Last update 27 April, 2014 by Alberto Llopis
Paco Jémez led Rayo Vallecano to the best classification in its history in First Division last season. Yes embargo, for much of this, the technician has been in the trigger for something as difficult as it is rare in the times in which we live, go all the way for an idea.
How we do not like to be truthful, It must be said ahead that whoever writes to them, He thought that Paco Jémez was sinking the Vallecano team to the bottom of the table for wanting to defend a football concept that perhaps was not the ideal one for one of the teams with the lowest budget in the category, one of the things that are usually coined when a professional soccer team does not play well. The truth is that last season he received praise and this one sticks that in the end, have had to turn into praise. It sounds confusing but it makes sense.
El Rayo, he was one of the best in terms of play and also in the qualifying table where the Vallecas team got an eighth place that gave it to European competition. A place that the UEFA European alter ego of FIFA (that body that removes and puts sanctions according to the name of the team) annulled like that of Malaga, as the Rayista team was in Bankruptcy Law and that led to the entry of Sevilla as ninth classified.
With the arrival of the summer of 2013, the good season of the rayista team had not gone unnoticed and suffered the loss of its greatest props. Players like Leo Baptistao, Chori Domínguez, Piti, Married or Javi Fuego left Vallecas. For a team like Rayo, that could be a fatal blow, as it seemed to be during practically the entire season until the final stretch of the same.
El Rayo, with the same system as last year but a different player base, seemed to be shipwrecked and to walk towards the descent irrevocably. With a game, described as almost suicidal and always trying to get out with the ball under control and playing, lightning, they became the most goalscorer team in the League, losing game after game.
Fortunately for the faithful and spirited followers who flock to Vallecas, the club believed in their coach and did not dismiss him as is often the case in these cases and more so when the issue was almost a popular clamor. The technician always defended his idea and in the end he got his way. Jeméz himself said at a press conference that his idea was that and that he would not change what will happen will happen.
And what has happened is that Rayo is the fittest team in the last stretch of the season. In the middle of February, in the day 24, the Ray was the third to last in the table with 20 points. On the day 35, just two months later, the vallecano team is ninth with 43 points. While teams like Elche, health, Valladolid or Granada have added little more than 10 points and others like Getafe or Betis, just 7-8, Jémez's team has done 23, more points than in the entire first and part of the second round. A few numbers only within reach of the first three.
With the equipment saved comfortably, perhaps the time has come to close many mouths and recognize the triumph of perseverance and above all of the conviction of an idea. You can die or succeed for an idea but if you reach the end by believing in it, there is no other choice but to take off your hat, something that Jémez has achieved at least for those who write to them.
