The Pride of Vallekas

Given that Adrián Embarba just reached 100 appearances for Rayo, here is his story - some shared on this blog before, some not... Football is cruel. Hype is often wrong. And history forgets quickly. It's easy to forget that Embarba was the least heralded of three signings for Rayo B in 2013. Miki Ruiz was a striker heralded for his pace and strength, his finishing and his shot power. He was from Córdoba, he was ex-FC Barcelona, ex-Real Madrid, ex-Valencia and ex-Hércules, and he had already played for the U-20 Spain team, alongside Jesé Rodríguez and Derik Osede. He, at just 19, had a bright future ahead of him. So did Sergio Parla, ex-Getafe, ex-Real Madrid and ex-Alcobendas. The 21 year old center-back, whose ball-playing skills and pace made him a perfect Rayo defender. His future was bright too - sharing hydrotherapy pools with Ronaldo and, despite a torrid time with Alcobedas, his ability meant regular appearances for the first team. Embarba? Released by Real Madrid,...

Not so long ago, Spanish politics was a two-party system. The conservative center-right People's Party (Partido Popular or PP) and the center-left Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (Partido Socialista Obrero Español or PSOE). There are regional parties that also play an important role, but let's just focus on the first two. After the 15-M movement (15th May, 2011), which was an anti-austerity movement which shook Spain to its very core, two more parties came to prominence. One was a left-wing, anti-austerity, populist party called Podemos led by Pablo Iglesias, a professor; the other was a centrist party called Citizens (Ciudadanos), a Catalan party that opposes Catalan nationalism and is led by Albert Rivera. The December 2015 national elections ended the two-party system - PP, PSOE, Podemos and C's got 123, 90, 69 and 40 seats respectively, and with 176 seats needed to form a government predictably nothing happened. A June 2016 election did little to resolve the...

So as it turns out, I made a mistake. A few days ago, I talked about the Rayo squad, and as it turns out things are even worse - Zé Castro, who had reportedly rescinded his contract, had actually done so with no announcements being made. Because this is the Rayo website: Credit: rayovallecano.es I didn't even get to say goodbye! So here it is...a tribute to Zé Castro. August 29th, 2013. Leave it to Rayo to scramble at the last minute and make an amazing, seemingly impossible signing. This time, they made two. Zé Castro, and Seba Fernández half an hour later, were the two gems that had been picked up. Castro was a "boring" signing - he had played for Atlético de Madrid but was more of a backup. And at Depor, Zé Castro appeared in only ten games in 2009–10, and featured even less in the following season, prompting him to request a move in mid-November 2010. Some people even disliked him - in March 2011, he was to be picked as a last-minute substitut...

Travel blogs have always fascinated me. These are people who take time out of their lives to travel, explore, and then document the various corners of the world that many will never see. Being a travel blogger, therefore, is even more important in a world where information is accessible but experiences are not. This is an interview with football travel blogger Roddy Cons, founder of the travel blog The Team on Tour, or TTOT. You can follow this amazing blog on YouTube here , Facebook here , Twitter here and Instagram here . A little bit about yourself and your background I'm a Scot who has been living in Madrid for the best part of eight years now. Since finishing uni, I've done some English teaching and also worked as a freelance football writer, writing previews and match reports for a host of leagues across the world, including the Spanish Second Division. What made you become interested in visiting football stadiums around Spain and Europe in general? My writin...

I had something else to write for today, but I decided to shelve it for another day. Because yesterday marked 150 days since I started daily blogging. Today is 151. 150 days ago, things were very, very different... 16th February, 2017.  My palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy.  My brow is tense, my hand is anything but steady.  My head is spinning, the decision that I'm making  i s major, is intense, is everything, is all or nothing. Excuses come in - where will I find the time? Will I ever get drained and pained by this uphill climb? What may I find, how will I keep up the grind? Will anyone even listen to what I have in my mind? My head, filled with dread, tried to look ahead Tried to see that some stories just deserved to be read That other people would read what I had to say As long as I said it, and just started it today No delaying and stalling and dallying was gonna work I had to start today and hopefully someday see the per...

