RCD Espanyol de Barcelona
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It has been a ride guys. I have enjoyed returning to the Espanyol: The Offside, but time is money and the Summer is over and I just don´t have the time to write here anymore. It´s not an end guys. Starting very soon, there will be a site for Espanyol fans in English at Espanyolusa.info, home of the RCD Espanyol Supporter´s Club of Los Angeles that I will be running. So you see, itś really not an end, but I´ll be branching out and become much more connected with the club and the community of pericos worldwide. I want to thank Chris and everyone here at the Offside, it has been a pleasure writing for you guys.
Ciao,
Armando
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Alright, as of today, Pablo Daniel Osvaldo is as expected an AS Roma player. The striker returns to Serie A where he always said he was less than appreciated and he´s going to a club where the rifts between coach and captain have already begun to get noticed. There will be troubles for the newly minted forward and he might be wandering into a nest of vipers, but that´s alright when a player doesn´t want to stay the only thing you can tell him is, congratulations, wonderful contribution, who can we get to replace this ingrate?
First of all, we can forget Haedo Valdez. The guy who said he wanted to stay in the Spanish top flight bailed to Russia. Nicola Zigic is a guy whose name has been talked about, but I agree withe Sport.es. He´s too slow for the sort of quick-hitting forward we need. Floro Flores of Udinese is another option as is Hugo Almeida of Besiktas according to EMD, but the name I am most interested in is the one that is the least sexy: Denis Stracqualursi. He´s a forward for Tigres in Argentina. The 23 year old was leading scorer in Argentina in the 2010 Apertura.
We´ve been successful before with bringing South Americans from some of the other clubs in Argentina. Time to roll the dice with this signing.
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Are my eyes deceiving me? Am I reading this tidbit of information right from Sport.es? Apparently when the sale of Pablo Osvaldo comes through for 20 million euros to AS Roma in the next few days, the club have talked with both Tottenham and neighbors FC Barcelona for the rights to sign both Dos Santos brothers (Giovanni and Jonathan). 3-5 million euros is the asking price to buy Gio, one of the heroes of Mexico´s Gold Cup campaign and a former Barcelona youth product. Younger brother Jonathan would come with the now formal buy-back clause that Barcelona are using to free up space financially and hide their product.
I think both serve their purpose, Jonathan gives us cover on the wings and Gio gives us that much-coveted attacking midfielder that Pochettino wants. I wonder though who will be the target man in our 4-2-3-1. Interesting dilemma, but I love the idea of getting players that are further along in their development than our usual product line.
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Nelson Haedo Valdéz, the Paraguayan forward who took his country to the finals of the 2011 Copa America and who played last year for subsequently relegated Hércules of Alicante, is looking to continue playing in the Spanish first division. The club have a standing offer with Getafe apparently alongside interest from Real Betis and Real Zaragoza, added to a handful of offers from foreign clubs, the 4 million euro striker has a great deal of suitors. Looks like however, that he wants to come to Espanyol.
I like Valdéz, don´t get me wrong, but if people are expecting another Killer in front of goal then they have another thing coming. He´s strong and he has a great motor, and he´s passionate with his back to goal, but he´s not as great a finisher as Osvaldo and doesn´t have the range of skill that the has either. He´s more like Iván Alonso who provided a spark at the end of games for us last year playing alongside Osvaldo at times or just in front of him. We will need more if we expect to replace what Pablo Osvaldo did for us last year. He´s cheap however which explains why so many clubs in Spain are bidding for Hércules Paraguayan striker.
We will find out soon if he is coming. Hércules have put a 48 hour deadline on the sale as he will not feature in Saturday´s presentation of the club and will likely be sold beforehand.
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After stating publicly that he was happy in Barcelona, and that the Spanish league had been great for him in comparison with his time with Fiorentina in Serie A, Pablo Daniel Osvaldo and his agent are actively negotiating not with Atético Madrid or Tottenham as expected, but with AS Roma of all clubs.
According to Calciomercato.it, rumors are flying from Argentina linking the player with the giallorossi. One journalist, Ramenzoni Ruso on the television program ¨Indirecto¨ has him already in t he process of signing with Roma on a five year contract, and another journo Cesar Merlo has confirmed it.
I know some people question the ability of players in Spain making the adjustment to Serie A, but I think that´s a bunch of hooey in this case. Osvaldo has an Italian passport, played internationally for the Azzurrini, and played for Atalanta, Lecce, Fiorentina and Bologna before coming to Espanyol. He´s grown as a player and while I would like him to stay and help us secure a place in Europe, I understand what selling him to a big-money owner would bring us: one step-closer to financial freedom.
Good luck Killer, if this is indeed your exit, you will always have a place at Cornellà.
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It is difficult to write about Dani Jarque. Here was this kid really, experienced beyond his years, that had drawn the attention of management at Espanyol and particularly Mauricio Pochettino for his leadership skills and had forced out club legend Raúl Tamudo as club captain. Who was this shy and reserved defender, gangly but strong in tackle and comfortable on the ball? Here was the sort of leader we needed, the sort that would bring together a fractured locker-room. Espanyol were in Italy, on a preseason tour that would be cut-short prematurely. Jarque would be on the phone with the mother of his unborn daughter. He would collapse and be lost to us, but we pericos never forget.
