It’s at times like these that I feel such pride. I support Sevilla, the same team that got relegated not too long ago, got promoted again and dominated Europe for a couple years – all of this without crazy investment and limited transfer funds! I don’t care how much you hate us, anyone with common sense will admire our achievements from both a footballing perspective and even from the point where we proved that success is obtainable without money.

I mean just look at Man City (Shitty?) they’re probably one of the richest clubs in Europe right now, or at least have the highest investment but recently were knocked out by Nottingham Forest (Championship side – equivalent to the Spanish Segunda) in the FA Cup and sit in a highly respectable 13th place in the Premier League. It’s true, money can’t buy you happiness now can it? Think Robinho is regretting his move? He might not come out and say it, but I wouldn’t doubt it.

Glory hunters never seem to amaze me. I bet 99% of foreign Manchester United fans can’t even find Manchester on a map. Same goes for Liverpool, Chelsea, Milan and Madrid. It’s not ruining the game directly, but there are very few true fans anymore.

Once again, the pride in being a Sevillista, that small club from the south of Spain who was relegated not too long ago, fought their way back into the top flight and winning those 5 trophies just felt even sweeter. I mean if you’re winning a trophy everyday, the euphoria is lost, as in the case of some of Europe’s top clubs, it’s probably not appreciated as much as it could be, but when we won I can’t even begin to describe the feeling.

Anyway, in case you’re wondering, yes, this does have a lot to do with the transfer window. Money is ruining the beautiful game, everyone knows this. The youth academies of the smaller teams are virtually useless because the big rich clubs are just going to come and submit an irresistible offer for the young up and coming stars anyway.

At Sevilla we have probably the best sporting director in all of Europe, Monchi. He has found some of the now, biggest stars in Europe who were just average kids at one time. The likes of Dani Alves who started at local Brasilian club Bahia and was scouted when he was just seen as an average right back, Fredi Kanoute, the big Tottenham Hotspur flop who came to Nervion and was putting in goals left right and centre, and of course Luis Fabiano who played for Porto and were more than happy to let him go. These three once average players have all come to Sevilla and been more than successful, they were given the time and proper environment to develop. This however is all in vain if one of the bigger clubs in Europe come calling like we saw with Alves and Barcelona. We simple couldn’t resist the 22 million Euro transfer fee that Barca offered. Same deal with Poulsen and Juventus and the 15 million Euros they gave us.

Sure, these two transfers plus the Keita one have made us an extremely rich club over the past year, and allowed us to start a development project on our stadium upgrading the capacity and making it one of the best stadiums in all of Europe but still it doesn’t take away from the fact that we developed these players into the superstars they are but the temptation of money makes it hard for us to do anything. The prestige of playing for a “big club” outweighs playing for the club that made you who you are. It’s ridiculous.

The transfer window may have just opened but already Man Shitty have splashed their cash (12 million pounds) to be exact, on Wayne Bridge, a left back who has always played second fiddle to Ashley Cole. There have been rumours of both Chelsea and Inter Milan being interested in Luis Fabiano, and Kanoute. We now know that Scolari will not be given any funds at Chelsea to buy during this window but we all know that if they really wanted something, they could get it, no problem. Same goes for Inter, probably the best team in Italy right now, they have the money and prestige of a “big club” so when they come calling, it’s hard to say no.

What’s the point of Monchi and our board finding these stars if they’re just going to get bought a couple years later when they’re in their prime? It really defeats the purpose of the transfer window and for the smaller to mid sized teams to progress is made more difficult.

Think about it. We’re a team that is not big by any means, we’ve been successful over the past 5 years or so and we are constantly fighting for the Champions League spots in the league but by no means rich. How can we expect to develop and keep challenging for these places if all our stars are being lured by the more prestigious clubs? How can we even buy other stars if they are being pursued by other top clubs? Who would a player rather choose, Sevilla or AC Milan? I hate this and its slightly degrading to my own team but this is what football has come to, it’s sad.

I often think to myself just how long it will be before Navas and Capel are tapped up by some other European powerhouse… Just look what happened to Sergio Ramos, Julio Baptista, and Jose Antonio Reyes, all moved on to Real, with only one of them eventually succeeding. I’m sure if Puerta was still alive, he’d be one of the most sought after left backs in Europe, the boy was pure class. Our youth system has produced all these great players and only Navas is still with the club. David Prieto is a promising centre back, what if he becomes a world beater? Guess he’s not staying at Sevilla either.

