I
decided to wait a few days before writing this blogpost until the situation
settled a little bit. Firstly, let’s deal with the elephant in the room. This
week should have been a joyous one for Valencia. A first win over Real Madrid
in front of our own fans since 2019 (we, of course, beat them due to the Soler
penalty hat-trick during Covid.) But not only that: a win which effectively guarantees
Valencia’s place in the top flight, which looked seriously under threat.
Of course, what should have been a great
week is now one of the worst for our club and the city in ages. The racist
idiocy of a few fools has dragged the name of the club and city and fanbase through
the mud and tarnished the result. I’ve seen quite a few of our fans giving the
other side of the coin: certain players aren’t punished for provocation due to
the club they play for, Valencia are being treated harshly compared to other
clubs etc etc. Those views have merit but there is a time and place for such
discussions and NOW IS NOT THE TIME. Our focus should be on one thing and one
thing only: any racist in our fanbase, in our stadium or near our stadium is
one racist too many. It doesn’t matter what provocations, true or not, happen. Abusing
any player on the grounds of race, nationality, religion, sexuality etc is 100%
unacceptable. It is wrong. Full stop.
Now, as far as what’s been done, that only goes part of the way. There should a
zero tolerance policy to it. It shouldn’t have to get to the point where
protocols are enacted and games paused. Ground security should immediately
eject any offenders and they should be banned. A tough example would cut this
out.
“But it was only a handful of people in the stadium! Our fans are no worse than
others” I’ve been in Mestalla enough times to know this is true, but there were
a group outside the stadium chanting racist slogans. Those people are banned,
rightly from the stadium, but they’re still allowed to crawl around outside, engaging
in abuse which sometimes veers into bigotry and damaging our reputation. It’s
on the police to deal with them, so Valencia need to liaise with local
authorities and tell them in no uncertain terms that their payment for policing
also includes keeping these fools from gathering and arresting them if they do
gather and break into racist chants. Do these clowns not see that we have
Diakhaby, that we have Musah, that we have Thierry, that we have Kluivert and Moriba
etc?
Finally, our fans in and around the stadium need to make it clear through
banners and counter protests, that these Yomus groups are not welcome. We can
easily criticise wider authorities for not doing enough to deal with the
problem but we should set a proactive example.
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Let’s move on to the positive that we would have been talking about if all that
hadn’t happened. Valencia are now effectively safe. I’ve been looking at the
table and the remaining games and I believe that even if we lost the 3 remaining
games we’d still stay up as it would take a very unlikely combination of results
to relegate us.
As things stand, we are ahead of Celta, Cadiz, Almeria, Valladolid, Getafe and
Espanyol and 2 of those 7, including us, could go down.
If level on points, we have the better head-to-head against Celta and Getafe
and effectively Valladolid due to goal difference. We drew with Espanyol
earlier in the season so the head-to-head depends on that. Cadiz and Almeria will
finish above us if we’re level on points.
Let’s take the worst case scenario. We lose all 3 remaining games. The other
teams then get perfect results, all winning, against teams not in the
relegation fight. So the teams in capital letters win
Villarreal – CADIZ
Elche – CADIZ
Betis – GETAFE
CELTA – Barcelona
ESPANYOL – Atletico Madrid
Just to start with, I think all those results happening are very, very unlikely,
but if anyone disagrees, I’m sure there’s a bookmaker who’ll happily give you
good odds. (You’ll lose your money.)
However, that situation would leave La Liga as:
Cadiz 44
Celta 43
Getafe 41
Espanyol 40
Valencia 40
Almeria 39
Valladolid 38
(bottom two go down)
So that’s the situation if we lose and all other teams get perfect results. We’d
still not be in a relegation position. There would be remaining games not
included above:
Cadiz vs Celta,
Almeria vs Valladolid,
Espanyol vs Almeria,
Valladolid vs Getafe
Almeria-Valladolid would be key.
If there was a draw or Almeria won Valladolid would need to beat Getafe on the
last day.
If Valladolid won, Almeria would need to win away at Espanyol on the last day.
In both those cases, Getafe and Espanyol would also be fighting for survival,
so wouldn’t lose easily.
So I think even on 40 points and no more wins, we’re safe.
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Staying up when confirmed leads us into the familiar discussions of the manager
and transfer window, usually disappointing though they are. Baraja has stepped
up to the plate and delivered the safety he was hired for. Should he stay on? I’m
on the fence. I certainly think we can do better but there’s the problem of who
would come to Valencia now with all the instability (and this week’s
controversy doesn’t help either.) On the other hand, he’s shaken things up,
given the academy players a chance and they’ve delivered. It would also look
bad to reward him for saving us by firing him.
Let’s hope for a win at Mallorca to end this nasty week on a more positive
note.