Alongside a brutal, take no prisoners battle amongst Spain's top clubs to see who can be the most staggeringly mediocre this season - it's currently a toss-up between Atletico 'come to the Calderon and have some points' Madrid and Real 'goals are so passé' Madrid, there's another fierce struggle going on - the prestigious chase to become the year's biggest waste of money.
Whilst the contest in England looks done and dusted with Andriy Shevckenko's name already having been engraved onto a goldplated Betamax video recorder, the competition is still fairly wide open in Spain.
Among the front runners for the 'Maxi Lopez' trophy are Real Madrid's Mahamadou Diarra, a midfielder that would singlehandedly win the league, according to Fabio Capello back in August; Juan Roman Riquelme, currently charging Villarreal nearly four hundred thousand quid a month for his sulking, non-playing services and Joaquín, a 25 million Euro turkey.
Whilst his two opponents can offer either unfamiliarity with the Spanish game or complete
boredom with the entire footballing business as way of excuse, the same get-out is not available to Señor Joaquín Sanchez.
Having spent his career up to now in the pleasant climes of Andalusia at Real Betis, Joaquín decided over the summer that it was high time that he find a brand new home to display his particular footballing skills of bottling big games, not scoring and poncing
about on the wing like - to quote Spike from 'Buffy' - 'a magnificent poofter'. "I've achieved everything I possibly can here, I want to continue my career at another club," proclaimed the 25-year-old midfielder.
After lucky escapes for both Liverpool and Chelsea, Joaquín finally opted to head for title-chasing Valencia - but not before spending 24 hours on loan to lower-league Albacete - a town only good for having a crap in, according to the Spanish - after a signing-on fee fall-out with Betis' unhinged club president Manuel Luis de Lopera.
Unfortunately for Joaquín, things haven't exactly gone the way he probably expected at the Mestalla. For starters, he had joined a club that was populated by more right-wingers than the Daily Mail letters page. And they were all better than him to boot. For the opening matches of the season, the misfiring midfielder could barely a get a look-in as Valencia
stormed from La Liga's starting blocks.
When Joaquín's moment to be a local hero came during a horrific run of injuries for his new club, he offered bugger all. In fact, in his ten starts and 17 appearances in the league before this weekend, he has contributed the grand total of zero goals to the cause.
Instead, it was left to the strikes of Miguel Angulo and David Silva, aided by the returning Vicente, Ruben Baraja and David Albeda, to push Valencia through an amazing six-match winning run to help them recover lost ground on the faltering Sevilla and Barcelona.
Joaquín's international career has also taken a bigger dive than Gio Van Bronckhorst's effort against Celta Vigo on Sunday night. Having been dropped from Spain's national team, Joaquín commented very publicly that Luis Aragones' flagging set-up was a complete joke - a
fair comment but one that ensured an outbreak of the Ebola virus would be needed before the country's crusty coach would ever contemplate picking the whinging winger any time soon.
However, all was not lost for Joaquín, who can be seen every night on Spanish TV in a beer commercial playing - and losing - a five-a-side game to a bunch of air stewardesses.
Having fought off rebellions, insurgencies and rediscovered David Villa's scoring boots, Valencia's coaching team decided this week to start a nationwide hunt to track down the winger's form - ideally before his Real Betis return on Sunday night.
Valencia's director of football Amedeo Carboni claimed that he had started to see signs of
improvement in their expensive flop, despite him having only played nine minutes of last week's 1-0 win over Recreativo - "I think he's trying to get better," said the Italian, optimistically. "I'm seeing a few less overhead kicks and more running from him."
Quique Sanchez-Flores, however, was suggesting that Joaquín was very much a work in process - "he needs to adapt physically, mentally and in his style of football. But I'm neither a psychologist nor a magician, so there's no magic wand I can wave to fix him," shrugged the
self-confessed Muggle.
Joaquín on the other hand was thinking only of his Sunday night homecoming and how many signed shirts he would need to take to a city where he is still very popular. Amongst one half at least. The ex-Betico was also mulling over what he would do if he actually scored against his old team - "it would be the saddest goal of my career," he whispered, tearfully.