Yesterday, I talked about Granada taking Rayo players away, but I actually didn't mention one of Granada's biggest signings from the club - Paco Jémez. So here it is. Paco refused to hear the scores when Rayo were 1-0 down. Nor when Rayo were 2-0 down. Nor when Rayo were 2-1 down. He turned to his bench, to the coaches who had supported him all season when criticism was at its zenith, to the coaches who had seen their players pull out for the season one by one, to the coaches who couldn’t hide their emotions as they responded. Granada? Safe. Getafe-Sporting? Draw. His head hung low, his eyes lost - searching for reason in a season that has been unreasonable to Rayo - his mind made up: "We are dead". We were dead. There was no hope - Sporting were playing Villarreal, who were coached by a Sporting fan, and Getafe were playing Betis, a team whose fan base has been friendly to Sporting for years. Out of Getafe, Rayo and Sporting, only Sporting were goi...

They called him el ultrahéroe de Vallecas at Rayo. In hell, he was their ray of hope. Born in Madrid, Pachón started his career in the fifth division of Spanish football, playing for Rayo Alúa in the 1995-96 season. He went on to play for Parla in the Tercera for the following two season, and was signed by Segunda club Leganés. After helping the club retain their division two status, in 2000 he moved to La Liga outfit Real Valladolid. He would go on to play 31 games in his first year and 24 in the 2002–03 campaign, but only seven in the other two seasons combined. Failing to make an impact, he was released in January 2004 and moved to Segunda outfit Getafe, proving an essential offensive unit in the club's first ever promotion to the top division - on 19 June, he scored all five goals in the decisive 5–3 away win against Tenerife. He was mainly used as a substitute in the following three seasons and also helping the side to the 2007 final of the Copa del Rey. Immed...

Miguel Bastón was a goalkeeper who played for Atlético - but only with its reserves - and spent most of his career with Real Burgos CF. His dream of playing for the first team of the club that he graduated from never materialized. Born in Madrid, Borja arrived in his hometown club Atlético Madrid's youth system at the age of four. He began as a goalkeeper, the position which his father played professionally, but he converted him to a forward so that he could enjoy the game more. He made his senior debuts in the 2009–10 season, scoring 12 goals for the reserve team in the third division. On 15 May 2010, in the campaign's last round, Borja made his first-team and La Liga debut, coming on as a substitute for Tiago in the 58th minute of the game against Getafe CF. He had fulfilled his father's dream. That dream, however, faded quickly. Twenty minutes later, he was stretchered off with a serious anterior cruciate ligament injury on his left knee, in an eventual...

There are many midfielders known for their ability to "clean up the mess", to defend with both heart and mind. There are many midfielders known for their ability to distribute the ball with authority, to create chances with ease, to keep the team ticking, to control the tempo and flow of the game. There aren't many midfielders known for doing both. Gerhard Poschner was one of them. Poschner was born in Dumitra, Romania - a country from which in 1974, at the age of five, his family fled to escape the communist regime and moved abroad to Bietigheim-Bissingen, West Germany. Poschner started playing football at the age of nine with SpVgg Bissingen. At 13, VfB Stuttgart spotted him playing at a talent scouting event organised by the Württemberg Football Association, and e began his professional career in 1987–88 with the club. He played three seasons with little impact in the first team (an average of 15 Bundesliga appearances) due to intense competition in his position. ...

In February 2009, de la Vega was arrested in connection with an anti-drug operation in the Spanish capital. After eight days, he paid €30.000 in order to be released from custody. Former footballers Predrag Stanković and Txutxi were also involved in the plot, among others. In 2014 (confirmation in 2015) de la Vega was one of two persons acquitted, as five other people received sentences that ranged from four to 12 years. Predrag and Txutxi were condemned to nine years in 2014 (confirmation in 2015) for smuggling 950 kg of cocaine into the country. After emerging through Rayo Vallecano's youth system, right-back Carlos de la Vega went on to play with amateur sides Alcalá and Alcorcón, also from his hometown of Madrid, until well into his 20's. He did not have his first taste of full professional football until the 2008–09 season (he had only played one match with Rayo's first team in 2002–03's La Liga, two minutes) when, after returning to Rayo in the previous ye...