The transfer window was introduced in attempts for clubs to strengthen their squad before the second half of the season, but it has now turned out that it is more of the same. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. How many times have we seen this throughout history? Now it’s happening in football.

Today, Del Nido came out with a pure classic. Talking about Dani Alves and his supposed desire to leave for Barcelona, the Sevilla president had this to say.

“Por 25 millones de euros le mando al Barcelona las botas de Daniel Alves para que se las ponga un lateral del filial. Es quizás el mejor lateral derecho que hay actualmente en el mundo, y mi ilusión es que continúe los cuatro años que tiene”

For 25 million Euro, I’ll send Barcelona Dani Alves’s cleats so that a youth squad player can wear them. He’s possibly the best right back in the world and my hope is that he will stay here for the four years he has

Haha. What balls this guy has. I swear, the best things come out of this guy’s mouth. Basically he just told Laporta to screw off, and Dani Alves isn’t going anywhere.

Later in the convo, Del Nido denies that anyone has contacted him about the Brazilian, but does say that he won’t talk to anyone until the season is over.

It just so happens that this comes out of the Madridista AS, which sticks it to the Catalans any chance they get. But Del Nido knows how to deal, I’ll tell you that. He’s not afraid to stick his neck out there and say something stupid, but its what he’s known for. Well, that and the whole Malaga deal, but that’s neither here nor there! Jeje.

Sevilla continue their purple patch under the direction of one Manuel Jiménez with a 2-0 thumping of Steaua in Romania. Most of you wouldn’t think that a 2-0 win was a thumping, but Sevilla clearly dominated this match from start to finish.

The first half was all Sevilla. Upon firing up my portuguese bootleg signal today (which I pseudo understand) I was stunned to see Sevilla playing a 4-2-3-1 for what would be the first time in forever. The formation looked like this

—-Kanouté—-
—–Jesus Navas–Renato—De Mul—-
———–Poulson—-Keita——–
Adriano—Drago—Mosquera–Dani Alves

First thing that jumps out is Holy shit, it’s a different formation. I personally like this formation as Kanouté can keep the back four busy while Jesus Navas and De Mul can make runs upfront while Renato can drop back behind Kanouté and look for balls near the top of the box (aka his second goal). This also leaves Poulson and Keita to control the middle and limits the counterattacks and the spacing that can happen when Sevilla start to all out attack. Also Jesus Navas switched to the left which put Tom De Mul on the right with Dani Alves, giving the Dutch player a bit of support behind him.

The first half was completely dominated by Sevilla. They had plenty of opportunity, with Kanouté uncharacteristically missing on a few, especially a nicely given ball by Jesus Navas that Kanouté volleyed wide. On 24 minutes, Dani Alves whipped in a corner kick that was headed on goal brilliantly by Poulson and parried away by Zapata. The ball found Renato who calmly slotted it into an open net while the defender marking him simply stood still. The reaction by Zapata was one of sheer amazement as how the defender could have simply let his mark go. Sevilla continued to dominate until the end of the first half when I had to go to class (booooooooooooooo) I seriously contemplated not going to class, but I figuered now in a ph.d program, I kind of have an obligation.

The second half was more of the same for Sevilla. Steaua’s chance came as the referee called a Steaua player offsides after beating Palop. Upon seeing the replay he looked onsides to me, but of course I’m not complaining. According to the recaps that I have read, the ref also missed a clear handball in the box against Steaua, but thats an aside. Renato’s second goal came on a header that was served up superbly by Jesus Navas.

According to all reports, Sevilla were clearly the better team. Tom de Mul had a solid game, but he will need to play to gain some confidence wearing a Sevilla shirt.

Sevillista del Día

Clearly my SdD today was Renato. He takes to that withdrawn striker/center midfielder position so well, and with Keita and Poulson playing proper midfield roles, Renato is free to roam around and create. Renato can score goals, and even though I’m sure Luis Fabiano will be a bit disappointed that he is sitting the bench, maybe this new formation is the way to go. With Renato creating and scoring like this, I’m sold.

Here are the highlights.

What a great game yesterday that showed me just how resilient we really can be.

I’m not going to lie, I was a bit on edge yesterday going into the game. No matter how certain one can be about their club, in times of struggle it is easy to think pessimistically.

The Champions League games are generally played on Tuesday and Wednesday, which means that my Tuesday Semantics and Corpus Linguistics class that gets out at 3:30 cuts into my game watching time, and my Advanced Phonetics class from 3:30-6 on Wednesday just can’t give me any leeway.