As it happens, Joaquín needn't have lost any sleep. His Andalusian arse remained parked on the Valencia bench until the closing stages of Sunday's match, when, rather unfairly 2-1 down, Sanchez-Flores decided the situation was desperate enough to let him onto the pitch, to great cheers from the locals who were either pleased to see him or interpreted his appearance as a sign that visitors had thrown in the towel.
Overall, Valencia were a tad unfortunate not to have extended their winning run to a record-equalling seven. It took an unusually competent goalkeeping display from Betis' Antonio Doblas between the sticks, an offside effort - but not by four metres as Flores
claimed - and a soft penalty, both converted by Robert, to bring about their downfall. "I don't understand these decisions," shrugged the manager after the game. "This is the league and people have got to take more care over them." Good luck with that campaign.
The defeat still keeps Valencia in the Champions League places, but only equal on points with Atletico, who bottled it yet again at home and drew 1-1 with a rampant Racing Santander. Above them sit Real Madrid - not actually playing badly but as well as a mid-table standard starting XI allows them - who lost for the first time to Villarreal. Sevilla remain in second after a ding-dong 4-2 away win to Ian Harte's Levante.
Barça bucked their ideas up a little with a 3-1 home win over Celta Vigo. Although they deserved the three points, the Catalans owe a great deal to a referee who decided that a dive from van Bronckhorst, outside the area, was a penalty.
"The linesman indicated that the foul was outside the box, but the referee blew for the penalty, anyway. I don't know whether it was down to home pressure or not," fumed Celta boss Fernando Vásquez, whose team have now conceded six against Barcelona this season - "with three of them illegal", according to the furious coach.
As Joaquín is still discovering, the Spanish league is a tough one to play in and Valencia is a tough club to play for. Their playing style is based on discipline and industry - not exactly strong points for the ex-Betico. But with the Champions League due to re-start in a few weeks and his new team having a genuine chance at a title run, the winger can still avoid receiving his 'Maxi Lopez' trophy. But he hadbetter get a move on.
Whilst the contest in England looks done and dusted with Andriy Shevckenko's name already having been engraved onto a goldplated Betamax video recorder, the competition is still fairly wide open in Spain.
Among the front runners for the 'Maxi Lopez' trophy are Real Madrid's Mahamadou Diarra, a midfielder that would singlehandedly win the league, according to Fabio Capello back in August; Juan Roman Riquelme, currently charging Villarreal nearly four hundred thousand quid a month for his sulking, non-playing services and Joaquín, a 25 million Euro turkey.
Whilst his two opponents can offer either unfamiliarity with the Spanish game or complete
boredom with the entire footballing business as way of excuse, the same get-out is not available to Señor Joaquín Sanchez.
Having spent his career up to now in the pleasant climes of Andalusia at Real Betis, Joaquín decided over the summer that it was high time that he find a brand new home to display his particular footballing skills of bottling big games, not scoring and poncing
about on the wing like - to quote Spike from 'Buffy' - 'a magnificent poofter'. "I've achieved everything I possibly can here, I want to continue my career at another club," proclaimed the 25-year-old midfielder.
After lucky escapes for both Liverpool and Chelsea, Joaquín finally opted to head for title-chasing Valencia - but not before spending 24 hours on loan to lower-league Albacete - a town only good for having a crap in, according to the Spanish - after a signing-on fee fall-out with Betis' unhinged club president Manuel Luis de Lopera.
Unfortunately for Joaquín, things haven't exactly gone the way he probably expected at the Mestalla. For starters, he had joined a club that was populated by more right-wingers than the Daily Mail letters page. And they were all better than him to boot. For the opening matches of the season, the misfiring midfielder could barely a get a look-in as Valencia
stormed from La Liga's starting blocks.
