It’s been several years now since Valencia CF experienced a huge decline… Third-placed club in the Spanish league in the late 90s and early 2000s, the club then experienced a terrible financial crisis, and logically lost its sporting glory, still managing to stay in the top half of the table and seeing players like David Villa, David Silva and Juan Mata pass through its ranks. On the verge of disappearing in the late 2010s, the club thought it had found its saviour when Peter Lim, a Singaporean entrepreneur known in the world of Formula 1 and close to Jorge Mendes, bought the club in 2014. Things had actually started off rather well, since during the 2014/2015 season, Valencia managed to finish in fourth position and therefore returned to the Champions League the following season.
At the start of the Lim era, investments had been substantial and full of hope. Large sums had been invested in players such as Rodrigo Moreno, Alvaro Negredo, Enzo Pérez, André Gomes and João Cancelo, a sign that there was a desire to implement an ambitious project. Enough to suggest a golden era for Mestalla? Unfortunately, things quickly turned sour. Lim suddenly stopped putting his hand in his pocket, gradually sold his best players and the squad lost quality year after year. With some lunar episodes to follow, such as the departure of Marcelino, who was criticized for… winning the Copa del Rey in 2019, when the management had told him to drop the competition and focus on La Liga.
Lim, public enemy number 1
Weekend after weekend, fans are mobilizing to demand the departure of Lim, who no longer sets foot in Valencia, although he continues to manage the club from Singapore. Management is perhaps a bit of an overstatement, since it is mainly Jorge Corona, the sporting director, who seems to be steering the ship as best he can. However, he must wait for Lim’s validation for each decision on the transfer window, and has sometimes had to wait several days before getting the green light from his boss to recruit… Huge crowds are therefore gathering to demand that the Singaporean sell the club as quickly as possible, but the latter clearly has no intention of submitting to the will of the fans. He is also criticized for not speeding up the paralyzed work on the Nou Mestalla, the new stadium that the club has been waiting for for over a decade now. Because of him, Valencia, the third largest city in Spain in terms of inhabitants, should not have a stadium for the 2030 World Cup.
An untenable institutional situation that led to another disastrous summer transfer window. In total, the club spent… 1.35 million euros, recruiting players from the Spanish second division, such as Dani Gomez or German Valera or Maximiliano Caufriez from Clermont. Since 2020, Valencia has only spent 36 million euros, while more than 200 million euros have been obtained by selling players, as indicated Relevo. Suffice to say that it is no coincidence that, after four days, the club is already bottom of La Liga with just one point taken. And there is clearly little reason to be optimistic for the future. Clearly, the shadow of relegation already narrowly avoided during the 2022/2023 season hangs more than ever over Mestalla.
Training, the club’s only hope
A very light squad, and which is carried by several young players trained at the club and Ruben Baraja, coach and old glory of the club. It must be said that the former midfielder can rely on several players trained at the club already performing, like the goalkeeper Giorgi Mamardashvili who signed with Liverpool for next summer, the midfielder Javi Guerra, the central defender Christian Mosquera or the winger Diego Lopez, among others. Young people who were given responsibility very early and who produced a superb second half of the season last year, surrounded by some good picks like the Portuguese midfielder André Almeida or the striker Hugo Duro.
“The players carry this club, without investment, we can’t do much more”Baraja summed it up well a few days ago. Clearly, if the club’s training center wasn’t so efficient, the Ches would probably have already been relegated to the second division. A tragic fate that remains inevitable in any case if there is no change in the situation in the coming months. After the break, the schedule that awaits the Murcielagos is also very complicated, with a match against Atlético de Madrid for the restart and then a trip to Girona. Suffice to say that the supporters can pray, and hope that the club’s young guard can achieve a new miracle…
