Bon dia, groguets! Villarreal ticket sales are proceeding along briskly (in spite of some rain in Vila-real today) but I thought I would catch us up on some lower division news and some financial issues.
As I posted in a comment thread, UD Salamanca has gone under. Most recently, they played in the Segunda B, but had some seasons in the Primera back in the 1990's. They've been in bankruptcy since 2011, and the creditors finally decided their chances of getting some money back are better if they force a sale of the club's assets--including a 17,000 seat stadium, and the 'himno official' (valued at €25,000, in case you're interested). Probably someone will step forward and form another club to play in the town, but it will have to start life in the regional leagues.
The playoffs for promotion from the Tercera to the Segunda B are well underway, but to be honest even teams that crashed out of them could still move up. Castellón, for instance, lost their first round playoff, but is hoping to be able to buy a place--literally--in the Segunda B:
La posible plaza que deje el Ontinyent, opción más factible - Deportes - El Periódico Mediterraneo
It's complicated, to say the least, but they may be able to do it. Of course, Castellón are not in great financial shape themselves!!
Phil Ball visited the Canary Islands not too long ago and provided this picture of a small Spanish team--a long way away from Barcelona or Madrid, isn't it! As Phil says, sometimes we need to remember the roots of the game.
http://espnfc.com/columns/story/_/id/1395277/ball:-the-canary-chronicles?cc=5901
I did not realize his son was in the Real Sociedad cantera!
Meanwhile, at the top level, the gap between the big two and the rest of the league continues to grow. How wonderful then to read that the new league president believes TV revenue splits like those in Germany or England would be "too egalitarian". And check out that photo of him accompanying this story--he's a Spanish Herman Munster! Scary.
Tebas no está de acuerdo con el reparto televisivo inglés o alemán porque "es demasiado igualitario"
In order to acquire players without actually having any money, some clubs (Sevilla, Gijon, Atleti, Zaragoza, etc.) have turned to investment funds, of which the Doyen Group has become most notorious, with players like Falcao having little to no say in where they ultimately move. EL PAIS has an excellent story on this here:
Investment funds alter playing field | In English | EL PAÍS
Why am I not surprised that UEFA wishes to ban third-party ownership (for perfectly good reasons, in my view) but Spain has virtually no rules regarding it?