I seem to remember many saying that it was the Sevilla DOF (Monchi?) who was just as much behind Sevilla´s resurgence as Ramos. Theis article seems to contradict that - and what´s more it´s quite pleasing to read that we´re all the rage over there (most hadn´t heard of us last year). Anyway here´s the article:
http://football365.com/spanish_thing/0,17033,9405_3084101,00.html
Scintillating Spurs On Sevilla Minds...
Posted 28/01/08 11:10
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If it wasn't for the lack of rain and roastings you could almost mistake Madrid for Manchester these days. Especially if you have taken as many disco biscuits as Shaun Ryder.
That's because everything and anything English has suddenly become all the rage for Spain's coolest cats.
Everywhere you look, people are sporting jaunty Pete Doherty hats, yelling into mobile phones, binge drinking and crunching their credit cards like there's no tomorrow.
Everywhere you look, people are also watching English football.
For the sports-obsessed couch potatoes of Spain who prefer the rantings of Rooney to the magic of Messi, the past eight days have been one long televisual dream.
In just over a week, eight matches from the league, Carling Cup and the FA Cup were broadcast on two terrestrial channels. Even Falkirk v Celtic was available for those in the mood for something a little more left-field.
However, there was one match in particular that caught the attention of those with an eye on England. That match was Tottenham's midweek mauling of Arsene Wenger's vanquished.
If there was wailing and gnashing off teeth in the city of Seville on Tuesday night during Arsenal's Carling Cup calamity, it wasn't due to the mind-numbingly mediocre co-commentary of former Newcastle numbskull Marcelino, but the sight of Juande Ramos' supercharged Spurs side looking a bit like the Sevilla of old.
From the overlapping full-backs to the constant counter-attacks, the Tottenham performance displayed all the attributes that are lacking from today's Sevilla side - a side that is 'light years away from the old one,' according to former Zaragoza coach Víctor Fernández.
Although Sevilla recovered from the shakiest of starts against Arsenal in the Champions League to top their group, the side's domestic season in Spain has limped from tragedy to disaster.
Even the most Prozac-poppingly pessimistic of Sevilla fans could not have predicted such a dismal campaign for what had been one of the jewels of European football.
It is a campaign that sees Sevilla floundering in mid-table with ten defeats to their name and relying on the most controversial of injury-time penalties to give them am ill-tempered 2-1 weekend win over Osasuna.
Although they are still capable of playing the kind of football that has you clapping inanely like an overstimulated sea-lion, those moments are all too rare.
Instead their play this year lacks confidence, commitment but most importantly of all, concentration.
"We should be ashamed ourselves," admitted Luis Fabiano after a recent last-minute defeat to Getafe.
Spurs' revival under Ramos - which was inspired by the removal of a cake trolley from the White Hart Lane dressing room according to 'El Mundo' - has reminded Sevilla fans of what they have lost and more importantly how they lost it.
Sevilla's season started with the death of Antonio Puerta and some players say that the team has yet to recover from that tragic blow.
"We lost a team-mate who filled the dressing room with joy every morning. He left an enormous gap," claimed winger Diego Capel.
But this was a theory that Juande Ramos never espoused. Instead, he pointed the big finger of blame at his preening president José Maria del Nido, a man with the inability to stop bragging about the side's supposed all-round brilliance.
"Some people thought we were invincible," said Ramos after the Arsenal defeat - the kind of comment that caused the final, embittered break down in relations between the two men.
Although Ramos claims that his managerial move to London was a dream come true, his former agent Alvaro Torres argues that the Spaniard was well aware that Sevilla was on the slide and that it was time to jump ship before his stock fell faster than an Oxo cube lobbed off the Eiffel Tower.
"Juande told me that Sevilla were going to fall back. He had to leave before that happened," said Torres. "He wanted to go before things turned for the worse."
When Ramos 'betrayed the club for money' according to a still-miffed del Nido last week, the man chosen to take over the helm of the apparently-sinking ship was 'B' team coach and former club legend Manuel Jiménez.
Although Manolo offers enthusiastic arm-waving and whistling to the role, he is a coach out of his depth and is set to be replaced by Recreativo and Racing Santander miracle-maker Marcelino or Espanyol coach Ernesto Valverde in the summer.
Jiménez' Sevilla has lost the ability to grab pragmatic draws and has an away record that would see the club relegated.
As it stands, the Andalusian side are outside the European places, after the narrowest of 2-1 wins in a match that saw Osasuna coach, Ziganda, attempting to take on Sevilla's staff and being held back by the police.
With long-term injured Javi Navarro and Andrés Palop out of the side, Sevilla are also missing Freddie Kanouté and the impressive Seydou Keita on African Nations Cup duty.
So it has been left to the inconsistent but occasionally brilliant Manchester City target Luis Fabiano to carry them through this roughest of spells.
And his tally of 14 league goals in 14 games has meant that his team are avoiding the unseemly scrap for relegation that seems to involve just about everybody in the league.
However, the Brazilian's impressive performances cannot cover up the problems with a side that -cannot simply win matches with what we've done in the past,' according to Jiménez.
Del Nido's rather ugly attack on Juande Ramos - although not untypical of a lowlife lawyer whose clients have included former Atlético Madrid scumbag Jesus Gil - was met with raised eyebrows by Juande Ramos, whose name had faded from Spain's collective memory until his Spurs side popped up on the goggle-box.
"I don't want to go into a war with him, but it surprised me four months after I left," said Tottenham's titan to 'Marca'.
Sevilla's pumped-up president would do better to focus his-not-inconsiderable ire on his own side.
With a mass of mediocrity above them, there is still time for a run at the Champions League places, currently eight points above them.
