Villarreal USA: for Villarreal CF fans

Not a pleasant few weeks for fans of the Yellow Submarine. Remember how we said getting 12 of 15 points was our goal? Well.....3 out of 15 with four losses in a row, injuries all over the place, and a squad weakened by selling Rulli and loaning Danjuma (weaker on the pitch, anyhow) with no replacements. How much is Quique Setién to blame for recent results, and how much is the fault of a front office that decided to wait for the summer to make things happen? Sidarth and Allen discuss all of this, our recurring injury problems, ask what might lead the club to cut Setién loose, etc etc etc. And, the Conference League takes on new importance--win it, and we would get into the Europa league next year. Otherwise, qualifying for Europe might be difficult. Certainly this losing streak has put pay to any Champions League dreams. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Robin and Allen discuss our transfer happenings, or lack thereof. It's a wide-ranging discussion, replete with references to our favorite players over the years, why some of Villarreal's current squad just can't fit into Setien's 4-3-3, how much we will miss Danjuma, etc etc. And we even feel sorry for Valencia at the end. Have a listen. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen and Sidarth discuss the transfer market this January, Quique Setien's impact on Villarreal, and for some reason (maybe we still have memories of Villarreal's relegation in 2012 we need to expunge?) we talk a lot about the bottom half of the La Liga table and teams that might be a little....worried? Enjoy, and Endavant Villarreal! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen is joined by Jamie Kemble to talk Villarreal---what's going on in the transfer market, who might leave, where might we (or should we) look to reinforce ourselves in January or the summer? Also, we briefly celebrate our recent results. And we also talk about the stadium rebuild, not all positively given what we've seen in social media about the away end becoming even more unwelcoming. Enjoy and Endavant Villarreal. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen is joined by Sidarth to review recent happenings at Villarreal. We are pretty upbeat, though we still await our first victory under Quique Setien. This was recorded prior to the Athletic Club match, and prior to all these rumors about Aston Villa moving for Nicolas Jackson..... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It's been quite a week--I spend a month in Spain and come home to this! Apologies for not having a pod for a while, but hopefully this helps to make up for it. The main topic is of course Unai Emery's departure--why now, why Aston Villa, and then the replacement. Quiqui Setien has been out of football for a couple of years but a lot of the panel remember his Betis teams fondly. Julian, Robin and Rahul are pretty mellow about it all...though the real worry will come in the next transfer windows, we think. Endavant Villarreal, and fond memories of Sr. Llaneza as well. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I was a guest on Jeremy's 'Colchonero Chat' podcast previewing the match, and now he returns the favor on a postgame pod. We were expecting this to be a tight, exciting match, and so it was, though for the first hour of a 0-0 we thought we might have jinxed it. But then things happened! We talk about Cholo Simeone's decision to let Villarreal have most of the possession in the first 30 minutes or so--a sign of respect for Nico Jackson's speed, or hoping we would turn the ball over in midfield? Whatever, it didn't work as Villarreal dominated the first half and were unlucky not to go in with a lead. Second half we knew Atleti would change things up,and they did, dominating the third quarter of the match and pushing the Yellow Submarine back. But strangely enough, Villarreal's first goal came from the sort of counter--indirectly, at least--Cholo had feared. A Jackson shot off a pass from Gerard produced a corner, and Atleti's Molina miskicked an attempted clearance, the ball fell to Yeremy Pino who arrowed a shot across Oblak into the corner. Gero Rulli channeled his inner Iker Casillas to claw a Carrasco header back--just--and then the luckless Molina was sent off in injury time for a fist to the neck of Alex Baena, who had incurred his wrath by wasting time giving the ball back. Gerard Moreno scored on the last kick of the match from another counter. Cue the Atleti 'faithful' in the Fondo Sur screaming and throwing insults and water bottles in his direction, and apparently after the match a small group of 'fans' insulted Griezmann and Mario Hermoso as they were running on the pitch after the match. Anyway,Unai Emery's first win over Diego Simeone, ever. Enjoy our discussion! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I am joined by Sidarth to talk about things Villarreal. Two episodes in one week!! We'd like to focus on victories for the first and second teams in week one, but the looming cloud of transfers requires our attention too. Which is sad really--why can't the transfer window end BEFORE the season starts? And why do we have to focus so much on how much money everyone is making--can't we just enjoy the Beautiful Game? Well, obviously not. And that was before we heard of Barcelona trying to buy Juan Foyth for some made-up price that they can't pay except in Monopoly money anyway and we have indeed sold Pervis Estupiñan, who is now a Brighton Seagull (my mother's favorite English team, for reasons I won't go into here!!) Anyhow, do enjoy this. We managed to keep it pretty short, for us. