As Villarreal prepare for their upcoming league match with Real Betis they will, not for the first time this season, be looking at a club that has recently undergone a managerial change.
As announced on 10 January, Real Betis have parted ways, for the second time in three years, with manager Pepe Mel. It did not come as the most shocking of news with Los Verdiblancos sitting 15th in the league and on an eight-game winless run in all competitions.
And now the manager-less Andalusians face a match against a team in outstanding form, traveling to El Madrigal to face a Villarreal side on a run of five successive wins in La Liga.
But entertaining a club that has recently sacked their manager comes as nothing new to El Submarino Amarillo this season as they have already done it on two previous occasions.
The first time was one fans of the side would wish to forget. Just seven days after parting ways with manager Paco Herrera, Las Palmas welcomed the Yellow Submarine to the Estadio de Gran Canaria looking to break a streak of three successive losses. The team from the Canary Islands managed to do as such, playing out a bore draw with their Valencian visitors in one of La Liga’s most uninspiring matches of the season.
Las Palmas’ new manager Quique Setien sent his team out to defend in a way that put off the visitors, whose football away from home is rarely particularly expansive, and it worked to aplomb.
The optimists view of this match for Villarreal would be that any point gathered away from home is a good one as is the old adage to “win your home games and draw your away games.” Thus the Yellow Submarine, for the first but not the last time of the season, became a recipient of good fortune with reference to a club ousting the man running the team.
It was only a matter of time before Valencia parted ways with Nuno Espirito Santo, thanks to his low supporter rating outside of the boardroom, and in his place came Gary Neville. The former right-back from Manchester is yet to convince either and the change in management has not benefitted Valencia close to the amount it has benefitted their direct rivals.
Villarreal hosted Valencia in the Derbi De La Communitat on New Year’s Eve and triumphed over their local rivals 1-0. This match was played a mere three weeks after the sacking of Nuno against a team that still could not grasp the methods of their new boss.
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Since the turn of the year, Valencia are still winless under Neville as many teams continue to benefit from the ruthlessness of club owner Peter Lim but Villarreal are the team that has been aided the most with a victory in a derby as well as a win over a direct rival for fourth place.
Going in to Jornada 20 and Villarreal are looking to take points off another club whose owners have been fed up with the team’s performance.
Real Betis, a proud club hailing from Seville, have only just returned to La Primera this season after a year in the Segunda. If they were to end the year in position 15, as they sit now, 2015-16 should be considered a success on the pure fact of consolidating their place in the league.
What worked against Pepe Mel is his side’s poor run of results which has seen it fall to just five points above the relegation zone. It is crowded down the bottom though as one win could lift the Green and Whites as high as 11th in the table.
Travelling to El Madrigal will not be what interim manager Juan Merino would have hoped for in his first match in charge of the first team. Villarreal have not dropped a point in their last five Liga matches, picking up victories over Valencia and Real Madrid, and have already held Betis to a draw on their home ground in the opening round of the season.
Fans of Betis will be hoping for the “New Manager Bounce”, currently being exhibited by Guus Hiddink at Chelsea, in which a side that removes its underperforming manager suddenly exhibits a new will to win.
What will not work in the Andalusians’ favour is their inability in front of goal, having scored a league-low 13 goals all season with 34-year-old Ruben Castro having scored eight of them. The new man in charge, whoever that may be, will be looking for a higher output from his squad in an attempt to stave off relegation.
Thus all signs point to Villarreal once again being the main beneficiaries of ruthless club owners. One point taken away from home from a club praying to break the pointless drought, three points taken from a direct rival whose new manager is yet to get off the ground and now welcoming a team whose impotence in front of goal has seen the end of a man’s tenure looks to be all in favour of the Yellow Submarine.
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