The Asturian coach expects an intense and highly demanding match against Deportivo Alavés (Friday, 9pm CET)

Villarreal CF head coach Marcelino García Toral spoke to the media this Thursday to analyse the build-up to the match against Deportivo Alavés, corresponding to Matchday 28 of LALIGA EA Sports, which will be played this Friday at 9pm CEST at Mendizorroza.

It is a venue of maximum difficulty for Villarreal CF, where the Yellow Submarine have traditionally found it hard to come away with a win. “It’s a very tough ground. The club has never had it easy there and neither have we as a coaching staff. They’re a very intense team and it’s a stadium where the fans push a lot. There are many second balls. I think all those factors make it a very difficult place for everyone,” the Asturian coach explained.

When analysing the opponent, Marcelino predicted a very demanding match: “We expect a very tough game because they have a lot at stake. They have changed manager and that makes our analysis more difficult. With Quique Sánchez Flores, they’ve changed their structure. They defend with five at the back and we believe they will be a more direct team. Quique is a coach who organises his teams well and gets good performances in difficult contexts.”

Despite the challenge, the Yellow Submarine coach highlighted that the team arrives in a good moment to face the match: “We’ve had five days of rest. That’s enough time. We come into the game after winning and showing good moments of football, although there were many others we didn’t like. We must find the consistency we lacked against Elche and in previous matches.”

Finally, regarding the team’s objective, Marcelino insists on focusing only on themselves: “We’re not thinking about our rivals. We only want to focus on ourselves. Strengthen what we do well and improve the things we don’t do so well. We only have 11 efforts left. That’s very few. Having played in the Champions League, we have 54 points, which is an incredible amount and a big advantage over teams such as Betis, Celta, Athletic, Real Sociedad, Sevilla or Valencia. That highlights the great season we’re having, competing with Atlético de Madrid. That’s more than enough motivation to focus on ourselves and tackle every match with maximum ambition and desire to win.”

Below, you can watch Marcelino’s full pre-match press conference ahead of the game against Deportivo Alavés: