Admittedly we're sitting here 3000+ miles away and trying to read the tea leaves, but what is known is that Srs. Roig and Riog Negueroles met with Garrido after the match, the three of them the last to board the plane for the flight home, and the three of them sped off again once in Valencia.
The official site reports Garrido was disappointed, Borja upset, Cani angry, and none of them could explain the loss. Today Diego Lopez has come out saying "we're behind the coach". Yes, but...
General agreement among Villarreal twitterati, journalists and pretty much anyone watching the game that Garrido's substitutions--both the choice of players and their timing--were gamechangers, and not as the coach intended. For example:
Garrido tomó decisiones horribles - Deportes - El Periódico Mediterraneo
The main criticisms are:
Removing Cani immediately after he had set up our goal (and right after a five-minute spell where he had created several other attacks) made no sense. Camuñas was the logical player to go off, not Cani. (Castellani was a surprising choice, but to be fair he did well--but he would've slotted better into the Camuñas role anyway). But in any case, we had the momentum--why change things? Cani seemed fit enough, Garrido could've taken him off 5 or 10 minutes later if need be.
Bringing on Gonzalo for Senna was questionable anyway, but in any case why do it before Osasuna took a corner? It's a basic "rule" that you don't make substitutions when facing a corner kick--your defense can get confused by the change and its effect on responsibilities, and it also takes away focus from the corner. Surely it would've been better to have let the corner play out and then bring Gonzalo on very late to kill off some time.
We take three strikers to a road game and basically use one of them. Why call up Joselu, weakening the B team, if you're not going to use him? Yes, Nilmar is struggling to get game fitness, but bringing him on for five minutes at the end of a match was ridiculous. At that point Osasuna was killing time and he had no chance to make an impact.
Finally, in spite of the good play, it's still clear that Villarreal under Garrido lacks punch. We have 37 goals in 38 league matches in calendar 2011, the lowest of all. Even Racing had 38.
There is general agreement that if we didn't have a cup match this Wednesday, Garrido would be gone, though Adrian Ripollés wonders if the economic tough times aren't contributing to the reluctance to change coaches:
futvillarreal: Sin dinero no hay paraíso
Yes, in the old days probably Garrido would have been gone by now and replaced by someone like Benitez; then again, in the "old days" (circa five years ago!!) we would have signed a Vargas or someone like that too. Clearly, the economic situation has changed, and money is tighter. But that makes staying in the Primera more critical than ever.
In other news, our poll seems to suggest Nilmar will be on his way to Roma--at least that's what his agent says, and when have we ever known an agent to be wrong. Not sure why Borja is getting so many votes--his departure would surely condemn us, wouldn't it?
And Villarreal has a new official website, so change your bookmarks to http://www.villarrealcf.es/
The new site has some new features (and is available in Chinese!) but I have to admit I haven't had time to look closely at it yet. It's getting nice comments on twitter, though. Endavant Villarreal!!