“I know it’s not normal, that it doesn’t feel right, but Fernando Roig does the opposite of everyone else,” Fernando Roig said – and this time at least the president of Villarreal wasn’t wrong. Tuesday morning at the old orange grove they made their home and Luis García was packing up after training, worried about the situation his team was in but satisfied with the session and sure they could survive, when his phone rang. “Things have to change,” he’d said two days before, and things were about to change. Just not that much. And not how he hoped. Fernando Roig Jr was calling with bad news, a message from his dad: Villarreal’s coach was now their ex-coach. And their ex-coach was now their new coach.
Nineteenth, five points from safety, Villarreal sacked García on Tuesday after 49 days in charge and replaced him with the man he had replaced, the same manager they’d sacked just 50 days before. When the players arrived on Wednesday, Bobby Ewing was in the shower and Javier Calleja was on the pitch. Considered not good enough on 10 December, they’d decided that, actually, he was good enough on 30 January. Now it was time to move on, act like he’d never been away, pretend the bit in between hadn’t happened and they’d never been at war with Eurasia; to cling to the hope the mistake had been identified and rectified and lessons learned. Maybe Calleja had seen from the sofa what he hadn’t seen from the bench. “I’ve watched every game,” he said.
He hadn’t watched them win. Calleja had been sacked after a 3-2 defeat against Celta de Vigo on 8 December. It was their seventh defeat of the season, and they had won just once in nine, three in the entire season. In charge since September 2017, when he took over from Fran Escribá, Calleja finished last season fifth but he was sacked with them 17th this term, having collected 14 points in 15 games. Six games later, though, relegation looked more, not less likely. Under García, they picked up four points from a possible 18, and were second bottom, increasingly adrift. It was time for another change, to get back to what they know.
“This is a personal decision,” Roig Sr said; it was, some suggested, one Roig Jr, the club’s CEO, didn’t share. It was also one the players knew nothing about: they hadn’t been consulted. And although he had been critical after last week’s defeat against Valencia, insisting it was “about fucking time” they put a “fist on the desk”, García was convinced there was no particular reason to sack him, no trigger: no bust-up, no revolt, no irreversible decline. It’s not like things had got dramatically worse under him, either: he’d been brought in for a reason, after all. They’d also been better than results suggested, he thought. Although dreadful against Valencia, they’d lost just one of five before that, including a 2-2 draw against Madrid. Mind you, they’d not won any.
So Villarreal went for their third manager of the season, who was also their first, and García never got the chance to win another. Sacked in midweek, it had all happened so fast that he felt like he’d never really been there. Everyone else felt a little like Calleja had never been away. If the man sitting on the bench against Espanyol on Sunday looked familiar, it’s because he was: he hadn’t even had time to age a bit. The problem was that the result was too, and the way it happened – a 2-2 draw with Espanyol that was a portrait of Villarreal’s season. Another day, another draw – that’s 10 now – and another round of ammunition unloaded on to their own foot.
“It’s an odd situation,” Calleja said when he took over. “But I’m back because of the players, the faith I have in them, the faith that we can get out of this. If not, I wouldn’t be here. I’m also here for Villarreal: I won’t leave people hanging and nor will I abandon ship. And I’m here for Roig too: I can’t fail him. If that happens, I will die with him. I will give my life to get us out of here.”
Sunday provided more proof that it won’t be easy. Villarreal are in real trouble. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. “No one can understand it,” one player says. Their final positions over the last five years read: fifth, fourth, fourth, sixth, sixth – and, Calleja said “you don’t lose that overnight”. They have the sixth biggest budget in primera and a salary cap over €100m. In the summer, they spent €73m, including €50m on three strikers: Gerard Moreno, Toto Ekambi and Carlos Bacca. They are – here it comes – too good to go down. Only, they’re not. They lost Rodrigo to Atlético and Bruno’s been out for over a year. Moreno, Ekambi and Bacca have just 11 goals between them. Almost everyone is underperforming. And at the back they’re embarrassingly weak.
Then there are the other doubts, hinted at by the change of coach, the attempt to turn back time. Doubts about what exactly it is they are, what they’re trying to do and trying to be. “Teams that are down there have to play a different way; we have to change,” García had said after the Valencia defeat. Goalkeeper Sergio Asenjo meanwhile demanded “11 warriors”, insisting: “Until we have that, we won’t get out of there.” But Villarreal don’t have that; and, some inside the squad believe that if relegation is to be decided like that – “on bollocks and all that stuff” – they will probably lose. Villarreal aren’t built for fighting; they’re built to play. If they are to do it, perhaps it would be better to do it their way, faithful to what they are.
The problem is that playing is proving hard too. The ball “burns”, one player says. As the pressure grows so the desire to receive it diminishes: few have the bravery to offer for it. Those who have it find fewer people to pass to, to play with. Good footballers become fearful ones. And so it spirals downwards, fatalism taking hold. How much can an old new coach change that when he is part of the decline too?And some wonder, how much authority can a manager have when six weeks ago his club sacked him?
