Mallorquinista: Roller Coaster Ride
Real Mallorca fans are experiencing a roller coaster ride with a win, a draw and a disappointing loss in their last three games. On Sunday the 20th of October they hosted Rayo Vallecano with a lunchtime kick off. Over 18,000 fans saw their team at home for the first time in 33 days. La Liga’s inexplicable scheduling meant the previous three games were all played away from Palma.
Vallecano are the fourth team from Madrid currently playing in the premier division in Spain alongside the obvious Real, Atletico and the lesser known Leganes. They have never won in Palma and that run continued. Mallorca were in control from the start with Navarro hitting the post in the opening minutes and astonishingly Muriqi headed a simple chance into the ground and over the bar. The Kosovan has scored in every game he has played against Vallecano and this proved no exception when he put a bullet header into the net from evergreen Dani Rodrigues corner in the 76th minute. He is regarded as the best header of a ball in Spain and wasn’t going to miss another golden chance. However Rayo’s head coach Inigo Perez must have been furious as Muriqi was totally unchallenged. With seconds remaining, substitute Antonio Sanchez bundled a second “goal” into the net. Many fans celebrated and left the Son Moix Stadium in a happy mood. After an age the referee indicated that VAR had disallowed the goal because of offside and promptly blew the final whistle for a one-nil home win.
On the 28th of October, Monday Night Football came to town with the visit of Athletic Bilbao and nearly 20,000 fans in attendance. Revenge was anticipated as Bilbao had beaten Mallorca in the Copa del Rey final in Sevilla on penalties in April. Mallorca tore into the visitors and Muriqi had a great effort saved by visiting goalkeeper Agirrezabala after only 90 seconds. The match was then turned on its head when Samu Costa was shown a yellow card for a foul on former Mallorca player Galaretta in the 10th minute. The referee then left the pitch to consult VAR with fans holding their breath hoping the yellow card wasn’t going to be converted into a red. The ref returned giving the declined sign with his arms. Most people thought that meant that the yellow had been rescinded. Replays were then shown on the big screen which appeared to show that Samu had taken the ball cleanly. The crowd then hurled abuse at the ref for awarding the free kick and yellow in the first place. On 23 minutes Samu fouled Galaretta and was shown a deserved yellow. The referee then brandished a red card! The crowd was stunned when realising the first yellow had not been rescinded. Head Coach Arrasate had to change tactics and immediately sent on defensive midfielder Mascarell in place of striker Larin who gave the ref a mouthful and was promptly booked. He then kicked a water bottle into the crowd, not exactly covering himself with glory. From then on the match turned into something akin to the Battle of the Alamo. Central defenders Valjent and captain Raillo rolled up their sleeves and declared they shall not pass. Every man jack of the team resisted the repeated attacks by the team from the Basque Country. At the final whistle a huge roar greeted the nil-nil scoreline and in these circumstances it felt like a win. The referee received a cheery send off!
Only four days later on the 1st of November, the Palma team travelled ironically to the Basque Country to play Alaves in Vitoria. The home side are coached by former Mallorca coach Luis Garcia Plaza who led the islanders to promotion to La Liga in 2021. There were more Mallorca connections as former bit part players Sedlar and Stoichkov were on the home side bench. Arrasate decided to make huge rotational changes leaving goalkeeper Greif, Valjent, Sergi Darder, Johan Mojica and Muriqi on the bench and Samu Costa was obviously suspended. Their replacements looked like they had never played together before – which they hadn’t. Alaves are in a lowly position and the game was an error strewn apology for a La Liga fixture. Neither side deserved to win but Alaves netted a winner from veteran Guridi in the 76th minute following a mix up in the Mallorca defence. A match to forget quite simply.
Mallorca sit in 8th place in La Liga but only three points behind fourth placed Villareal. They now have a very attractive fixture at home to Atletico Madrid on Sunday the 10th of November. These are usually feisty encounters and that takes us up to yet another of those interminable international breaks abhorred by most football fans.
