The rebellion of two modest authors

In a League marked by economic austerity, differentiation goes through the ability to discover talents where others with more resources do not detect them. Also for creating teams with all the letters. Solid groups that through their automatisms are capable of performing above their individual virtues. In a context of general equality and after more than a quarter of the championship, two teams have slipped into the European positions, that party to which in principle only the largest budgets are invited.

Osasuna and Rayo Vallecano are two author projects, two teams forged from the tough Second Division that now reap the fruits of the elite based on patience and trust in their coaches. Jagoba Arrasate arrived in the summer of 2018 in Pamplona. After a campaign in which the rojillos, returned to the silver category, disappointed not even reaching the promotion playoff positions, the Biscayan coach had the challenge of returning a historic to First. He was endorsed by his good performance at Numancia and his team swept, with a championship and record numbers.

Already among the best, the challenge doubled its difficulty, but the truth is that in these, more than two seasons, Osasuna has achieved two reliable permanences. He has only stepped into the red zone at the most critical moment in Arrasate, when in December 2020 and before a streak of thirteen games without a win, Luis Sabalza, the president, and Braulio Vázquez, the sports director, gave the coach the necessary support to get over the bump. The virtue of patience, so rare in football as recommended in the medium term.

Stability has given wings to homegrown players like David García, Moncayola or Javi Martínez, all with enormous progress, and has also allowed them to retain pillars such as goalkeeper Sergio Herrera, central Aridane or the destabilizing Rubén García and ‘Chimy’ Ávila, who have suffered two serious knee injuries in recent times. The now classic Unai García, Oier or Roberto Torres, heirs of the Osasuna lineage of Patxi Puñal, and high-profile signings such as Kike García and Ante Budimir, the most expensive acquisition in the club’s history -eight million euros-, complete a cocktail of success, which allows the Navarrese team to rub shoulders with the greats and boast of being the best visitor of all the major European leagues, with four victories and a draw at the Bernabéu that right now only Liverpool, Naples, Milan and Atalanta equal.

Meanwhile, in Vallecas el Rayo follows a dynamic that seems to be traced, although at an earlier stage of the project. Like Arrasate, Iraola also bets on high pressure and alternates the combinative game and the bet on direct and daring football. The purpose is still to try to consolidate itself in the elite after recovering its place in First by surprise. And the thing is that Iraola’s first year on the fringe bench was a long-distance race. The Gipuzkoan coach was endorsed by a great debut in Spain at the hands of Mirandés and his team fought for a place in the promotion playoff for much of the year. Finally he won the game against Sporting on the penultimate day. On the bell but enough to have the opportunity to surprise Leganés and Girona in all or nothing and return to the highest category of Spanish football.

Falcao and the heroes of the ascent

The bet was clear, as Osasuna at his maximum confidence in the promotion block and the baton of the main architect of success. Iraola strengthened his squad with the physique of Pathe Ciss and Nteka, both from Fuenlabrada, and received two gifts on the hour to significantly increase his squad’s ability to perform: Falcao and Sergi Guardiola. On the Colombian weighed the doubt about his physical condition, the burden for a footballer of another level. The striker who astonished the world dressed in Atlético’s red and white is no longer here to play every minute, far from it, but his minutes on the pitch are plenty to sign four goals at this point in the course.

The auction of its star point and the preponderant role of the heroes of the promotion to First -Dimitrievski, Catena, Saveljich, Fran García, Isi Palazón, Comesaña, Óscar Valentín, Álvaro García or Trejo- make Rayo an intractable team in Vallecas, where he has achieved five victories in his five games to date. The most recent victims: Barça and their former technician, Ronald Koeman. Surely they will not be the last of a team that with 19 points, curiously the same as Osasuna, already has a lot of progress on the road to permanence. At the moment in Vallecas they dream big, as in Pamplona.