When Joaquín's moment to be a local hero came during a horrific run of injuries for his new club, he offered bugger all. In fact, in his ten starts and 17 appearances in the league before this weekend, he has contributed the grand total of zero goals to the cause.
Instead, it was left to the strikes of Miguel Angulo and David Silva, aided by the returning Vicente, Ruben Baraja and David Albeda, to push Valencia through an amazing six-match winning run to help them recover lost ground on the faltering Sevilla and Barcelona.
Joaquín's international career has also taken a bigger dive than Gio Van Bronckhorst's effort against Celta Vigo on Sunday night. Having been dropped from Spain's national team, Joaquín commented very publicly that Luis Aragones' flagging set-up was a complete joke - a
fair comment but one that ensured an outbreak of the Ebola virus would be needed before the country's crusty coach would ever contemplate picking the whinging winger any time soon.
However, all was not lost for Joaquín, who can be seen every night on Spanish TV in a beer commercial playing - and losing - a five-a-side game to a bunch of air stewardesses.
Having fought off rebellions, insurgencies and rediscovered David Villa's scoring boots, Valencia's coaching team decided this week to start a nationwide hunt to track down the winger's form - ideally before his Real Betis return on Sunday night.
Valencia's director of football Amedeo Carboni claimed that he had started to see signs of
improvement in their expensive flop, despite him having only played nine minutes of last week's 1-0 win over Recreativo - "I think he's trying to get better," said the Italian, optimistically. "I'm seeing a few less overhead kicks and more running from him."
Quique Sanchez-Flores, however, was suggesting that Joaquín was very much a work in process - "he needs to adapt physically, mentally and in his style of football. But I'm neither a psychologist nor a magician, so there's no magic wand I can wave to fix him," shrugged the
self-confessed Muggle.
Joaquín on the other hand was thinking only of his Sunday night homecoming and how many signed shirts he would need to take to a city where he is still very popular. Amongst one half at least. The ex-Betico was also mulling over what he would do if he actually scored against his old team - "it would be the saddest goal of my career," he whispered, tearfully.
As it happens, Joaquín needn't have lost any sleep. His Andalusian arse remained parked on the Valencia bench until the closing stages of Sunday's match, when, rather unfairly 2-1 down, Sanchez-Flores decided the situation was desperate enough to let him onto the pitch, to great cheers from the locals who were either pleased to see him or interpreted his appearance as a sign that visitors had thrown in the towel.
Overall, Valencia were a tad unfortunate not to have extended their winning run to a record-equalling seven. It took an unusually competent goalkeeping display from Betis' Antonio Doblas between the sticks, an offside effort - but not by four metres as Flores
claimed - and a soft penalty, both converted by Robert, to bring about their downfall. "I don't understand these decisions," shrugged the manager after the game. "This is the league and people have got to take more care over them." Good luck with that campaign.
The defeat still keeps Valencia in the Champions League places, but only equal on points with Atletico, who bottled it yet again at home and drew 1-1 with a rampant Racing Santander. Above them sit Real Madrid - not actually playing badly but as well as a mid-table standard starting XI allows them - who lost for the first time to Villarreal. Sevilla remain in second after a ding-dong 4-2 away win to Ian Harte's Levante.
Barça bucked their ideas up a little with a 3-1 home win over Celta Vigo. Although they deserved the three points, the Catalans owe a great deal to a referee who decided that a dive from van Bronckhorst, outside the area, was a penalty.
"The linesman indicated that the foul was outside the box, but the referee blew for the penalty, anyway. I don't know whether it was down to home pressure or not," fumed Celta boss Fernando Vásquez, whose team have now conceded six against Barcelona this season - "with three of them illegal", according to the furious coach.
As Joaquín is still discovering, the Spanish league is a tough one to play in and Valencia is a tough club to play for. Their playing style is based on discipline and industry - not exactly strong points for the ex-Betico. But with the Champions League due to re-start in a few weeks and his new team having a genuine chance at a title run, the winger can still avoid receiving his 'Maxi Lopez' trophy. But he hadbetter get a move on.
Great stuff
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