After getting out of class what a shock to see in the 60th minute it was 3-1. I can’t remember the last time I was shocked that Sevilla were winning, but it was something that needed to happen, and it started happening yesterday.

I didn’t see much of the game as my live-footy.org stream was marginal at best, but I was watching the updates through as.com and Marca.es. I only saw the highlights on the video above and by the looks of it, we missed about 2 or 3 sitters that could have been goals as well. But that is what happens every game.

I do have to say that I was a bit surprised that Koné didn’t start upfront in this game after Juande was praising his ‘doble K’. I’m glad that they got him on in the second half and that he was able to net a goal. What a signing he was. World Class all the way.

I don’t need to talk about all the goals because you can watch them uptop, but wow, what was that keeper doing on Luis Fabiano’s goal? He was out in Switzerland when he finally attempted to take a stab at Kanouté. That was just poor keeping. Not to mention the gift that the defender gave to Kanouté. Simply stunning.

Kanouté was the MOTM by the looks of it and by all of the reports I’ve read about the match. As.com actually said that it was Kanouté’s Exhibition. He scored the first goal, set up Luis Fabiano, Koné and Escudé, and looked to be in top form from all the choppy bits I saw.

I’m curious as to how Dani Alves played. I wanted to see if he turned it up a notch or two from the last few games when his crosses were lacking and his pace was a bit off. If anyone saw the game and could comment on that, I would appreciate it.

Also, in Sevilla yesterday, they had intense flooding that ravaged some of the suburbs, most notibly Alcalá de Guadaira where a good friend of mine lives. Alcalá is actually now declared a ‘zona catastrofíca’ which is basically a State of Emeregency in the States. The game was played in some intense rain, but never halted.

So should I go as far as to saying that we literally and figuratively ‘weathered the storm?’ I’m thinking so. But you are only as good as your next game, and that game will be on Sunday against Deportivo.

Today after driving home at 100mph after sitting in the most boring class of my life, I turned on my GolTV to see Sevilla were already down 1-0 to Espanyol. I didn’t see the first half, so I can’t commentate on it, but as per Crazy Ray Hudson, I’m sure it wasn’t pretty.

The second half was ALL Sevilla, minus about 1.5 minutes in which Espanyol managed to pump in 2 goals. I don’t want to go through and give you a minute by minute rundown of the game since that isn’t my style, but I would rather like to talk about the game in general.

* Sevilla have been ‘lacking’ since the passing of Antonio Puerta in the beginning of the season. Sure they rolled against Getafe and against Deportivo, but they are Getafe and Deportivo, that is expected. When they were faced with the test of Arsenal, they lost 3-0 at the Emerates, which was a terrible game for Sevilla and they lost 2-1 against Barcelona at the Camp Nou.

* Sevilla was thought to be the winner before this game even started, and were expected to roll Espanyol, but they didn’t come out firing on all cylinders. Dani Alves wasn’t terribly impressing and to be honest, he hasn’t impressed me much this season. I know we need him at Sevilla, but it is about time that he starts to produce this season and doesn’t wait around until the January transfer window to get out of Sevilla.

* Koné was absolutly magnificent today. The entire second half I didn’t see him give away a ball at all, and at one point he made his way through the entire Espanyol defense and gave a great pass to Alves on the outside. He scored a goal on a world-class header served in from Diego Capel (my second favorite Sevillista at the moment.) Koné is making a claim for the starting spot next to Kanouté for the rest of the season.

* Give credit to Juande Ramos for subbing in Kanouté for Adriano and playing three strikers upfront, not a normal formation for Sevilla. The three strikers upfront were terrorizing the Espanyol back four and allowed numerous balls to be played out wide for Diego Capel and for Jesús Navas, who has been playing great as of late.

* Luis Garcia played a solid game for Espanyol, netting the second goal and keeping Sevilla honest in the back. And subbing in Raul Tamudo proved to be the difference as he scored the game winner in the 88th minute.

* Komeni is an absolutly world-class keeper for Espanyol. He made a few amazing saves that would have given Sevilla the win.

And now I give you the BUENO, the MALO and the FEO

BUENO:
Komeni –was stunning in goal, and was the reason for the Espanyol win.

MALO:
Dani Alves–didn’t have the best crosses today when they were needed. He hasn’t be in form as of late.

FEO:
Kerzkahov–missed 3 clear chances for goals today. He will need to be better if he doesn’t want to watch Kone start in his place.