Villarreal news: Bailly, Bruno, U-21 squad

Eric Bailly has returned from Africa and will officially be unveiled as a Villarreal player tomorrow.  He will be wearing number 24--at least, the official site has him listed in the first team with that number. Anyone remember who has worn that number for us in the past?

A very nice article about him on ESPN FC (h/t to Jens the Dane) gives a good assessment of his positives and areas where he still needs to improve.  I thought he was impressive inthe AFCON final, and it's interesting that pretty much everyone I've seen comment on the move thinks it was a good deal for us.

Bruno Soriano said today he will do what he can to get back to the team as soon as possible; he realized immediately he had a serious injury and was happy it was not worse.   Watching matches on TV of from the stands won't be fun, but 'it is what it is'.

Under 21's:

One curiosity in yesterday's match between our "U-21" side and Everton's--I guess each side is allowed to use one over-21 year-old player, though we haven't--is that Sylvain Distin, 37 years young and with nearly 700 career appearances, played for Everton's side.  Here is a nice article in the Liverpool Echo about the match.  I've always liked Distin; anyone who can take to twitter to announce his retirement from international soccer, having exactly zero caps at the time, and have no regrets about that deserves some respect.

Celtic drew with Everton 1-1, beat us 1-0 and defeated Sunderland 2-1; they have qualified for the next round.

Everton are on one point from two matches with 2 goals scored, 3 allowed;  Villarreal have four points, but only 2 goals scored and 2 allowed.  So if Everton win, even by 1-0, they will go through to the next phase.

Sunderland have one point from two matches, 1 goal scored and 2 allowed; if they win 1-0, then they are even with us, and I don't know what happens then.  If they win by more than one goal, or if they win 2-1, they go through.

Villarreal progress if the match ends in a draw.