Finally, winter break has arrived. In this circumtances, i would like to give some report during the first half of the season, and what we expected about the end of the season. Hope you enjoyed it!
On the latest article that you might found in #1 FM17 – Los Che Project: Bring Back Those days! [EN] , John Guidetti become the only one player that came into Mestalla. Since Guidetti’s arrival, we brought another four players, which three of them were prepared to play in Valencia U-19. Meanwhile, Vejinovic came from Feyenoord with £1.1M. His arrival gave us strengthen and additional player to the squad. He also became key player in several matches for us.
Until winter break, we have finished seventeen matches in La Liga, and two matches in Copa Del Rey.
We went to Vicente Calderon to play against Atletico Madrid, unfortunately we lost 2-0. The next two matches became horrible for us, since we can’t create a goal and failed to get 3 points. Luckily, those 2 matches, lead us to 9 matches unbeaten run. Include important win against Sevilla, Dani Parejo scored a winner from penalty spot. Win against Deportivo La Coruna was a dream for Nani, he created first hattrick for the club. Santi Mina who didn’t score any single goal since first Jornada, put hattrick against Leganes at home.
Match against Malaga became up and down for us. Although, we lead at first time, Jony and Gonzalo Castro made a difference to make a super comeback from Malaga. Another disappointment coming from weaker side, Espanyol. Ecuadorian striker, Filipe Caicedo scored the only goal in the match, poor result while we dominating the match. Losing strike was extended when we lost against Barcelona at Camp Nou.
Two leg matches in Copa Del Rey was quite well, we beat Mallorca side, 2-0 back to back, to make 4-0 on aggregate.
Match against Bilbao is match of the season so far. For the first time, shot on target amount ended nearly amount of shots, also we are dominating the game and created lot of chances. Matthew Ryan made his first appearances this season in La Liga.
In terms of tactic, i’ve wrote in here #1 FM17 – Los Che Project: Bring Back Those days! [EN], that i’m gonna use 4-1-2-3 with slightly changes in role, team instruction and mentality depend on opponent that we gonna face. When we played against weaker side, i will put two complete wing back, to gain more possesion with overload players, while played against stronger side, i will change into two fullback with support’s role to get more stabilty in defensive area.
I also made few changes in Defensive Midfielder position. I changed the role when Enzo Perez or Mario Suarez unavailable, i put Marko Vejinovic to occupy deep lying playmaker role. He controlled the game very well in there.
These scheme sometimes doesnt work very well, since lack of quality striker. Guidetti injured for 6 months due to broken leg. Luckily, few changes made in front, brought one name to be light in the dark, Rodrigo has scored 6 goals so far.
Man City loanee player, Mangala was superb until winter break. He scored two goals at the beginning of our unbeaten run. He successfully managed 227 interceptions and 28 successful tackles from 31 tackles attempt. I just hope that we have enough money to bring him for permanent move next season.
So far, everything worked very well, except Guidetti who’s been injured since pre-season. He will running again in training for next few weeks ahead. Celta Vigo will be our opponent for next round of Copa Del Rey.
I have a plan to bring few faces come into Mestalla, those players are expected to strengthen our squad until the end of the season, but, budget restriction might be the reason that we fail to bring few players (hopefully not).
See you at the end of the season one!
You can hit me up in twitter on @clearcutchances. See ya!
Clearcutchances 