Saturday, November 9, 2024, 1:18 p.m.
Barakaldo is surprising everyone and everyone, rubbing shoulders with the best teams in the First Federation, despite being a newcomer to this category. The factory team occupies third position, demonstrating every day that it can compete against anyone. In that sense, this Sunday at 12:00 p.m. has a trial by fire. The Gualdinegros will visit the National Stadium of Andorra to face one of the ‘coconuts’ of the league and favorite for promotion. A test of the highest demand to continue calibrating the forces of those on the Left Bank.
After having added two points in the previous three days, Barakaldo returned to the winning path with a bang, giving Gimnástica Segoviana a resounding 3-0 victory. Furthermore, in that same week of three games, Imanol de la Sota started 23 of the 24 players at his disposal. “This good week, where everyone has participated, has made internal competitiveness increase even more and better training sessions have been seen,” the coach said.
Most of the players have performed at a good level in recent matches, which makes it difficult to predict the eleven they will put together to face Andorra. “I have always had it difficult, that makes the internal competition that we want on a daily basis grow, those who had the least minutes and also those who were playing have done very well, but I have the same doubts as always,” he said. From the Sota. The Santurtziarra has all his troops available for this match, which is expected to be “very complicated.”
Second Division quality
Andorra “is one of the transatlantic, a recently relegated team with a squad of brutal quality,” said the factory coach. In fact, up to eleven players were active last season in the Second Division: Nico Ratti, Oier Olazabal, Diego Alende, Martí Vilà, Jesús Clemente, Sergio Molina, Erik Morán, Álvaro Martín, Christos Almpanis, Manu Nieto and Lautaro de León. De la Sota stressed his “quality”, with which “he can hurt you at any moment.” He also noted that it is “a balanced team.”
At the moment, Andorra is fifth, two points below Barakaldo. They have won four games, drawn five and lost two, registering nine goals for and seven against. However, they have gone four consecutive days without winning – one defeat and three draws. “It is a group that is in the process of growing and acquiring concepts,” says the coach of the Baracal team, who reveals that his idea is to try to make them “less dominant” because “the quality they have makes it difficult for the rival.” the game a lot,” he warns.
The team led by Gerard Piqué aspires to return to the Second Division. Although Barakaldo is not intimidated by its great power and will seek a new victory in a stadium that until now has been impregnable. Andorra has two victories -Barça Atlètic (2-1) and Real Unión (2-0)- and three draws -Ponferradina (1-1), Cultural Leonesa (1-1) and Real Sociedad B (1-1)- at home, having hosted some of the strongest teams in the league. Even so, Imanol de la Sota highlights that “a point can be considered good depending on the circumstances that have occurred, but I can assure you that at the beginning we only consider the three points as good.”
