The Pride of Vallekas

If you read the Porto piece yesterday , you would have seen the story of a player who lasted just 16 minutes at Rayo. But he was competing for the Q letter with another player, who lasted slightly longer - 58 minutes, to be exact. Felipe Miñambres, our ex-sporting director, once said that "we can't offer potential new players anything tangible; what we can offer them is affection and a shop window". Hugo Álvarez Quintas made just one league appearance for Rayo, and yet he deserves an entire article. And that's because he represents another facet of Rayo's transfer policy - the facet of resignation at the prospect of losing all their best players. This is the story of a player who used Rayo as a springboard for his career. Born in Vigo, Galicia, Álvarez made his senior debut with Tercera side Las Rozas, after playing youth football with Celta de Vigo and Real Madrid. He first arrived in Segunda B in the 2006 summer by signing for Rayo Vallecano, but played ...

That's right - there are four Spaniards playing at Puerto Rico Football Club, a franchise that resides in the second division (NASL). And one of them is Yuma , the former Rayo youth graduate and cousin of Antonio Amaya and Iván Amaya. But what about the other three? The American dream is all about doing better than your parents. Chus Martínez, a defender, never even made it to professional football - the high point of his career was playing for Numancia in the Segunda B between 1989-93. In contrast, midfielder Mario Martínez made his professional debut at the age of 18. Also a product of hometown Numancia's youth system Mario first appeared with its first team during the 2002-03 season in the Segunda. It took him several seasons, including two loan spells to Segunda B sides Las Palmas in 2006 and Zamora in 2007, until he finally broke into the first team. Under Gonzalo Arconada, He would go on to play 34 times scoring three goals in the 2007-08 season as the S...

This is a continuation of part 3 , where we looked at players who moved from Granada to Cádiz in the 2011-12 season. Other examples involving non-Spanish players should not be ignored either - there's Scottish midfielder Ikechi Anya who was born in Glasgow and moved to Oxford when he was seven years old. Anya joined the Wycombe Wanderers youth team in the 2003-04 season at the age of 15, having been released by Oxford United, where his performances earned him a debut at the age of 16 in September 2004, becoming the club's youngest ever player. He was released in the summer of 2007 and signed for Oxford City, before being snapped up in January 2008 by Halesowen Town. In the summer of 2008 he joined the Glenn Hoddle Academy for two years and in February 2009 signed for League One side Northampton Town. Northampton manager Stuart Gray was keen to re-sign Anya on a long-term deal at the end of the season, but in July 2009, he joined Sevilla Atlético, the reserve side of Sevill...