From: franherr@romeo.caltech.edu (Herrero, Francisco)
Subject: Spanish Soccer News 4/13
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.40    
Organization: California Institute of Technology
Date: Mon, 13 Apr 1992 10:03:00 GMT

Hey Dudes!

It's time for another of my weekly postings on the state of Spanish Soccer.
It is right now 2:00 AM in the morning here in California, so I don't know how
much I'll be able to print up before I get tired and go to bed. Also, it seems
that people had a lot of trouble last week getting my posting. All I can say is
have patience. I always type them up on Sunday nights and I can do nothing about
the computers being too slow and sending it out three days later. Rest assured
that, barring previous notice or a sudden emergency, I will be posting up the
results every week, so have a little patience.

Anyway, on to the job at hand. Here are this week's results and standings in
the Spanish First Division:

Albacete                       3      Deportivo de la Corun~a               0
                     Zalazar (p)
                     Zalazar
                     Echeverri
Burgos                         2      Logron~es                             0
                     Balint
                     Balint
Mallorca                       0      Real Madrid                           0
Espan~ol                       2      Sporting de Gijon                     0
                     Lluis     
                     Francisco
Real Sociedad                  2      Sevilla                               1
                     ??????                                        ??????
                     ??????
Zaragoza                       1      Athletic de Bilbao                    0
                     Gay
Oviedo                         2      Valladolid                            1
             Esteban (own goal)                                    Aragon
                     Carlos (p)
Atletico de Madrid             5      Cadiz                                 1
                     Manolo                                        Tilico
                     Manolo
                     Manolo
                     Manolo
                     Sabas
Osasuna                        2      Tenerife                              0
                     Arozarena 
                     Martin Dominguez
Valencia                       1      Barcelona                             0
                     Fernando

STANDINGS:

TEAM                          POINTS
1. Real Madrid                  44
2. Barcelona                    42
3. Atletico de Madrid           40
4. Valencia                     36
5. Albacete                     36
6. Real Sociedad                34
7. Zaragoza                     33
8. Sporting de Gijon            32
9. Sevilla                      31
10. Burgos                      30
11. Logron~es                   29
12. Oviedo                      27
13. Osasuna                     27
14. Athletic de Bilbao          26
15. Espan~ol                    24
16. Tenerife                    23
17. Deportivo de la Corun~a     23
18. Valladolid                  22
19. Cadiz                       21
20. Mallorca                    20


As for second division, wellllll..... let's say that I didn't have a chance to
listen to the games on the radio this morning because I had partied too much
the night before, and then they gave the scores in a strange order on the radio
this afternoon, and I wasn't quite able to match up the scores with their
respective matches. I am not completely sure of any of these, so I won't print
up a table of standings, but here's more or less what I know:

Barcelona "B" - Las Palmas          2 - 1
Palamos - Castellon                 3 - 1
Sabadell - Lerida                   ? - ?
Bilbao Ath. - Malaga                1 - 0
Betis - Merida                      3 - 1
Aviles - Sestao                     ? - ?
R. Madrid "B" - Eibar               1 - 1
R. Vallecano - Figueras             1 - 1
Compostela - Las Palmas             ? - ?
Celta - Rac. Santander              5 - 0


The biggest news this weekend was the match played between Valencia and 
Barcelona at Luis Casanova Stadium in Valencia, where the real protagonist of
the game was referee Garcia de Loza. The game was pretty even in the first half,
with Barcelona constantly on the attack and creating the better scoring chances
but unable to score. Koeman even missed a penalty kick. At the end of the half,
Fernando was able to put Valencia on top of the score. Then came the second
half, or lack thereof. Eight minutes into this half, the referee lost control
and began carding players left and right. Barcelona coach Johan Cruyff got the
first red card, and then three other players got it. Then a Barcelona player
started running towards the referee to protest when a Valencia player prevented
this by pushing him to the ground. At this, the referee all of a sudden took off
towards the locker room, and a while later, without even entering the field 
again, called the game over from inside the locker room, leaving both teams 
sitting around on the field stunned. The only explanation so far for this
behavior was that he felt threatened somehow by the Barcelona players, as Cruyff
had been making some pretty harsh statements all week about the refereeing. Who
knows... The game may have to be played over, or the referee hanged by his
toennails, or something, but it is definite that this story will not end here.