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Safe to say the summer has been hotter than the Villarreal transfer market, so we figured it was time to do a podcast to get the action going. Seems to be working, with Lo Celso deal apparently agreed. Anyhow, Robin, Julian and I had a good time chatting about the prospects for the upcoming season, which players might still leave, who we might still get, etc etc. Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

We jokingly called this the "Grumpy European" episode. Robin from the UK and Julian from Norway join me to discuss some controversial talking points.....sure, Unai Emery, you won the Europa League, but what have you done for me lately? 7th in the league is pretty disappointing. (Of course, when you barely got a full season out of the trio of Gerard, Danjuma, and Paco combined, maybe the medical staff bears some responsiblity.....) Anyhow, we discuss this, whether Gio Lo Celso was really that good, where we really need to reinforce the squad, who might leave......and Allen and Robin are respective fanboys for Manu Trigueros and Alfonso Pedrasa, of course. Enjoy!!! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen is joined by Sidarth to discuss Villarreal's needs in the transfer market--specifically, what we might try to do to give Geronimo Rulli some competition as goalkeeper. Enjoy! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Allen and Sidarth get together to talk about the victory over Bayern (of course) and look ahead a bit to Liverpool. After the break, we get into how various ex-Villarreal players and coaches are doing now, the B team, Villarreal Feminina.... Enjoy and Endavant Villarreal! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen is joined by Sidarth to discuss Villarreal's first qualification for the Champions League quarterfinals since 2009, when Villarreal USA was a Word Press blog and Sid was one of the writers. (I hadn't found them yet!). Our 2009 team had some nice names in it, but two (Giuseppe Rossi and Diego Godín) were young, not what they would become later--Marcos Senna and Joan Capdevila were at the top of their game, and we had some good team players of which the best was Gonzalo and Cani, probably Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Three goals in the last 20 minutes dispatched a frustrated Juventus--Allen and Jamie discuss what turned out to be a perfect night in Turin. And what will Unai Emery plan for our quarterfinal matchup against Bayern Munich? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

So we have an official changing of the guard to announce. Zach is handing over the VUSA site manager job to Jamie Kemble this week. Zach will still be around, look for his byline on articles and definitely he'll still be tweeting from the VUSA account, blue check and all. Jamie brings a lot of football writing experience, he's actually living in Spain so can see our matches in person most of the time. Plus, he's young and energetic. All good. Of course we talk Yeremy Pino. How could we not? And there's praise for Unai Emery, and also for maybe the best under-the-radar signing of all time, Etienne Capoue. And Sergio Asenjo's contract expires at the end of this year--what will Villarreal do there? What moves might we see in the summer? After the break (Jamie had to go at that point) Zach and I discuss this season in La Liga. Could be you have to finish 5th to get into the Europa League, 6th only gets you the Conference League. A juicy battle for Europe over the last three months of the season. (not to mention a second leg match against Juventus). Enjoy! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen and Zach catch up with Villarreal news--mostly looking ahead to the Juventus match on Tuesday but also we cover the planned redevelopment of Villarreal's stadium this summer and the news about Sr. Llaneza. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen is joined by Robin and Zach. We talk about recent Villarreal performances first and who has really impressed us....then we move into a discussion of Geronimo Rulli and his strengths and weaknesses, possible reinforcements in winter (a brief discussion of Cedric Bakambu) and how we're feeling about the remainder of the season. Endavant! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen and Sid chat about Villarreal's first half of the season, and the current La Liga standings. Which teams ahead of us look likely to falter? Which look strong? (we recorded this before last weekend's matches btw) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen has returned, managed to see a bit of Villarreal's matches but Robin and Julian have seen more, and we're all concerned. So we talk about tactics, squad composition, squad selection, formations, all that stuff. How can Villarreal get out of this funk? In the best social media tradition, we give Unai Emery our advice. We want to win!!! And at the end we give our predictions for the Valencia and Young Boys matches. