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EURO BITES: Top 3 win, Malaga impress but Nevilletino not working

THE WINNERS

Top 3 begin to pull away – plus Fernando Torres finally hits goal 100!

All three at the top managed to come away with victories but none of which were particularly convincing. Perhaps fatigue is starting to set in, despite a winter break, as all three are guilty of not really rotating their star players this season as to avoid any potential slip-ups. Obviously fatigue can’t be as much of a problem for Real Madrid as the other two having exited the Copa del Rey at the first hurdle.

Barcelona bested a Levante side that continues to play nice football under Rubi but those performances haven’t correlated into victories. Luis Enrique chose to rest Sergi Busquets but in doing so conceded the midfield battle against their lesser opponents. However in Luis Suarez they have the best centre forward in the world right now and that always gives you a chance. David Navarro gave the Catalan giants the lead after he turned Jordi Alba’s cross into his own net but Levante didn’t feel sorry for themselves. Playing with two recognised strikers the Barcelona backline struggled to deal with wave after wave of attacks and it was down to that man, Mr. Suarez again, to score at the death to seal a hard-fought victory.

For Atletico Madrid, after defeat against title rivals Barcelona, they welcomed Eibar to El Calderon. The surprise Europa League hopefuls are still finding it largely tough on the road though. Jose Luis Mendilibar’s charges have won just one of their last seven away from Ipurua, losing five. After a strong opening 45 minutes where they kept Atletico at bay they improved after the break and took the lead. Saul Ñiguez’s howler at the back gifted an opportunity to Keko who made no mistake from the edge of the area. The goal stunned the indifferent home crowd but it spurred Atletico into action. We saw a brief glimpse of the ‘old’ Atletico as they scored two set-piece goals, via Jose Maria Gimenez and Saul respectively, to take the lead. There was still time for a magic moment for Fernando Torres as he got on the end of a fantastic Yannick Ferreira Carrasco cross to score – at last – his 100th goal for Atletico Madrid, 15 years after making his debut for the club.

The Madrid-based media have fallen over themselves to laud everything Zinedine Zidane has done so far, be it in press conferences or whom he has chosen to play since taking over from Rafa Benitez. The reality is there isn’t a great difference in terms of performances. Benitez used to smash the smaller sides but struggle away from home and it’s the same for Zidane. They were poor against Granada for long periods on Sunday night. Even after Karim Benzema had given them the lead you didn’t feel confident they’d hold onto it. Youssef El-Arabi took advantage of the referee getting in Luka Modric’s way as he coolly slotted past Keylor Navas. However the last word would belong to Modric as he produced a wonderful strike from the edge of the area in the 85th minute to take all three points back to Madrid and leave Granada scratching their heads as to how they didn’t get a point.

Malaga find their groove, outside bet for the European places

You sometimes feel a side’s good run of form can be overlooked due to not holding a prestigious status or not effecting things at the top of the table. I certainly feel this is the case when it comes to a Malaga side that, under Javi Gracia, have embarked on a wonderful run of form which has seen them forget about a relegation battle and instead focus on qualifying for European football next season.

They started the season with seven losses and just two wins in their opening 12 La Liga fixtures. Alarm bells were ringing after a disastrous summer where they’d lost key members of the squad and Gracia wasn’t allowed to replace them. It looked ominous for Malaga as their off-the-field strife had transcended into their on-the-field performances. It felt like a sinking sink, one rooted to the bottom of the table for the foreseeable future – another club ruined by an overly ambitious owner who appeared to know little about football.

But lo and behold, the precipitated doom never came and after nearly three months the side began to gel and started picking up points. Whether it be the return of Ignacio Camacho to the midfield or Charles being in the form of his life, the turnaround has been remarkable. They’ve won six of their last ten, only losing to Sevilla and Barcelona, and brushed aside Getafe with ease on Friday evening. Christian Atsu might prove to be an able replacement for the recently departed (to Watford, he’s not dead) Nourdin Amrabat, too.

Priceless victory for Rayo - can they avoid the drop again?

And much like many didn’t predict Malaga’s resurrection, the battle at the bottom of La Liga seems to take a different twist with each passing week. Paco Jemez isn’t one to go down without a fight and that belief has been passed on to his players, you can see. Not many sides would be able to recover from a horrid run, losing six out of seven, from the end of November to the beginning of January – Rayo Vallecano have.

They were desperately unlucky against Valencia, then outclassed a makeshift Celta Vigo side that had one eye on the Copa del Rey before coming close to beating Deportivo de La Coruña at Riazor. Last weekend saw Las Palmas visit Vallecas and they showed once again the value of having a coach who values work ethic over name value.

Miku has been in a rich vein of form, keeping out the club’s veteran top goalscorer Javi Guerra, and he opened the scoring for the hosts. Bebe got free down the left and his shot squeezed past Javi Varas while Pedro Bigas could only stop it on the line. This left it on the plate for Miku to score after just three minutes.

