Even though they won’t win LaLiga, you must watch Girona،
Looking at the five major European leagues, you might have been tempted to think that Girona is part of a pattern. What do I mean? Well, the lesser known of Catalonia’s three important clubs are top of La Liga, while Tottenham Hotspur were first in England, Bayer Leverkusen set the tone in the Bundesliga and Nice look down on the scum of France. League 1.
At a glance, it’s an endorphin rush for any fan who’s tired of football’s status quo and yearns for the underdog to bark, snarl and maybe even win “best in show” from time to time. Spurs have not won a league title since 1961, a 62-year streak of struggle and conflict. Nice’s drought in Ligue 1 dates back 64 years, until 1959, while Leverkusen have never been German champions.
Despite this, Girona remains ultra-outlier and doesn’t even fit into that unusual group of table toppers this season. Much smaller than neighboring clubs Barcelona and Espanyol, they have a tiny pitch (capacity of 14,000), a tiny budget (55 million euros last season) and a cupboard to even smaller trophies.
– Stream on ESPN+: LaLiga, Bundesliga, more (US)
Let’s compare again: Spurs have 24 major trophies, including various UEFA competitions, and they were Champions League runners-up only four years ago. Nice have eight major trophies – including four-time French champions – and were runners-up in the Coupe de France as recently as 2022. Bayer Leverkusen could well be considered Germany’s perpetual bridesmaids, finishing eight times runners-up in the Bundesliga or cup, but they have one European trophy as well as two other major pieces of silverware and one Champions League final appearance in their history.
Girona simply don’t know what it’s like to win a major trophy of any kind.
Please note: the few victories in the third or fourth Spanish division do not count here. No chance. In fact, their promotion in 2017 was the first time in the club’s history, having been established in 1930, when The Albirrojos actually participated in La Liga. They have never come close to qualifying for European competitions and must hold back a nosebleed given their dizzying position at the top, two points ahead of Madrid and four ahead of champions Barcelona after 12 games.
When it comes to Spain’s Copa del Rey, this club from the upscale, quiet northeastern part of Catalonia, about an hour’s drive from Barcelona, has never made it past the quarter-final stage. So what the hell are they doing at the top of the Spanish Primera Division?
The first thing to tell you is: always watch Girona. They are a real roller coaster ride – always on offense with seemingly very little commitment on defense, with an exciting style and swagger in equal measure. In short: they’re fun. Really good fun.
Míchel’s team scored more than Madrid or Barcelona, by six and five goals respectively. If you had looked at every The Whites Or Blaugrana In a league match this season you would have seen a total of 31 or 36 goals respectively. Girona, the hosts, can scoff at these statistics, scoring 29 times and conceding 15. So watching Girona has, so far, been a 44-goal feast.
In quick comparison, Spurs’ matches have seen 36 goals, OGC Nice only 17 (remarkably they have only conceded four times in Ligue 1) and Leverkusen 40. However, Xabi Alonso’s side, Like Spurs, might have also taught Girona a thing or two about defending, having conceded just 10 themselves.
Girona’s great achievement is not that they are first at the moment — they won’t win the title and it would be a minor miracle if they manage to finish in the top four — but that the whole thing is much more greater than the sum. pieces. There is not a single player under Michel’s leadership that could be considered world class. Among their team’s standout footballers, 26-year-old Aleix García, who had the season of his life in central midfield, has no Spanish cap or team and failed to qualify for Manchester City (City Football Group, or CFG, are majority shareholders in Girona.)
Next comes – at least arguably – Sávio Moreira de Oliveira, sometimes nicknamed Savinho, a sublimely talented 19-year-old Brazilian who didn’t even make his national team rosters and was playing Dutch second division football for Jong. PSV (the club’s Eredivisie youth team) last season.
Daley Blind, 33, has been around the block many times, but his lack of pace is painfully evident and at times this season the same can be said for his sharpness. Goalkeeper Paulo Gazzaniga may be from World Cup-winning Argentina, but he has only played one friendly with them, is at the seventh club in his 12-year career and, in recent weeks, did not seem the strongest.
I could go on; What about Yangel Herrera, the Venezuelan international who was under contract at Manchester City for five years and didn’t play once for Pep Guardiola’s team? Or defender Eric García, on loan from Barcelona this summer, or club captain David López, 34, who I imagine Espanyol thought was over the hill a few seasons ago when they got him let go on a free transfer to newly promoted Girona. .
You understand my point. Without naming the full team, you can see that Girona have somehow managed to concoct a stew using many of the ingredients that other clubs, other football directors and many international coaches were thinking of very little. There is enormous merit in this, and the credit goes to Girona’s intelligent and patient sporting director, Enrique “Quique” Carcel. He has been at the club for almost 10 seasons, overseeing five promotion playoffs and two promotions, as well as the only four seasons Girona have spent in Spain’s top division. They know they have a diamond on their team and that his contract runs until 2027.
What about the coach who managed to convince more than the sum of his patchwork team’s parts? And faces a group of essential players, including his best, Oriol Romeu, who left last summer? Known as Michel, his real name is Miguel Ángel Sánchez Muñoz. As a small midfielder, he was a legend of the game at Rayo Vallecano.
Why should you like it? Well, his total commitment to daring, to attacking football on the one hand, and that works too. Exactly two years ago, Girona was fourth in the second division: today, it is at the top of the ranking.
That’s not to say that Michel wouldn’t like his team to concede fewer times or sign better defenders and goalkeepers. He would. But he also has to work with a restrictive budget that two years ago was just €14 million, and fits brilliantly with the work Carcel is doing to spot and persuade talent that other clubs ignore to join us. “I want to empower and develop my players, not minimize risk when we play” is one of his delicious refrains.
Another welcome revelation is that when Girona were struggling with relegation two years ago, the CFG sent Michel a direct message saying that “all their data was telling them that the football we were playing was good enough to get us a promotion and that in no way was it. I have to compromise or change anything. How much would the majority of coaches give not only for this firmness of support, but also for this absolute clarity of vision and analysis from those who own or manage their club?
A few other names deserve your attention, but they are not ones that will entertain you when you tune in or, better yet, visit the Montilivi Stadium.
Pep Guardiola’s younger brother Pere is a shareholder at Girona and helped secure Ukrainian fantasy international Viktor Tsygankov just under a year ago. Heading into his 50th international cap, the left-footed midfielder was at the end of his contract with Dinamo Kyiv and clubs were lining up to try to snap him up for free. Instead, Guardiola persuaded Tsygankov that Girona wanted him, not just a good deal, that they wanted it immediately and were willing to pay Dinamo rather than rob them at the end of the season. Deal done. He is pure class. The club spent €5m in transfer fees to bring in Tsygankov and calculated, even then, that he was worth six or seven times that.
Finally, Girona’s board has a bit of shine in that Bolivian-American Claure, one of David Beckham’s original partners in building the Inter Miami franchise, is a shareholder.
This is not a column to over-praise or over-project their efforts: after all, I’m sure they won’t keep pace with Madrid, Barcelona, Atletico Madrid or Real Sociedad over the course of a long season and exhausting. Instead, Girona will have put in a magnificent performance if, by June, they manage to turn their exceptional start into debut form in European football.
Their budget will thank them too, but what is essential to emphasize here is: always, always keep an eye on Girona if you can. They will reward you for it.
