After a week when the UK Foreign Office advised against travelling to Israel – Isn’t it good to see that Brits have these people to look out for them?! – Real Mallorca’s sporting director Pablo Ortells has been in Slovakia to watch Spain taking part in the European Under 21s competition. He also met up with our No. 1 goalkeeper Dominik Greif’s representatives to offer him a contract improvement to retain him amid market threats. Mallorca have significantly improved the offer but the financial proposal is, perhaps not unsurprisingly, still short of the salary Rajkovic received before leaving for Saudi Arabia last Summer. Greif’s uncertainty has sparked the interest of several La Liga sides such as Betis and Valencia as well as foreign clubs. Ortells is well aware of the situation and doesn’t want to let the issue drag on until the Summer transfer window shuts on Monday, September 1 at 7pm.
On Tuesday night local news outlets were full of stories regarding the availability of the 27-year-old Congolese winger (brought up in Woolwich, London) Grady Diangana whose contract at West Bromwich Albion is coming to an end. Again there are several clubs interested in signing him including Valencia. The big problem that scenario brings for Mallorca is that the present Valencia coach Carlos Corberan used to be West Brom’s manager so Diangana knows all about his coaching methods etc.
Coach Arrasate’s players have just under three weeks to go before they return to training. Between July 7 and 9, the players will have their pre-season medicals in the Juaneda hospitals. On July 10 proper training starts at Son Bibiloni until the 26th. The first friendly match is scheduled for July 23 (opponents unknown at the moment) before they head for Austria on the 26th. There the team will play three preparation games on July 27, 30 and 31, the day they return to Palma.
Back home the players will put the finishing touches to their pre-season with another friendly. This one may well be the prestigious annual “Potato Cup” against Poblense in Sa Pobla on August 6. The historic City of Palma cup match against who knows who (as yet) will take place on August 9 and then it’s the big kick off scheduled for the weekend of August 16/17.
Santi Cazorla, a 40-year-old “boy with a dream”
The battle for the final position in next season’s La Liga will be settled tomorrow night (Saturday 21 at 9pm) at the Carlos Tartiere stadium in Oviedo. After Levante (Valencia) and Elche clinched automatic promotion from La Segunda two weeks ago, it will be third-placed Oviedo (coached by ex Mallorca player Veljko Paunovic) and fourth-placed Mirandes (Province of Burgos) to go head to head. The first leg saw Mirandes win 1-0 so it’s all to play for. If Oviedo win, it will be the first time they’ve been in La Liga for 23 years, Mirandes have never been in Spain’s top division.
Oviedo's Santi Cazorla. Photo: Facebook
If the game is level after extra time, there will be no penalties as the team that finished higher in the league will automatically be promoted. For a certain Santi Cazorla this game is something special. Born a stone’s throw from Oviedo (his boyhood club) it’s a miracle that (two-time European Champions winner) Cazorla is even walking properly. He spent six years at Arsenal where he became a “legend” before leaving in 2018. His final two years were plagued by a serious Achilles tendon injury. It was so bad he had to have 12 operations to cure the problem. One of these operations led to gangrene and doctors feared the worst, saying “He should be satisfied just to walk again.”
On Cazorla’s arm is half a tattoo, the other half is on his ankle, as he had skin grafted from one area to the other. His daughter’s name India is in two bits and is a constant reminder of the injury that almost ended his career. He’s made a remarkable recovery and said recently “I’ll keep playing for a while longer, as long as my ankle allows. I hope to play in La Liga again but whether or not I do doesn’t matter, what matters is my beloved Real Oviedo get to the Promised Land again.”
AND FINALLY, I’ve done this story before but the incident in question was used on TalkSport the other night so I’ve resurrected it. This is a true story as described by retired Howard Webb, now chief refereeing officer, i.e. overseer on everything VAR in England!! “In a game between Middlesbrough and Italian side Chievo Verona in August 2006, one of the Italian players was being persistently aggressive. Midway through the second half, he put in a ‘leg breaker’ tackle. I called him over to give him a tongue wagging. He said ‘No inglese, no inglese.’ So I asked one of the ’Boro’ multilingual players to act as translator. “The Brazilian Fabio Rochemback came forward so I told him ‘Tell this guy if I see any more fouls like that last one, he’ll get a red card.’ ‘No problem, Ref’ said Rochemback as he purposely strode over to his opponent, prodding his index finger in the air at him and yelled ‘Eh you, any mora foulsa you getta reda carda’ in Italian-accented English. He may just as well have added a Joe Dolce-style ‘Shaddap you face’ for good measure!!”
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