La Liga Lowdown, Jornada 21: Resilient Osasuna ruin Real Madrid’s title hopes

2 Feb, 2011 Luke Colbourne Europe, Latest, Spain

“But it’s only February,” you may be thinking to yourself. How can one result end a team’s hopes of winning the league? Well, if one of the teams you’re competing against is Barcelona, a single loss can be catastrophic. That much we saw this weekend in La Liga as Real Madrid were beaten by a heroic Osasuna.

Funnily enough, it was at the Reyno de Navarra stadium in Pamplona where Real Madrid clinched their last league title, at the end of the 2007/08 season. But Osasuna’s victory at home this time round looks sure to have ended Madrid’s charge at the top, as they now sit seven points behind leaders Barcelona. In fact, they’re now closer to second-placed Villarreal than they are to Barça.

It may seem like a small margin between the top two, but with the way Barça are playing, it looks unlikely that they’ll be dropping points any time soon, nevermind seven of them. Pep Guardiola’s men have won 19 of their 21 games in the league this season, losing just once against Hércules back in September. They were in action against Hércules again this weekend, but made no mistakes this time. The team from Alicante were swept aside without fuss by Pedro and Leo Messi, as Real Madrid endured a night of hell in Pamplona.

Madrid lined up on Sunday with Lass Diarra and Sami Khedira as the two in midfield, and whilst they’re both good players in their own right, they aren’t Xabi Alonso. He was badly missed again. The classy playmaker has established himself as an indispensible part of José Mourinho’s team and one thing has become abundantly clear – if Alonso doesn’t play, Real Madrid don’t play. He is as important to them as Cristiano Ronaldo is.

It wasn’t pretty from Osasuna, but they managed to find a way through in the 62nd minute of the game, via Javier Camuñas. By that time, Mourinho was getting desperate. His team weren’t creating chances. They weren’t playing. His only option was to throw on a flu-ridden Xabi Alonso, in order to provide the creativity that were severely lacking.

It didn’t really help though. The Osasuna players were making it difficult on the pitch, whilst off it, the fans were doing their best to thwart Madrid by throwing on extra balls during their attacks, making an already frustrated Ronaldo even more annoyed. What happened was “inadmissible,” he said after the game – another game in which Ronaldo had failed to find the back of the net. In truth, he never even came close.

Mourinho threw on Kaká and recent loan signing Emmanuel Adebayor for his debut, but neither were able to get them back into the game. Ángel di Maria and Mesut Özil were struggling, and Karim Benzema was nowhere to be seen, obviously. They looked short of ideas, and time was ticking. To make things worse, former Madrid youth player Carlos Aranda was running wild for Osasuna, having the time of his life and making life hell for the defenders. Incidentally, the defenders were Ricardo Carvalho and Raúl Albiol; both good players but they seem to be missing the presence of the Portuguese international Pepe at the back.

While all this was going on, there was also a disaster going on off the field over at Marca HQ. To much amusement, Marca, a site that hasn’t been down for as long as I can remember, was inaccessible. Error. No page, no info, nada. That was until after the game had finished and Madrid had lost the game 1-0. When the site was finally back online, it came plastered with a headline declaring that the league had now “escaped” Real Madrid. “Time to focus on the cups” – the Copa del Rey and the Champions League.

And it’s a thought shared by many. Even the most optimistic of Madridistas are somewhat resigned to defeat. Not all though, and certainly not the Madrid players. Captain Iker Casillas admitted that it was a “setback”. Speaking about the gap between them and Barça he said: “It’s an important difference, but it’s salvageable. It’s clear that we’ve taken a step backwards, but all is not lost.” The words of Iker were similar to the words of everyone else; they knew it was a huge blow, and that the loss had probably cost them the league title, but they have to remain positive. As the old cliché goes: anything can happen in football.

As Real Madrid faltered in Pamplona, third-placed Villarreal capitalised to take themselves within six points of Mourinho’s men, claiming a brilliant result over Espanyol at the Cornellà-El Prat. Villarreal have proved this season that they aren’t just ‘one of the rest’, they’re better. They are closer to the top two than many people think, and are just as competitive. If they had the money to spend that the two above them have, they’d be serious contenders for the title. But as it stands, they’re doing an excellent job with what they have and are playing the kind of wonderful football that Barcelona are so often praised for.

One thing they do have is Giuseppe Rossi, arguably the best player outside of the top two this season. It was Rossi once again who led Villarreal to victory, scoring a magnificent goal in the process – his 20th in all competitions this season. Real Madrid sure don’t want to be dropping points with a team this good snapping away at their heels.

Lower down the Lowdown

The game of the round came at the Riazor. What?! No, really. Deportivo were involved in an amazing six goal thriller against Sevilla. Depor went 2-0 through Lassad, only to find themselves pegged back to 2-2 with 15 minutes to go. Then, somehow, a Sevilla that once again weren’t particularly good found themselves 3-2 in front thanks to Álvaro Negredo’s brilliantly taken second goal of the night. That was until the 88th minute, when Laure smashed in the equaliser to make it 3-3. The Depor fans are probably still in recovery as we speak.
It’s still doom and gloom at the Vicente Calderón as Atlético lost 2-0 at home to Athletic Bilbao. With Diego Forlán, Sergio Agüero and Fernando Llorente on the pitch, Gaizka Toquero was somehow the best striker on the night, scoring two goals for his team. Both Javi Martínez and Andoni Iraola also had excellent games for Athletic, whose recent form has seen them climb up into 6th, just two points behind Espanyol.
La Rosaleda played host to an important game between Málaga and fellow relegation strugglers Real Zaragoza. Portuguese winger Duda put Málaga in front with a nicely taken volley, but Zaragoza hit back twice; first through Nicolás Bertolo and then in the 88th minute through Florent Sinama Pongolle. Manuel Pellegrini admitted after the game that he was “worried” about his team, and so he should be – they now sit in last place after three successive defeats, with the worst defensive record in the league.
Sporting Gijón grabbed their first away win of the season against Mallorca, and they did it in style, winning by 4-0 – their third consecutive win and third consecutive clean sheet. They look a different team from the one that was struggling at the bottom not so long ago. “A month ago everything was black,” said coach Manolo Preciado. His job was at risk, but he seems to have turned things round for now, and Sporting are up into a safe mid-table position.

Results

Mallorca 0-4 Sporting, Real Sociedad 2-0 Almería, Levante 2-0 Getafe, Málaga 1-2 Real Zaragoza, Hércules 0-3 Barcelona, Deportivo 3-3 Sevilla, Atlético 0-2 Athletic, Osasuna 1-0 Real Madrid, Espanyol 0-1 Villarreal, Racing 1-1 Valencia.

Goal of the Week

Giuseppe Rossi (Espanyol 0-1 Villarreal)