Salamanca traveled to Albacete to compete for promotion to La Liga with an impossible task on their hands. They had to overturn a 2-0 deficit away from home, against a side that entered La Liga's relegation playoff spots on the final day, and who had scored 44 goals in the league - just four less than Salamanca themselves. As the clock ticked towards the 90th minute, Salamanca were winning 1-0 yet in danger of losing a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Born in Tudela, Navarre, Urzaiz began his professional career at Real Madrid's B-side, making his debut in Segunda División in 1989. Despite being a successful youth international, he did not make any La Liga appearances for the first team (however, he did play one game against Odense BK, in the 1990–91 European Cup). Urzaiz spent the 1991–92 season on loan at Albacete Balompié, making his top flight debut when he came on as a substitute against Athletic Bilbao in October 1991. In early 1993, he was loaned to Celta de Vigo...

In 2000, as Atlético struggled to assemble a squad, a package deal of three Rayo players was arranged against their will. I wrote a piece for Into the Calderon about the story - you can read it here . Follow @Vallecanos1924

In 2007 he won the Segunda title with Valladolid. In 2008 he won the Segunda title with Numancia. In 2010 he was this close to seeing Cartagena promoted and was in the top 3 for the Pichichi trophy. In 2014 he helped Deportivo secure promotion to La Liga. José Verdú Nicolás, or Toché, is 33 years old and is a specialist at getting promoted. At jumping up a level. At rising above the defence and scoring. At rising above the shadows. A former Atlético graduate, he has Champions League and Europa League experience with Panathinaikos. And now, he is at Real Oviedo. The club that just got promoted and wants to get promoted again. A powerful header, a knack of rising above a defense and an uncanny ability to score goals, Toché has scored nine times in eighteen games and will surely try to find the back of the net again. But what goes under the radar when it comes to Toché is his technical ability. In Oviedo’s attacking, one-touch system, he scores one-touch goals like these . He d...

Yesterday, I wrote an article about Carlos Aranda, who holds the record for playing in La Liga for the most number of clubs - eight. If you consider just playing for a La Liga club, not actually playing in La Liga with them, that figure becomes nine. But I dug deeper, and found out that if you look at professional clubs (La Liga and Segunda), Carlos Aranda holds that record jointly with Moisés García - an astonishing 12 clubs.  Obviously, only if you use the second metric - by the first metric  Moisés García is top with 12 and Aranda comes joint second with 11 with a couple of other players. That record will be broken soon though - there are quite a few players who are at 11, and they still have a couple of seasons in the tank. So today, I look at a player whose records are unlikely to be broken anytime soon - Elche's Nino.  Even his name has the word modest in it. Juan Francisco Martínez Modesto, aka Nino, was born in Vera, Almería, and first appeared p...

Pop quiz: in the 2013-14 season, who completed more passes than Xavi, with 2,936 passes (2,537 good) to 2,587 (2,406)? In the 2014-15 season, who completed more passes than Toni Kroos, with 2,566 passes (2,213 good) to 2,353 (2,170)?  In the 2015-16 season, who  completed more passes than Toni Kroos, with  2,693 passes (2,351 good) to 2,425 (2,277)? Trashorras. Duh. The Rayo midfield linchpin has done it again - for the fourth consecutive season, he is on course to become the player with the most passes in the league he plays in. Player Team Total Passes Short Passes Long Passes Through Balls Trashorras Rayo 2,179 1,872 303 4 Fernando Seoane Lugo 2,175 1.940 234 1 Folch Reus 2,055 1,776 278 1 Zapater Zaragoza 1,998 1,728 265 5 Carlos Pita Lugo 1,844 1,539 302 3 Stats as per the 39th jornada i.e. before the Zaragoza game - Trashorras was suspended anyways! Also, considering the Seoane has played 545 minutes m...

