LaLiga Hangover: Could Freefalling Valencia Be Headed for a Relegation Battle?

Paco Alcacer sat largely motionless in the stands, wearing a club shirt he soon wouldn’t need. At every opportunity, the camera flashed his way, saying so much about Valencia each time it did.

Again, something off the field was compounding an issue on it; everyone knew where Alcacer was headed and the same went for the absent Shkodran Mustafi.

Worse, though, was the feeling of where Valencia might be headed.  

As Alcacer watched on at the Ipurua on Saturday, a familiar story unfolded. In flashes, the club he’s been with for more than a decade looked fast and crisp, carving out chances against a limited Eibar side and hinting that something better was coming. But something better never did: Missed chances piled up, momentum slowed, a goal was conceded, and Valencia never recovered, never responded. 

They lost, 1-0. Again.

“We should have won the game, with our play and the chances we had,” said manager Pako Ayestaran afterward. “I am frustrated by the result. You have to make an overall assessment of the game, however, and that is positive.”

As Ayestaran spoke, you could understand where he was coming from, but this is an ever-present theme for Valencia. Both on the pitch and off it, there’s potential there, but over and over, it fails to materialise. Since the beginning of last season, Los Che have lost 18 of 40 games in the league and have won only 11 of them—a figure on par with Eibar, Sporting Gijon and Real Betis in the same period, and fewer than Espanyol, Las Palmas, Real Sociedad and Malaga. 

When some suggested Valencia could be candidates for a relegation struggle ahead of the season, it was easy to dismiss it as hyperbole. But now there’s a growing sense that it’s not. 

Valencia finished only six points clear of the drop zone last term, thanks only to a three-game upswing in April. By season’s end, the belief might have been that they’d fallen as far as they could, but the concern now is that they’ve gotten worse. 

To comply with financial fair play (FFP) regulations that have lingered because of the failure to cement themselves in the UEFA Champions League, the club has been forced to offload. Early in the transfer window, Andre Gomes, Pablo Piatti, Javi Fuego, Antonio Barragan, Sofiane Feghouli, Rodrigo de Paul and Alvaro Negredo all departed, the latter on loan to Middlesbrough. And the list continues to grow. 

This week, Mustafi will sign with Arsenal (per Sky Sports) and Alcacer will join Barcelona (per Sport). When those deals are officially announced, Valencia will have lost their best defender, their most talented midfielder, two of their leading forwards and a plethora of experience in a single window. The arrivals list doesn’t compensate. 

Equally as troubling is how it has all unfolded. 

After the defeat to Las Palmas, Ayestaran insisted that Alcacer and Mustafi were “not for sale.” It was, he said, the message he’d been given by club president Layhoon Chan and the message Chan had expressed herself (link in Spanish).

And yet both men are headed for the exits anyway. 

On the back of 12 months of turmoil, the deals point to further disconnect between team and manager and the club’s owner Peter Lim. As explained here at Bleacher Report by Andy Brassell and this writer, Valencia have become a club stuck in a sort of nothingness because of a regime blessed with cash but little else. 

Since Lim’s takeover, Valencia have spent recklessly, which has haunted the club this summer with regard to FFP. In the same time, critical experience has been lost in former president Amadeo Salvo, sporting director Francisco Rufete and scout Roberto Fabian Ayala.

What’s more, a too-cozy relationship with agent Jorge Mendes has lingered amid Lim’s detached approach, and the suspicion of Valencia being run for the benefit of Lim, Mendes, friends and clients was heightened by Gary Neville’s stint at the Mestalla last season. 

It’s true that Lim rescued Valencia from financial ruin, but that’s all. His arrival was meant to herald a new era in which stars wouldn’t be sold and an upward trajectory would commence. But here we are two years on, and a mass exodus is unfolding.

Nothing has really changed. 

La Liga kicks …

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