Univision was all prepared to broadcast the Valencia-Barcelona game today, but
upon finding out about the "festivities" of this game, ended up broadcasting
Malloca-Real Madrid as a substitute. This game ended up in a 0-0 tie, but it
could have easily been a goalfest on Real Madrid's part, as they controlled the
game from start to finish and gave the Mallorca defense fits. Mallorca's goalie
Stelea played the game of his life, stopping every shot from every angle from
every Real Madrid player, whose strategy was to launch missiles at the goal from
outside the penalty area to loosen up the Mallorca defense. Unfortunately, the
goals didn't arrive, so the game ended up in a scoreless tie. For Real Madrid,
who is looking forward to this week's matchup against Torino, several players
are very banged up. Sanchis is very doubtful for Wednesday with a bad back,
Chendo is also semi-doubtful with a twisted ankle, and Butraguen~o is also
under 100% with some sort of a leg injury (I think a bad ankle). Lasa seems to
have permanently taken over for Villarroya on the left side, while Paco Llorente
is right now the undisputed left wing on the team, taking over for Hugo Sanchez.
It looks really doubtful that Hugo will play on Wednesday, as he is nursing
a sore muscle, and Prosinecki, the human hospital, won't be there either but 
will be ready to play very soon, if he doesn't hurt himself for the fifth time
this year. We'll keep our fingers crossed...

Atletico de Madrid took the opportunity left by Barcelona and Real Madrid and
shoved it down lowly Cadiz's throat, with a 5-1 thrashing at Vicente Calderon
Stadium in Madrid. Manolo, the leading goal-scorer in the league, scored the
first four goals for his team in a truly inspired afternoon. Once Atletico 
finally scored the first goal, towards the end of the first half, and the Cadiz
defense loosened up, the game became a festival of goals. The only bright spot
for Cadiz was their recent acquisition from Brazil, Tilico, who after scoring
two goals last week, came back to score another one today, presaging good things
in the future for the normally pathetic Cadiz offense...

Oviedo defeated Valladolid by a score of 2-1 at Carlos Tartiere Stadium in
Oviedo. The only thing worth noting in this game was that it was the first for
Valladolid without coach Pacho Maturana, who I don't know if he resigned or if
he was thrown out this week. Anyway, this finally ends up the Colombian project
in Valladolid, with a total disaster to show. Maturana's game plans have gotten
the team into third-to-last-place and looking more and more like a second
division team, and the three Colombians he took with him, Valderrama, Higuita,
and Alvarez, were a total bust. The new coach, whose name I don't know, is
going to have to perform a miracle to save the team from second division.

The coach who is working miracles these days is Javier Clemente at Espan~ol.
Since he took over, Espan~ol has taken 16 of 24 possible points and gone from
last place to 15th in an incredible comeback. The Russian trio of players on
the team is working wonders for the offense, and things are looking really good
these days for them. Today, they got past the inconsistent Sporting de Gijon
at Sarria Stadium in Barcelona with a 2-0 victory, with goals from Lluis and
Francisco. It looks like they might just avoid the promotion rounds at the end
of the season.

Albacete continued its incredible season with a 3-0 drubbing of Deportivo at
Carlos Belmonte Stadium in Albacete. They had been in a slump recently, but
they took care of a Deportivo team which is getting more and more desperate
each week to win to avoid the promotion rounds. Actually, the game was a lot
more even than the score would indicate, as the last two goals came in the
final ten minutes of the game, with Deportivo completely on the offensive and
leaving huge holes on defense. Albacete keeps tied with Valencia for the fourth
spot in the standings and is looking good to make UEFA Cup next year, a truly
memorable feat if they can pull it off.

There wasn't anything exciting in the other games so I won't go into them. On
Wednesday, the European Cups resume, with Barcelona playing at home against
Benfica and Real Madrid playing in Italy against Torino. Barcelona will go the
final of the Champion's Cup if they defeat Benfica, while Benfica can also make
it if they beat Barcelona handily and get a little help from the other game in
their grouping. As for Real Madrid, things are looking grim. The Italians are
very pissed off about the treatment they got when they played in Madrid (for
very good reasons, if I may add), and they are looking for some serious revenge.
Real Madrid will better not expect any luxuries or friendliness when they arrive
in Turin, and they'd better get out quickly after the game...

Later, dudes.

Paco Herrero                            | A Spaniard in a foreign land |
franherr@romeo.caltech.edu              | Hala Madrid!!!               |