One of my first ever posts was about Raúl Baena and his important to Rayo. (You can read it here ). This week, Baena, who is out of contract this summer, was linked to Alcorcón. The team is short of midfielders, since  Víctor Pérez and Bakic will be returning to Valladolid and Sporting Braga respectively. Pep Guardiola was revered by Barcelona fans because he achieved something believed to be impossible - winning trophies consistently whilst playing beautiful, attacking football. But beauty is subjective - and it isn't just of one type. It's hard to justify how a tough-tackling, yellow-card accumulating player who barely ever scores or assists goals can be described as beautiful. It's hard to see the importance of a player like that in a system that rewards passing and movement. But there is something beautiful, something heroic, something almost poetic, about a La Masia youth graduate, his hair flying in the air, his eyes determined, his brow tensed, his speed, ...

There are two kinds of people in the world. If you give both a task to do in 12 hours, one of them will carefully calculate how much work needs to be done in each hour, and calmly finish it before the deadline. The other will binge watch half a season of their favorite TV show they haven't seen for the fourth time, and then all hell breaks loose in the last hour - a frantic, hectic, enjoyable-to-watch mess. Given that  Roberto Trashorras was suspended - you knew that all the calm, careful calculations of the Galician were gone. You knew all hell was going to break loose. Rayo attacked loads and defended loads. Fran Beltrán and Jordi Gómez dribbled and ran with the ball, Patrick Ebert went on long mazy runs with the ball on the left. Embarba made excellent runs on the right - even hitting the post from an Ebert cross. But Rayo were overrun in the center of the park. Time and time again, Zaragoza players waltzed past Rayo defenders. Time and time again, Manuel Lanzarote ...

Yesterday, on the 26th of May, 2017, was the 100-day-anniversary of this blog. Over three months ago, I started a daily blog on Rayo Vallecano (my favorite team) and Spanish football in general. After months of doing nothing I decided to get off my arse and do something. Thank God I did. Since then, I have published 122 blog posts in 100 days, including a 19 day project called Hinchas y Jugadores where I interview 45 fans, footballers, coaches and staff who share this crazy bond with something as silly as a game where 22 people kick a ball around. I look forward to sharing the progress I make in the next 100 days. Over three months ago, I started a daily blog on #Rayo Vallecano (my favorite team) and Spanish football in general. After months of doing nothing I decided to get off my arse and do something. Thank God I did. Since then, I have published 122 blog posts in 100 days, including a 19 day project called Hinchas y Jugadores where I interview 45 fans, footballers...

Ahead of the Zaragoza-Rayo game, I wanted to write a piece dedicated to José María Movilla, "the terrier". But how do I start? He was the player who Trashorras succeeded. José María Movilla was once a bin man and then a union man throughout his playing career. He too was from Real Madrid's youth system. He helped Numancia reach the quarterfinals of the Copa del Rey while they were still in the Segunda B, and even helped level the tie against Barcelona with a 89th minute goal (2-2, 5-3 loss on aggregate). He took Málaga from the Segunda B to La Liga in back-to-back seasons. He helped Atlético Madrid return to La Liga, won the Copa del Rey and avoided relegation with Real Zaragoza, Not to mention a top flight return for Rayo Vallecano. He is currently the sporting director of Rayo Majadahonda. "I was doing coaching practice with Iriondo, there was a vacancy and my name was proposed. That attractive style of Rayo - we have it here too!"  -Movilla ...

Last week, the striker who promised Valladolid he'd score 40 goals and actually scored five, the striker who became friends with fellow lusophone Diego Costa, the striker who has played in Turkey and England, Greece and Spain, and who took four seasons to reach 97 league appearances at Valladolid reached 100 league appearances at Rayo in three. It's interesting to think that Manucho started out as a left-winger - and a pretty good one at that - in his native Angola. Nowadays, he revels in the super sub role, coming on in the last 10 or 20 minutes as Rayo's plan B. He isn't quick by any means, but he brings direct play, a powerful header and a central focal point to the attack. And hard work - lots of it. Out of the 100 league games, Manucho has started in just 31 (of which he has completed the full 90 minutes in 27). That's right - Manucho has had 69 substitute appearances. And while 14 goals in that time sounds measly, those 100 league games total a mere ...