Espanyol is no exception. All the First and Second teams have barely any preparation margin in this express course start that will start on the 12th. However, in the case of the richest club in the Second Division, it is aggravated by the profound changes that the squad must undergo, the absence of important players in the preseason games and that today the average age of the group is the second lowest in category.
Footballers like RdT or Sergi Darder, in the market but still without concrete proposals, they have not been able to play minutes this preseason. And other players like Adrian Embarba They also did not act in the previous match against Cádiz by reducing the pace of training. The latter is expected to be against Málaga this Wednesday, although it will have barely been shot before the start of the course. Marc Roca, also absent on Sunday, he flew to Barcelona this Tuesday to undergo a routine examination already scheduled with the doctor Ramon Cugat.
To these conditions, which Vicente Moreno accepts naturally, he adds that the squad is currently the second with the lowest average age in the category, and that it has veterans like Diego López, who will turn 39 in November. The average age of Espanyol is 26 years, only lowered by the 25.4 of Mirandés. The leader of this longevity classification is Sabadell, with 29.
Vicente Moreno's team only has five players who are over thirty. It is, apart from the Galician goalkeeper, Oier Olazábal, Dídac Vilà, Fran Mérida and David López. Although the sports management wants to provide him with experience in the silver category, it is not expected that players who exceed those ages will arrive, so the parakeet team could be one of the youngest in the category. That does not exempt its objective: to upgrade.