Espanyol-Athletic

Oh, bugger. I had a nice long post with news about the match tomorrow and one wrong click and it's gone.

Basically Gorka Iraizoz is coming back to Espanyol tomorrow as Athletic's goalkeeper. Espanyol's goalkeeper for the past five years has some mixed feelings, saying that he never expected to play against Espanyol and that it is surreal.

Luis Garcia has come out against rotation, but reminded the public it was the coach's decision. He felt fit enough to play every game, and said that the ultimate goal was to play for the team's benefit. He's been receiving some attention for the Premiership as well, with Sport claiming his agent has been receiving calls from the Premiership about the Asturian forward.

And it's one year to the day until Espanyol's new ground at Cornella-El Prat is completed. Three years ago, president Daniel Sanchez Llibre exhorted the workers to "Start, already!" as they began building a replacement for the club's beloved Sarria. The new ground, costing a pretty modest sum of 53 million euros, will seat 40,000 and the club are looking at securing UEFA 4-star status, allowing the new ground to host UEFA Cup finals (perhaps ones involving Espanyol?). Despite Llibre and fans unofficially calling the ground Nou Sarria, a sponsor will pay for the ground's name to help offset costs. The club expect to begin playing at the Nou Sarria in January 2009.

Finally, tomorrow's game is at 4 p.m. UK time, and is not on Sky. If the wonders of the Internet cannot find a picture, Marca has the best text commentary, in your author's opinion.

The buildup to Espanyol-Athletic

Tomorrow at 4 p.m. in the UK (8 a.m. in the USA), Espanyol are home to Athletic Bilbao. Athletic are doing better than they did last year and are sitting in 12th with 13 points. One of the subplots to this game is the return of Gorka Iraizoz, the former Espanyol goalkeeper who is now with Athletic.

"It's different, special, rare.... I am going to play against my former club who I played with for five years, so for me it is a very special game. For me it is surreal, because I never imagined playing there."

Marca link (in Spanish)


In other news, Luis Garcia has reminded people that he has never played for Liverpool by publicly opposing a rotation system.

Today, Luis Garcia talked about rotations and the overloaded calendar. The forward is not in favor of them but clarified that it is the coach's decision to rest players. "Personally, I don't like the rotations. I'm fit and I only hope that I don't get injured, so that I can give the maximum for Espanyol and help the team, said Luis Garcia, that he is the fourth player of the group that more minutes has disputed and that it has not been affected by the changes in the alignments of the technician, Ernesto Valverde.

El Mundo Deportivo link (in Spanish)



The new stadium at Cornellá de Llobregat y el Prat de Llobregat is also getting on, with Espanyol confirming that one year from now, the new stadium will be completed. Three years ago, Daniel Sanchez Llibre told workers: "You can begin, already," and the first piece of earth was dug for a new home for the club to replace the beloved Sarria. Espanyol have spent 53 million euros building the new ground (which is not a lot of money - so either good value for money or it'll be a spartan ground) and will be looking for a sponsor to pay for the stadium's name, although Llibre and fans have unofficially called it the Nou Sarria. Capacity will be around 40,000, leaving open the possibility of Espanyol hosting UEFA Cup finals in the futre and Spanish international games.