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen welcomes Jamie Kemble to the podcast for the first time. Robin joins us as well. Jamie introduces himself, and then we discuss the draw against Atleti (I mean, we had to, right?), and then we analyze Villarreal's transfer window and how best to use all the players we have. And we have questions. For instance, Paco Alcácer.....is he going to return to scoring form on the pitch? We're amazed we've kept three left backs--which one might end up being the odd man out in January? With all these wing-type players we have, do we play a 4-4-2, or a 4-3-3 in attack? How do we get Gerard untracked? And finally, Robin asks Jamie and me for our favorite Villarreal players and then tells us what that says about us. Well, he got me right, that's for sure! Enjoy. I will be on a hiatus for a few weeks so not sure if we'll have any new podcasts until I get back. Meanwhile, ENDAVANT VILLARREAL, let's get some wins ! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Every week, Villarreal USA is featuring the predictions of an expected goals-based model developed by Mitchel Green and adapted by Charlie Tuley for La Liga. Today Charlie joins me and Zach Hicks for an explanation of how the model works. We also discuss how we should interpret the predictions, what sort of tweaks could one make to the model to (perhaps) improve it, etc. and of course also understand what its limitations are. Zach and I really enjoyed this discussion and I'm sure we'll have Charlie back on another podcast in a couple of months to discuss a lot of these issues with the benefit of more matches behind us (and hopefully Villarreal will be winning rather than drawing every match!!!) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen and Sidarth discuss the Champions League draw and fixture list. And after the break we muse about what formation Unai Emery would like to play, which works best for us right now, and we predict the inevitable low-scoring draw against Atletico Madrid. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen and Sid get together to discuss Villarreal's bloated roster--what moves are still to come? And after the break, we move on to the league. Where will Villarreal finish? Who do we pick to do well, and who might fall back this season? We give our predictions for Monday, also. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen is joined by Robin, Sid and Rahul. First part is our not-terribly-optimistic outlook for the Supercup, given all our injuries, Covid doubts, and everything else, but hey. We can do this! After the break we talk about the implications of Messi leaving Barcelona, both for that team and for the league. If they end up being able to register their new signings, they won't be so bad, but the extent of their financial mismanagement is truly staggering. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen is joined by twitter's "Austrian Groguet", Constantin. We talk about how he became a Villarreal fan (now there's quite a story), and what it was like for him watching the EL final on TV. Constantin will be doing an internship with Villarreal this summer, so we hope to keep in good communciation! Enjoy and Endavant. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen catches up with longtime friend Thomas McIlroy--Thomas first came to Vila-real to teach English in 2011-12 and, after returning to his native UK for awhile, joined Villarreal CF's English-language communication department in 2018. He was at the Europa League Final, but not in the stands--working in the pressbox! Which didn't stop him from being as emotional about the moment as the rest of us. It's a really exciting time for him, heading up Villarreal's English-language communications department, as we face yet another English team in the Supercopa and get ready for a Champions League group stage where we could well face Manchester United or Liverpool (there's a 40% chance we are matched with one of those two in our group). Plus, the women's first team is playing in the Primera next season, the 13 year-olds won the La Liga Promises tournament...it's quite a time to be working for Villarreal. Enjoy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen and Sidarth relive an epic final and an amazing day in Vilarreal CF history, not to mention in the history of the town of Vila-real. What an end to the season! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is there to say, really? Enjoy!!! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Allen and Sidarth, longtime Villarreal supporters, talk about the end of the league season, but after the break we address what it means to make a Europa League Final, how achieving it has changes the narrative about Villarreal, and how we think our team might line up if some of our injured players can be available. Endavant! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

