The Pride of Vallekas

The ruthless marker, they called him. He was a central defender not of size but of stature. He was a central defender who never stood tall but always stood out. And it started at the age of 16, when Hernández began to stand out in football in the youth teams of Real Madrid. His time there coincided with Real Madrid legends such as Ramón Grosso and Manuel Velázquez, the latter of whom spent a year on loan at Rayo. Máximo Hernández would leave Real Madrid's youth team for Rayo Vallecano in 1995, making his senior debut at the newly promoted Segunda side. He would play there for three seasons, and formed a solid partnership with Gregorio Benito in the last two - who was, coincidentally, on loan from (you guessed right) Real Madrid. For the 1968-69 campaign, Celta Vigo were looking to strengthen their side, and wanted to achieve promotion to La Liga after 10 long years in the Segunda. Their first signing of the season was that of Máximo Hernández, from Rayo Vallecano....

Three months ago, the 31st of March to be exact, right here on this blog , I said: "I've been compiling some stats for a long time - so watch out in the coming days for them." Oops. Welcome to part 2 of this Statistics series. In part 1, I compiled of teams that never won away in the top three divisions since 1990. This is a list of teams that were relegated for non-sporting reasons from the Segunda B. In o ne word: Madness. 1985-86: In group one, Deportivo Alavés (5th) and Palencia CF (7th) were relegated for economic reasons - their places were bought by San Sebastián CF (8th) and Pontevedra CF (9th) respectively. 1986-87: Mallorca Atlético (21st) gave up their seat and were relegated. 1988-89: In group two, CD Cala Millor (15th) were relegated for economic reasons and replaced by SD Ibiza. Also, FC Barcelona Aficionados (11th) were relegated to the Tercera because Barcelona Atlético were relegated to the Segunda B, and they were replaced by AEC Manlleu...