At the 21st minute, much as Real Madrid fans chant Juanito´s name in the 7th minute of every game, Jarque is remembered and it´s good to remember, we should always remember the eternal captain, but personally I just can´t write about him without some very personal memories returning. See, my wife and I had just gotten married around that time. She was in her last trimester with our son who is close in age to Dani Jarque´s daughter Martina. His death hit me hard because of what I hold dear and the empathy I have for his family. We think of what we´ve lost as fans or supporters, but I can´t help but thinking of his daughter who doesn´t have her father near. So let´s remember Dani sure, let´s celebrate what he brought to the club, but let´s not forget that in his passing he left more than just a grieving fanbase.
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Let me savor that scoreline for a minute folks. 3-0 to the Espanyol against the cross-town rivals. Sure, it was Barcelona´s B-side and not the Champions League winners we were facing (they have unfinished business at the Bernabéu this weekend), and it was a regional cup we were in line for and not the Copa del Rey, but it´s still a trophy. An empty victory you say? Espanyol´s A side against the blaugrana babies? Not so. Other than old-man Luis Garcia we were also starting a group of youngsters.
Delofeu was looked dangerous with his pace, terrorizing our defense through much of the night down whichever side he played on, and they dominated possession with their one-touch, tiki-taka, but they showed the inherent weakness at La Masia. Grimaldo, Dos Santos, Rafinha and the rest were great at circulating the ball, but they had difficulty putting the ball in the net. It´s why they spend money on strikers.
On the other hand, we should be very proud of our youngsters. Thievy Bifouma was incandescent all night in a central role. He´s no Álvaro Vásquez, let alone Pablo Dani Osvaldo, but he is versatile, pacy and difficult to defend. Relentless, as well. Like Edgar Davids with a better motor, sans eyeglasses, but with a killer top-knot haircut. He´ll contribute week-end and week-out this year, and Cristian Alfonso looks like he will as well. I have to say, if this was billed as battle of canteras, you´d be hard-pressed to come up with a scenario where theirs beat ours tonight.
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In the latest Don Balon, Spain´s preeminent weekly Sports Magazine, they have an interview with our outgoing President Dani Sanchez-Llibre. Here are some highlights.
Game day will be, ¨Completely different¨, he says, ¨I´ll arrive half an hour early, like all the other supporters. I will hang out with friends, and when the traffic is more fluid, I will go home with no press conferences and no need to greet the other team´s entourage.
Memories: He´ll remember many things, but he says the eight year process of building the new stadium is his lasting legacy. ¨From when I had my first meetings with the mayors of Cornellà and El-Prat, and with ex-President (of the Generalitat) Jordi Pujol. The work was completed in August 2009. It is to be proud considering that the club´s heritage (Sarrià) disappeared in 1997. 14 years later, Espanyol has a much stronger global image, better than before.” As for difficult memories, he mentions the 03-04 season when not only were the club in serious danger of relegation, saved on the last day in Murcia, but that off the field his presidency suffered the indignity of a failed coup by Grupo 3.0 and José Manuel Lara. From then on, the club was split and held together only by the supporters. It would end only after buyout Lara´s shares. He also of coure mentions the death of Jarque. ¨He had fainted and were trying to revive him. At that moment I thought it was a low blood sugar because my father and my brother had suffered. Five minutes later I called again to say that things went wrong. 30 seconds later they tell me he has died. We had a very special relationship. Three weeks before we had dined together. He had put his contract on the table so that I could fill in the duration.¨
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Let´s assume that with Giuseppe Ross staying at Villarreal, and FC Porto not in the market to sell either Hulk or Radamel Falcao Garcia to Atlético Madrid, that Pablo Daniel Osvaldo leaves as is speculated with or without his evaluation of 20 million euros being met. Let´s say the deal is finished in the next week, and let´s say that we have enough time in this window to find a replacement. Who do you call on?
Álvaro Vásquez is at the U-20 World Cup with Spain and will be tied up, as Jordi Amat will by the way, until at the latest the day before the season begins in August. Rui Fonte can and has played the role of a number 9 before but he´s slight and not your typical 9 who holds the line. Luis García is an emotional leader but not really built for the role either nor are the remaining forwards Thievy and Sergio García. Iván Alonso is playing for Toluca in Mexico. Raul Tamudo? Over Pochettino´s dead body I´m afraid. It´s not looking very promising. The clubs looking for deals have already found them. What´s left are the over-priced and the under-talented.
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With Kun Agueri signing for Manchester City and the colchoneros flush with money from the sale, are we likely to see them pay the required 20 million euro price-tag and take our Italo-Argentine forward from us? Pablo Daniel Osvaldo is a great young player, one of the best strikers we´ve had over the last few years since the decline of Raúl Tamudo, but I am under no illusions that we can keep him or any other player if another club is willing to overspend for him.
He has become a talismanic figure for us, a deadly finisher who is also unselfishly good at involving his game in the umbrella of his team-mates´, and we have responded in kind by cheering for him, and in the example of yesterday´s 3-1 win against Boca Juniors in a friendly at Cornellà-El Prat by chanting Quedate Osvaldo, Stay Osvaldo, but we can´t deny a player his place. At the moment Atléti is better situated to play in Europe and a player wants to win trophies. I´m sure also that he wants to attract the attention of Cesare Prandelli before the next World Cup. He could give Italy a much needed spark.
It´s not urgent or imminent, but the player did nothing to hide his intent: ¨I am very happy here because of the affection of the fans. I have a contract with Espanyol and I would love to stay but I don´t know what will come to pass in the next few days because it does not depend solely on me.¨
I think he´s gone.
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