Premiera Liga Reaction: Valverde Feels Derby Delight
Ernesto Valverde dedicated RCD Espanyol's stunning derby victory against FC Barcelona to the club's supporters, who revelled in beating their city rivals.
Goals from Luis GarcÃa, Raúl Tamudo and Rufete gave los Periquitos a 3-1 victory in Montjuïc and ended Barça's run of four consecutive wins at the stadium.
"We are happy for our supporters because this was a true derby and they responded to all the expectations," Valverde explained.
"The result was justified, although I actually believe that we could have score more goals.
"I believe that the key to the game was my team's reaction after Barcelona drew level. We had to start over again having had everything going in our favour and I think we did that very quickly.
"We had some bad moments from the tenth minute on as we found it quite difficult to create chances until we finally found a way through."
Despite leading with five minutes of injury time remaining, Valverde believes that Rufete's late third goal was crucial.
"At 2-1 we were doing things well, but we had to still be careful because knew that Barcelona still had a chance to do something," he said, before going on to praise the fans.
"They were spectacular and supported us all the way through. They have become somewhat accustomed to suffering and today they were able to feel real joy."
Xtrider
a-Lost-9uY
its a Derby
SexyChin
Barcelona had lost considerable form after the world club championship. They have not won a single Primera Division since returning from Japan. No freaking idea what had happened to them, but I am hoping for them to continue the form for some time.
stellazio
its quite a known fact that world club championships destroys a team's momentum.
Agenda
Originally posted by stellazio:
its quite a known fact that world club championships destroys a team's momentum.
What with all the Jap girls you bonk every night?
ghimpheng
they are missing Messi (the lion) and Eto (the monkey)
and Frank.R dun like to use saviola and they lack a finisher
gujohnsen is more a midfielder than striker as in chelsea under jose he was converted to OMF instead of remaining as striker
so barcelona is now in crisis thank to Frank.R who refuse to use saviola @ the starting line up even though he a really good player who score twice in the spanish copa del rey and against espanyol only goal after coming on as a sub
Saviola goal scoring record has been great and have been an excellent player for any club why don't barcelona use him instead of keep loaning him off to other clubs
he is already a proven goal scorer
i think Frank.R or the barcelona management got some biasness against saviola or something