And as one of the most exciting and exhilarating teams in the world, on their day, it is something of which they are more than capable
http://football365.com/spanish_thing/0,17033,9405_3084101,00.html
Scintillating Spurs On Sevilla Minds...
Posted 28/01/08 11:10
EmailPrintSave
If it wasn't for the lack of rain and roastings you could almost mistake Madrid for Manchester these days. Especially if you have taken as many disco biscuits as Shaun Ryder.
That's because everything and anything English has suddenly become all the rage for Spain's coolest cats.
Everywhere you look, people are sporting jaunty Pete Doherty hats, yelling into mobile phones, binge drinking and crunching their credit cards like there's no tomorrow.
Everywhere you look, people are also watching English football.
For the sports-obsessed couch potatoes of Spain who prefer the rantings of Rooney to the magic of Messi, the past eight days have been one long televisual dream.
In just over a week, eight matches from the league, Carling Cup and the FA Cup were broadcast on two terrestrial channels. Even Falkirk v Celtic was available for those in the mood for something a little more left-field.
However, there was one match in particular that caught the attention of those with an eye on England. That match was Tottenham's midweek mauling of Arsene Wenger's vanquished.
If there was wailing and gnashing off teeth in the city of Seville on Tuesday night during Arsenal's Carling Cup calamity, it wasn't due to the mind-numbingly mediocre co-commentary of former Newcastle numbskull Marcelino, but the sight of Juande Ramos' supercharged Spurs side looking a bit like the Sevilla of old.
From the overlapping full-backs to the constant counter-attacks, the Tottenham performance displayed all the attributes that are lacking from today's Sevilla side - a side that is 'light years away from the old one,' according to former Zaragoza coach Víctor Fernández.
Although Sevilla recovered from the shakiest of starts against Arsenal in the Champions League to top their group, the side's domestic season in Spain has limped from tragedy to disaster.
Even the most Prozac-poppingly pessimistic of Sevilla fans could not have predicted such a dismal campaign for what had been one of the jewels of European football.
It is a campaign that sees Sevilla floundering in mid-table with ten defeats to their name and relying on the most controversial of injury-time penalties to give them am ill-tempered 2-1 weekend win over Osasuna.
Although they are still capable of playing the kind of football that has you clapping inanely like an overstimulated sea-lion, those moments are all too rare.
Instead their play this year lacks confidence, commitment but most importantly of all, concentration.
"We should be ashamed ourselves," admitted Luis Fabiano after a recent last-minute defeat to Getafe.
Spurs' revival under Ramos - which was inspired by the removal of a cake trolley from the White Hart Lane dressing room according to 'El Mundo' - has reminded Sevilla fans of what they have lost and more importantly how they lost it.
Sevilla's season started with the death of Antonio Puerta and some players say that the team has yet to recover from that tragic blow.
"We lost a team-mate who filled the dressing room with joy every morning. He left an enormous gap," claimed winger Diego Capel.
But this was a theory that Juande Ramos never espoused. Instead, he pointed the big finger of blame at his preening president José Maria del Nido, a man with the inability to stop bragging about the side's supposed all-round brilliance.
"Some people thought we were invincible," said Ramos after the Arsenal defeat - the kind of comment that caused the final, embittered break down in relations between the two men.
Although Ramos claims that his managerial move to London was a dream come true, his former agent Alvaro Torres argues that the Spaniard was well aware that Sevilla was on the slide and that it was time to jump ship before his stock fell faster than an Oxo cube lobbed off the Eiffel Tower.
"Juande told me that Sevilla were going to fall back. He had to leave before that happened," said Torres. "He wanted to go before things turned for the worse."
When Ramos 'betrayed the club for money' according to a still-miffed del Nido last week, the man chosen to take over the helm of the apparently-sinking ship was 'B' team coach and former club legend Manuel Jiménez.
Although Manolo offers enthusiastic arm-waving and whistling to the role, he is a coach out of his depth and is set to be replaced by Recreativo and Racing Santander miracle-maker Marcelino or Espanyol coach Ernesto Valverde in the summer.
Jiménez' Sevilla has lost the ability to grab pragmatic draws and has an away record that would see the club relegated.
As it stands, the Andalusian side are outside the European places, after the narrowest of 2-1 wins in a match that saw Osasuna coach, Ziganda, attempting to take on Sevilla's staff and being held back by the police.
With long-term injured Javi Navarro and Andrés Palop out of the side, Sevilla are also missing Freddie Kanouté and the impressive Seydou Keita on African Nations Cup duty.
So it has been left to the inconsistent but occasionally brilliant Manchester City target Luis Fabiano to carry them through this roughest of spells.
And his tally of 14 league goals in 14 games has meant that his team are avoiding the unseemly scrap for relegation that seems to involve just about everybody in the league.
However, the Brazilian's impressive performances cannot cover up the problems with a side that -cannot simply win matches with what we've done in the past,' according to Jiménez.
Del Nido's rather ugly attack on Juande Ramos - although not untypical of a lowlife lawyer whose clients have included former Atlético Madrid scumbag Jesus Gil - was met with raised eyebrows by Juande Ramos, whose name had faded from Spain's collective memory until his Spurs side popped up on the goggle-box.
"I don't want to go into a war with him, but it surprised me four months after I left," said Tottenham's titan to 'Marca'.
Sevilla's pumped-up president would do better to focus his-not-inconsiderable ire on his own side.
With a mass of mediocrity above them, there is still time for a run at the Champions League places, currently eight points above them.
And as one of the most exciting and exhilarating teams in the world, on their day, it is something of which they are more than capable
