THE 2020/21 LA LIGA SEASON- WHAT CAN WE EXPECT FROM IT?
The new La Liga season is about to kick off from 12 September 2020, Saturday and is scheduled to conclude on 23 May 2021. This season of the Spanish top-division football league will be its ninetieth edition and predictably, goosebumps might arise amongst all fans, spectators and pundits cheering for their favourite sides on as the heat of the battle gets underway. The La Liga, which is also known as La Liga Santander due to sponsorship reasons, is one of the top five football leagues in Europe along with the English Premier League, German Bundesliga, Italian Serie A and French Ligue 1.
Although other leagues such as the Dutch Eredivisie and Portuguese Primeira Liga too come close to etching their name in the hallowed walls of the five mentioned above, they are still a ways to go before they are inducted into the elite club of top European football league competitions. The La Liga is surely one of the best football leagues in the world and there is no question regarding its authenticity and credibility. For a long period of time, top players from across the world have plied their trade in this football competition, as they do at the moment as well.
The ninetieth edition of the La Liga competition will see a total of 20 teams competing in it as always, which consist of seventeen sides which were already playing in the division and three teams which have been promoted from the La Liga 2 (which is also known as the Segunda Division.)
The teams which were demoted from the La Liga at the end of the 2019/20 season were Espanyol, Mallorca and Leganes, and these sides make way for Cadiz, Huesca and Elche who arrive freshly from success in the Segunda Division (or the second division football competition.)
WONDERFUL STADIUMS AT BEAUTIFUL GROUNDS- NEW AND OLD
The 2020/21 La Liga season will be played at some wonderful stadiums situated across Spain in beautiful territories. Some of the new grounds which will make an entrance into the elite hall of fame of La Liga stadiums are the Estadio Ramon de Carranza of Cadiz, Estadio Martinez Valero of Elche and Estadio El Alcoraz of Huesca. This grounds make an entry into the La Liga due to the fact that their host clubs have qualified into the top football competition in Spain after having achieved success in the La Liga 2 or Segunda Division.
While Cadiz were the winners of the La Liga 2 in the 2019/20 season, Huesca ended the season as runners up. Elche managed to qualify into the La Liga for the 2020/21 season by winning the playoffs and defeating close challengers Girona. The Estadio Ipurua of SD Eibar and Estadio Mendizorotzza of Deportivo Alaves are another couple of beautiful grounds situated in beautiful locales which have fewer capacities than most other grounds but have a clear charm of their own for sure. Playing at these grounds give the players plying their trade in the La Liga a distinctive feel of being extremely close to their supporters.
To go with these mid-scale or small-scale grounds, the vast expanses of the Camp Nou of FC Barcelona, the Wanda Metropolitano Stadium of Atletico Madrid, the Estadio Benito Villamarin of Real Betis and the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium of Real Madrid are always going to present themselves in the La Liga. However, the last of those remains under construction and there is still no update as to when it will be completed. After the lockdown was lifted on football, Real Madrid played out the remainder of their matches at the Alfredo Di Stefano Stadium and it looks that they are going to do the same in the new season as well, at least for some time.
THE LIONEL MESSI SITUATION AND THE FRACAS AT FC BARCELONA
After having established the fact that the defending champions Real Madrid might have to play out the majority of the 2020/21 La Liga season (what with the completion date of the works at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium being bandied about as June 2022), we need to turn our eyes towards the confusion and turmoil that is prevailing in the camps of their oldest and fiercest rivals, FC Barcelona. The disturbance that is at play at the club from the Catalonia region of Spain will not be welcome by new boss Ronald Koeman (formerly of Everton and the Netherlands) and there is no denying that he has to get his house in order before the new season begins or else the club’s troubles on the pitch may continue.
The biggest draw in the FC Barcelona issue at the moment is the presence (or rather, absence) of their captain Lionel Messi. When the great Argentine decided to give the pre-season RT-PCR test a miss recently, there were rumours abuzz that he has finally decided to move lock, stock and barrel from Spain. There have also been newspaper reports which have suggested that he has put in a transfer request to the club’s hierarchy but that a slight technical ordeal has not allowed him to make a move somewhere else yet.
English Premier League heavyweights Manchester City, who were in the news for winning the championship two times in a row in 2017/18 and 2018/19, have been the forerunners of getting Messi’s signature, but it remains to be seen what conclusion is drawn of this never-ending saga.
There have been other issues at FC Barcelona as well, and manager Koeman will be only too keen on settling them before the new season begins on 12 September 2020, Saturday. The likes of Luis Suarez and Arturo Vidal have been linked to moves away from the club, as has been the fulcrum of FC Barcelona’s midfield Ivan Rakitic, who has now decided on going back to his former club Sevilla FC. The Dutch manager has reportedly also said to left back Jordi Alba and centre back Gerard Pique that they are not needed in his squad anymore, and it remains to be seen if these players pursue moves elsewhere.
NEW MANAGERIAL CHANGES AND WHAT IT WILL DO THE BASIC PHILOSOPHY OF THE LA LIGA
Another thing which we need to keep an eye out for and enjoy watching in the 2020/21 La Liga season is the appointment of new managerial personnel. Apart from FC Barcelona’s Koeman, there have been changes at the top at other clubs too. While the most high-profile of these changes will certainly be the appointment of former Paris Saint Germain and Arsenal coach Unai Emery, who replaces Villarreal’s Javier Calleja, others are not too far behind either.
Javi Gracia was appointed as the manager of Valencia CF after former coach Voro saw through the end of his interim spell with elan and former Manchester City boss Manuel Pellegrini took over the reins at Real Betis after caretaker Alexis Trujillo was relieved of his temporary duties. Deportivo Alaves’ Juan Muniz refused to sign a new contract and was replaced by Pablo Machin at the helm at the Estadio Mendizorotzza. The most recent appointment in the La Liga was that of Jorge Almiron on 26 August 2020, who took over as the new manager of Elche after the incumbent Juan Pacheta resigned.
What these new managerial appointments will do is give a breath of fresh air to the La Liga, which has, more often than not, borne the allegation of being a league in which absolute power was concentrated only with the top three clubs- Real Madrid, FC Barcelona and Atletico Madrid. However, other top half clubs such as Valencia, Villarreal and Sevilla have improved their performances tremendously and the latter’s championship-winning show in the UEFA Europa League 2019/20 will have given a lot of hope to the fans of Spain’s top-flight football competition.
It will be an interesting time when managers of the calibre of Real Madrid’s Zinedine Zidane, Atletico Madrid’s Diego Simeone, FC Barcelona’s Koeman, Villarreal’s Emery and Real Betis’ Pellegrini clash against each other.
All of these individuals are top tacticians and their influence will be felt deeply across the La Liga when they make their presence felt. Interestingly, apart from Zidane and Simeone, all the managers mentioned above have had moderately successful spells in the English Premier League, and we expect some of that old hostility to come up on display for the fans, supporters, pundits, experts and football aficionados from across the world.
CONCLUSION: WHAT CAN BE EXPECTED FROM THE 2020/21 LA LIGA SEASON?
In conclusion, we can very confidently say that the upcoming season of the Spanish La Liga is going to be among the best we have seen in years. While defending champions Real Madrid will go into the competition as favourites and their closest rivals and challengers FC Barcelona look to sort out the mess in their house, we believe that the 2020/21 season will provide excellent opportunities to both youngsters and experienced players to come good and make a name for themselves. The fans can not wait for the season to begin!