That's right, we are not even going to talk about Saturday's match. Instead, it's all about the Europa League Final. (well, we do review the Sevilla match as far as whether that might tell us anything, but we pretty much figure we're finishng 7th in the league) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This is the second part of the pod we recorded (this time just Sid and me) after the semifinal victory. We started out talking about the Arsenal match but then got onto a bit of a final preview. We'll have another one later now we have had the benefit of the Celta (hah!), Valladolid and Sevilla matches. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The founder of Villarreal USA, maddi, joins us for this special occasion; so too does Ravi, longtime Villarreal fan who was a site writer once upon a time, before working for the Seattle Sounders took priority (!), and Sid. All four of us just revel in the moment and try to explain to the rest of you why it is such a moment. Enjoy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Not much need to beat around the bush here--there's one topic and one topic only, the upcoming second leg at Arsenal. (Well, we do rubbish the penalty decision in the first leg and VAR's non-use in what it was designed for, fair enough). How will Unai Emery set up his squad? Do we go defensive early, or try to get away goals first to put the tie away? And who replaces Juan Foyth and Etienne Capoue in the lineup? Endavant Villarreal! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The main part of this podcast is--of course--our preview of the first leg tie with Arsenal at the Ceramica. Will it be a wide-open slugfest, a tactical chess match, or.... And who will Emery play in goal? We all give our predictions for the first leg, too. After the break we remember Robin Harris, "Mr. Villarreal" who passed away recently and was a friend to many of us who visited Vila-real, and we also salute the Villarreal Women who have been promoted to the Primera! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In light of the bombshell news that 12 clubs were going ahead with forming a "European Super League", Allen and Sidarth discuss the chaos and how it might be resolved. On the one hand, the 12 are trying to position themselves outside UEFA (maybe understandable given their reputation for probity), on the other, the 12 are creating a perpetual, locked-in revenue stream of their own (which is totally against the concept of competition to earn European places). We recorded this while Florentino Perez was giving an interview on Spanish TV, so we missed the opportunity to weigh in on trickle-down economics. Suffice it to say we're not impressed..... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

And lo, it has come to pass. It was inevitable, wasn't it? Villarreal and Arsenal face each other in a Europa League semifinal. Not only do these clubs match up for the third time in a European semifinal, but it's also a contest between Unai Emery's current club and his former one. Allen and Sidarth enjoy the moment, reminisce about our prior semifinals, etc. (plus, we do get some brief discussion of Javi Calleja joining Alaves and the Juan Cala incident after our break) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Spring has sprung in the midst of an international break. Allen and Robin reflect on this long season, whether the break is coming at a good time or not, whether Paco Alcacer can get untracked, what to do about our logjam in midfield, and more....! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Villarreal dispatched Dinamo Kyiv and now face a tougher task, we expect, in Dinamo Zagreb. Yes, we're still interested in the league, and we start there, but with the draw at least giving us a fighting chance to get to the final, we can't resist looking ahead to Zagreb... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This was recorded before the Valencia debacle, but I had problems uploading it--if you want to skip our ruminations on how we thought that match would play out, skip to about 18 minutes in!! Allen and Sid mostly talk about the Europa League this season and how we might end up in something called the Conference League next season. Or, maybe not. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Allen is joined by Zach and Sid in the aftermath of the Betis debacle -- the result was bad enough, but Unai Emery's formation and choice of midfielders comes in for some criticism. Is it time to bench Sergio Asenjo? He's clearly not been on his best form (and Zach has some statistics to support that) but that could be risky. And while our injury list has been long, we just seem to be in something of a funk, not helped by last minute goals against us and goals of our own chalked off, etc. After the break we look at our Europa League opponents, Red Bull Salzburg, coached by Wisconsin native Jesse Marsch--and with a young American midfielder, Brenden Aaronson. Until our recent lack of form you'd have expected us to be favorites--Zach still thinks we are. Enjoy and Endavant!! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A special pod here as Allen is joined by Raúl and Robin to talk Villarreal. First, the men's first team....are there tweaks we could make to improve things, given all the injuries? And after the break, we talk about Villarreal's ladies' team. Coach Sara Monforte has her charges at the top of their group, they've clinched a spot in the next promotion round, and they look awfully good candidates to go up. Raúl has been watching them in action and gives us his thoughts on their progress and the ladies' game in Spain. Endavant!! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices