Duda freekick).

Yaaay, goals! We likes goals!

     Barcelona kept yet another clean sheet and achieved a manolito at the other end, beating Levante 5-0 with goals from Neymar, Rakitic, youngster Sandro Ramírez, former youngster Pedro and of course Messi, although the Flea untypically missed a penalty earlier in the game. For their part, Real Madrid looked to put to bed a lot of the disaffection that had been creeping into the fanbase with an 8-2 mauling of Dépor at the Riazor. CR7 helped himself to a hattrick while Bale and late substitute Chicharito grabbed a brace each and James Rodríguez rounded off the scorers. Dangerously-bearded Haris Medunjanin and Toché grabbed the consolation goals for not-so-Superdépor, who were nonetheless raucously supported by their fans. Fair play to 'em.

     In the rest of the games, Almería won 2-1 at Sociedad, new boys Eibar beat Elche 2-0 and Valencia continued scoring in threes, defeating Getafe 3-0.

     Due to the wholly random way the Spanish football authorities run the game over there, Gameweek 4 ran pretty much into Gameweek 5, which is already half-way through, and will in turn run straight into Gameweek 6, so not much of a let-off for me after a few weeks being out of practice. I don't get paid well enough for this. I could tell you that Celta beat Deportivo 2-1 in the Galician derby to move up to 5th in the table after small goalkeeper Sergio saved an 88th minute penalty from Medunjanin, or that Cristiano Ronaldo is now quite ridiculously the tenth-highest goalscorer in Primera history after he scored four in Real's 5-1 victory at home to Elche, or that Bale took second place in the Pichichi competition with his fourth of the season, or even that Keylor Navas finally displaced Iker Casillas between the sticks. But I shan't, 'cos that'd be cheating - I'm only talking about Gameweek 4 here. Gameweeks 5 and 6 next time, have some patience for Chrissakes! Normal service to resume as of next week, scout's honour.

Im going, and I'm taking my ball with me