From Miranda to Mirandilla

From Vilhena to Negredo. Espanyol was trying to drown their sorrows in the Cup –and beyond, like the defeat against Elche in Cornellà– with an unexpected signing, that of Tonny Vilhena, when the person in charge of that plot, Rufete, appeared to him in the New Mirandilla one of his reinforcements from the past. From Valencia, specifically. Negredo, his addition to the Ché team eight years ago, materialized the equalizing goal for Cádiz at his current 36 and started the play for the second, and they even annulled two others. The personalization of a game that was going to be a walk for a Espanyol that forgave and ended up bordering on drama.

RdT to Anduva. Because last night there were not a few who remembered that turning point last season in the Second Division, when Nico Melamed scored that goal against Mirandés as little celebrated as it was ultimately invaluable for promotion. A turning point in Anduva, Miranda de Ebro. This time, in the Nuevo Mirandilla, it was Raúl de Tomás, who else, the one who, in the last action of the match, in minute 95, saved the furniture of an Espanyol team that started Sailing with the wind in favor, he was literally one second away from being shipwrecked and finally reached the shore, although between nausea. Not even with a win. It was a tie. Time, even with the fearsome calendar ahead, will tell if after spilling the Cup, this bittersweet Cup of self-esteem at the last breath will be of any use.

the everlasting mistakes. The great sin of Espanyol is not only living with their backs to the fact that the rival also plays, and therefore must translate their minutes of superiority into goals, but it is precisely due to falling again and again into the same mistakes. In moments of absolute disconnection, such as those that caused the equalizer, in which everyone made a mistake in defense, from left to right and in unison, as if it were the line of a foosball table triggered by someone without too many reflexes. How to grant the second already in the addition of the second part. Like giving away the domain, also the occasions, of a match in which he had everything in his favor. How to ensure that, with very little – as happened against Elche – any rival can overcome it.

The soccer of the soccer players. ‘Whoever is against Cádiz is against humanity’ reads the mural that connects the changing room tunnel with the Nuevo Mirandilla lawn. Something similar could be said about good football, touch, quality and talented players. Like the midfielders that proliferate in Espanyol – as if there were few, Vilhena now arrives – and that, from time to time, sometimes very occasionally, coincide on a pitch, and football sprouts. Morlanes, Darder and Melendo make up a magical triangle that only took ten minutes to bear fruit. In a combinative and intelligent action. Waiting for the moment of the break, the pass with the outside, the unchecking and the definition.

Who forgives… Espanyol dominated in the first half with unsuspected levels of possession, unprecedented not only at home – where they had only won one game, the one on New Year’s Eve at Mestalla – but even in Cornellà. And prolific at times. Vicente Moreno, determined to keep the secret of a call until the end that half of Barcelona and part of Cádiz already knew about a few hours before the match, did keep the secret of his line-up: good sense. He banished the innocuous and almost anarchic 4-4-2 of recent days to return to 4-2-3-1 (or 4-1-4-1), to convert the need for the losses of Pedrosa, Dídac and Keidi Bare , and to thus surpass Sergio González in the midfield. In fact, it overwhelmed him until he could rectify the break. And that was where he realized that maxim that he who forgives pays for it.

Sergio and Calero. The coach from L’Hospitalet and emblem of Espanyol did not enjoy his dream debut at the Nuevo Mirandilla, and that he managed to touch it with his fingertips. He has plenty of capacity to straighten out the situation of Cádiz, the club that took the cat to the water of his signing, although other Primeras claimed him before this season. The same know-how that he showed in his day at Valladolid, where he gave free rein to the best Fernando Calero, who earned him a pass to Espanyol for eight million. Even with chiaroscuro, the center-back achieved in his reunion with Sergio something very complicated when his minutes are like Guadiana, which come and go: to be providential, as in a Lozano shot blockade a scant meter from the goal. And he aims to start on Friday, against Betis, after Cabrera saw the fifth yellow card. Oh, Betis!