The Mini Submarine head coach underlines the importance of getting something from La Romareda (Saturday, 4:15pm CEST) against Real Zaragoza
Villarreal B head coach Miguel Álvarez appeared in front of the press ahead of the match against Real Zaragoza, corresponding to Matchday 11 of the 2022/23 LaLiga SmartBank season, which will take place this Saturday at 4:15pm CEST at La Romareda. Here are the key points he had to make:
A marathon of matches
“It’s what we get in the second tier. We have to get used to it. We’ve also been lucky not to have to travel during the week. They had to come back from Santander. We’re going to compete with the greatest enthusiasm. We always make changes; the other day we made five. The team is fine.”
Exceeding expectations
“We are above expectations. We now have 13 points, although we don’t have more due to a lack of consistency. It’s nothing new. It happens every year because we have a lot of young people. There is a process and mistakes are part of that learning process. We lack consistency without the ball, but it’s crazy that we’re the top scorers in the second division. The lads have very much internalised what they have to work on and what our areas for improvement are.”
The opposition
“Carcedo’s teams are very hard-working. We saw that with Ibiza. They are a very hard-working team with a lot of intensity, but, as they say, goals are love. We’re expecting a full house and we’re going to enjoy the game.”
Travelling fans
“We want to thank the people who are travelling to Zaragoza because it will be one of the first times that people have come to help us except in the promotion play-offs. We are very happy and we thank them.”
Winning to gain momentum
“The most important challenge is to win away. It’s true that we won in Santander and drew in Málaga and we have good numbers for a reserve team, but we are demanding and we have to be more competitive away without the ball, on the ball, at set-pieces, etc. That will give us consistency as a team and them individually for professional football. It would be an incredible boost to win in Zaragoza, but also in terms of scoring because we’re not always going to score at home. We have to gain in football consistency and make things difficult for the opposition for 95 minutes. I want to hear the same as last year that we don’t look like a reserve team.”