Some of Villarreal’s issues are hard to identify. They’re not that bad, only look at the table and they are. Players don’t entirely know what’s wrong. The failure has been systemic, physical, and mental, collective and individual. The misses and mistakes have been multiple, and with every error, every stroke of bad luck, it gets worse. García’s time in charge had begun with a 2-2 draw against Huesca in which they conceded in the 94th minute; against Athletic they scored an own goal in a 1-1 draw; against Getafe, they conceded in the 89th minute. Only five teams have taken more shots or had more of the ball than them, but only two have a worse conversion rate and only two have allowed more shots.
“We feel like we have to do so much to win games; our opponents don’t need much to do us a lot of damage,” Vicente Iborra said. And here’s the thing: he didn’t say that back then, he said that now. His said that on Sunday lunchtime, after Calleja’s first game back, the same old manager living through the same old things, waking up one morning in the Cherry Tree Inn Bed and Breakfast, Punxsutawney, along with everyone else.
“This parenthesis has been good for me to reflect, to self-analyse, see where I might’ve gone wrong,” Villarreal’s returning manager said, and there was a new formation on Sunday, Villarreal shifting to three centre-backs, but in the end it wasn’t just him that was familiar; the whole thing was. In the middle of midfield, Santi Cazorla dominated. Villarreal created chances. Espanyol, the team who’d collected just three of the previous 30 points, couldn’t get control. With 15 minutes to go, Calleja’s team were 2-0 up, a goal each from Iborra and Cazorla. It was done, except that if they’ve learned anything it’s that it’s never done. And, as the balance tilted, it happened again. Asenjo spilled a simple shot and Daniele Bonera, playing his first league game, scored an avoidable own goal. Then, with eight minutes left, Roberto Rosales bent in a brilliant equaliser.
| GOAL! |
— Eleven Sports (@ElevenSports_UK) February 3, 2019
Santi Cazorla delivers, Vicente Iborra finishes 💛
Villarreal have the lead! #LaLiga pic.twitter.com/CNvYwOiMGB
| GOAL! |
— Eleven Sports (@ElevenSports_UK) February 3, 2019
Espanyol are back in it, and in bizarre fashion...
Villrreal's Daniele Bonera has followed up the free-kick into his own net 🤦♂️ pic.twitter.com/AFYkW3ttDy
| GOAL! |
— Eleven Sports (@ElevenSports_UK) February 3, 2019
WHAT A FINISH 💯
Roberto Rosales has netted a beauty to pull Espanyol level against Villarreal! #LaLiga pic.twitter.com/p7do0dKsOB
García’s first game had finished 2-2 against the worst team in Spain all season, a late goal denying them victory; Calleja’s first game back had finished 2-2 against the worst team in Spain over the last 10 games, a late goal denying them victory. Asked what now, Iborra shook his head: “I don’t know, I don’t know,” he said slowly. “Eventually, the day will arrive when we win,” he sighed, but the days slip away, hope does too, and nothing changes, even when it does. Well, almost nothing. “If I was angry before, I’m angrier now,” Calleja said.
Huesca 4-0 Valladolid, Levante 0-0 Getafe, Real Sociedad 2-1 Athletic Bilbao, Barcelona 2-2 Valencia, Celta Vigo 1-0 Sevilla, Villarreal 2-2 Espanyol, Real Betis 1-0 Atlético Madrid, Eibar 3-0 Girona, Real Madrid 3-0 Alavés
| Pos | Team | P | GD | Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Barcelona | 22 | 37 | 50 |
| 2 | Atletico Madrid | 22 | 18 | 44 |
| 3 | Real Madrid | 22 | 11 | 42 |
| 4 | Sevilla | 22 | 13 | 36 |
| 5 | Getafe | 22 | 7 | 32 |
| 6 | Real Betis | 22 | 0 | 32 |
| 7 | Alaves | 22 | -5 | 32 |
| 8 | Valencia | 22 | 4 | 30 |
| 9 | Real Sociedad | 22 | 2 | 30 |
| 10 | Eibar | 22 | -1 | 29 |
| 11 | Levante | 22 | -8 | 27 |
| 12 | Athletic Bilbao | 22 | -5 | 26 |
| 13 | Valladolid | 22 | -9 | 25 |
| 14 | Espanyol | 22 | -11 | 25 |
| 15 | Celta Vigo | 22 | -2 | 24 |
| 16 | Girona | 22 | -8 | 24 |
| 17 | Leganes | 21 | -6 | 23 |
| 18 | Rayo Vallecano | 21 | -11 | 23 |
| 19 | Villarreal | 22 | -8 | 19 |
| 20 | Huesca | 22 | -18 | 15 |