The second, decisive goal came on 73 minutes and it was the moment Bebe’s overall display merited. Jozabed, another cracking player this season, broke down the right and fed the ball into Miku who casually flicked it into the path of Bebe who slotted it home. Rayo are now out of the relegation zone.

Honourable mentions: Luka Modric - the little Croatian ran the show for Madrid and deserved his goal, even if his side maybe didn’t. Ruben Castro - where would Betis be without his goals? He scored in the crucial ‘final’ against Valencia to ease their relegation fears. Celta Vigo - after taking a pasting midweek, they showed plenty of grit to earn a point against 10-man Sevilla.

THE LOSERS

Gary Neville’s attempt to copy Mauricio Pochettino’s blueprint is failing

As I was watching the match, I wrote that it was painful to watch this current Valencia side. There’s nothing, absolutely nothing, to get excited about when they’re on the ball. You search for a philosophy, an idea or concept that something is beginning to take shape but in the end it looks like a mess a 3-year-old would make on the wall armed with a packet of felt-tip pens. The problems lie much deeper than Gary Neville but it’s hard to argue that he’s part of the solution any more either.

Neville wrote in one of his last columns for the Telegraph before taking over that Mauricio Pochettino was his ‘favourite Premier League coach’ and how he admired not only his style of play but the value of turning to youth as opposed to bringing in yet more players to replace the previous imports. The difference being Pochettino took years to perfect his methodology, his ability to see whether a man had the characteristics needed to play in his team and the experience of dealing with people, perhaps misunderstood or who had never been given a chance previously.

Gary Neville appears to have rushed all those methods into a mad, two-month spell and it’s not working. He’s tried to implement a high pressing system with players that either can’t do it, or simply won’t. One or two will charge forward while others sit and maintain, leaving huge gaps for the opposition to exploit if they move the ball fast enough. Joao Cancelo and Jose Luis Gaya have been pushed further forward but that means lesser quality fullbacks have to be played which weakens an already confidence-drained defence. Lastly he turned to Wilfried Zahibo to plug the hole in central midfield but the youngster simply isn’t ready, or good enough and less so in the current environment. Instead of aiding his development, Neville could be destroying it. Zahibo’s been by far the weakest link in every match he’s featured so far.

Rome wasn’t built in a day but Gary is trying to and if he’s not careful, it won’t be long before it all falls down on top of him.

Unai Emery’s faith in Llorente costing Sevilla in the league

I don’t think there are many better coaches in La Liga than Unai Emery but his rotation policy could be preventing his current Sevilla side from achieving much more than it currently is. I know, I know. He’s already in the Copa del Rey final and we all know how much he loves the Europa League but unlike last season, he just doesn’t have the same squad depth to rotate his key personnel.

You can almost hear, even all the way up here in Valencia, the sound of thousands of Sevilla fans slapping their forehead as they see Fernando Llorente in the side and not Kevin Gameiro. The sound is slightly louder when there’s no Ever Banega either, but due to his knee injuries you can almost excuse that one.

Llorente was lauded as quite the coup during the summer but he’s been poor value for money, which is saying something as he arrived on a free transfer. Sometimes Monchi gets it wrong – don’t tell him I said that – and the signing of Llorente appears ever increasingly to drop into that column. The Spaniard just doesn’t fit in the team at all and hasn’t scored since the beginning of November despite getting plenty of minutes on the field.

On the other hand Kevin Gameiro is enjoying one of the best spells in his career – 10 goals in last 12 matches - but still finds himself relegated to the bench, usually for away matches where Emery prefers a more physical look to the side. The problem without Banega is the team relies on individual brilliance and sometimes there’s too much brawn on display and not enough brains. Gameiro has played the role of super sub before; it’s time to let him run with the ball.

Deportivo are tough to beat but are drowning in draws

Now this column has regularly given praise to Victor Sanchez for the marvellous job he’s done – and doing – at Deportivo but there’s a danger all these draws will come back to haunt them in their quest for Europa League football. They’ve drawn an incredible 56% of their matches in La Liga. While they remain just four points off Athletic Club in the battle for the last European spot they need to get back on the winning trail - and soon.

Some will point to the fact in their last 13 matches (all competitions) Depor have only lost twice in the league – to Villarreal and Real Madrid – so the situation isn’t too bad. To an extent I would agree but the fact they’ve won just once in those same fixtures doesn’t strike me as Top Six form. Plus the cup exit at the hands of Mirandes was embarrassing, as if they could afford to pass up a chance at winning a trophy.

A few of those fixtures can be looked back on as points gained but the majority are points lost. In Lucas Perez and Luis Alberto they have a blossoming partnership which should get them going again but it’d be a disappointment if, much like neighbours Celta, the second half of the season fell away for Deportivo and their long-suffering fans.

Honourable mentions: Cristiano Ronaldo - another game, another flat performance. The return of Gareth Bale can’t come soon enough to maybe spark him into life. Federico Fazio - 25 minutes into his re-debut for Sevilla and he gets sent off. Spurs fans were not surprised. Athletic Club vs Villarreal - turned into a brawl more than a football match. 12 cards were shown, two of them red and zero goals.