Seven months to seal the goal

Celta is about to complete three months without winning in LaLiga and a good part of those problems to add the three points at stake in each game were focused on their own goal, since until last Saturday they had chained twenty days conceding at least one goal against. Against Valencia, the light blue team finally got Vicente Guaita to add his first unbeaten record as a light blue. The Valencian goalkeeper has now gone 90 minutes without conceding a goal, but he is far from the mark set by his teammate Iván Villar last year. The Galician goalkeeper accumulated 441 unbeaten minutes, surpassing the mark in recent years that José Manuel Pinto and Rubén Blanco had established at 385 minutes.

A few days after Iván Villar conceded the goal against Espanyol that broke their unbeaten record, Celta enjoyed a narrow victory against Elche in Vigo (goal from Aidoo), which would have a longer run than expected. That match played on March 18 was until Saturday, November 25, the last match of the league championship in which Celta had not conceded goals. In the next twenty (seven in the past and thirteen in the current one) the Celtics were unable to seal their goal.

The clean sheet is not enough

Thus, Celta’s fifth draw so far this season has been received with greater satisfaction by coaches, players and fans than the previous four. The difference is that the equalizer at Mestalla came after Guaita’s goal was protected. What’s more, Celtismo hopes that this goalless match will be a turning point and that from there there will be enough positive results to get out of the last places in the standings. Celta has dropped many points in the first fourteen rounds, but almost no one disputes that Benítez’s team has continued to compete at a good level but misfortune has punished them unfairly.

A fact that explains the situation that the results do not correspond to the game played by the Celtics is that six of the nine defeats suffered were by one goal difference. No other team in the top category has had so many victories or draws so close that they ended up escaping even in the final minutes.

In Mestalla that negative dynamic was broken and Celta made good on Benítez’s tactical approach of not being surprised by a Valencia that did not register any shots between the three sticks. The Madrid coach once again opted for a four-man defense and as many midfielders. There was not much separation between those two lines and the team was unable to overcome them.

That delicate thread of hope

The good defensive work shown by Celta in Valencian lands is what has been expected from Benítez’s team since the first league match. The Celta coach, however, did not find that defensive balance that he was looking for and even at half-time on the second day he opted for several containment systems. In San Sebastián he gave way to a defense with three centre-backs, which he maintained until the visit to Las Palmas. On matchday nine, against Getafe, Benítez recovered the line of four defenders. In the next, he gave the alternative to Guaita in goal after Villar was sent off.

Despite the new changes to the starting eleven, Celta continued without keeping a clean sheet. That continued to affect his interests, as he narrowly lost in Girona and Bilbao and came close to winning against Sevilla.

In the last four rounds, the Celtics have achieved two draws (Sevilla and Valencia) and two narrow defeats (Girona and Bilbao), which came in the final minutes.

The Celtics are not lavish in obtaining goalless draw results either. The one before Saturday also dates back to last March. It was during the visit to Pamplona. In that season, the Vigo team only had two draws to zero. He got the other one in Vallecas. As on this occasion, it also occurred on the fourteenth day of the last championship.

Between both draws without goals, Celta conceded 34 goals (10 correspond to the last days of last year and 24, to the current one). It has taken Benítez’s team twenty days to repeat that result, which is rarely seen in the First Division. In fact, the goalless draw at Mestalla is the tenth recorded so far in the championship. The sequence of 0-0 draws was opened, of course, by José Bordalás’ Getafe. It was on the opening day, against Barcelona. The Madrid team also drew goalless in Mallorca and again at home against Villarreal. Rayo has two away, at the Bernabéu and in Cádiz. However, Girona, Almería, Granada and Alavés have not yet experienced a 0-0 draw this season.

2023-11-27 05:10:58
#months #seal #goal