Vietto and Aquino departures, Baptistao arrival confirmed; season ticket campaign launched

Some official confirmations today from Sr. Roig:  Most importantly, Luciano Vietto is now an Atletico Madrid player, after one season in yellow.  Leo Baptistao is arriving to sign his contract (loan deal with option to buy), and as for Javier Aquino, he will play again with Ike Uche, in Mexico with Tigres.

More to say about Vietto's time with us in another story, but as for Aquino, I suppose we can briefly summarize his time with us.  He was signed from Cruz Azul in January 2013, that busy midyear window when we quickly revamped a club that was at that time on the fringes of the Segunda promotion race.  While he played a role in our promotion, for sure, he never became the fixture in the lineup we hoped he would become; he played 12 matches in the Segunda in half a season, and in the 2013-14 season, while he appeared in 32 matches, he only played 90 minutes in 10 of them.

He clearly didn't fit into Villarreal's plans this season, and was loaned to Rayo Vallecano, where he played some (24 matches, but again, 90 minutes on few of them) and didn't make much impact.  Which sort of sums up his participation in Mexico's Copa America team as well.

Aquino scored two goals for us: one in the league, which I hardly remember (against Osasuna early in the 2013-14 season).  Much more memorable was his last-second strike against Elche in the Copa to earn us a 2-2 draw.

No terms with Tigres have been announced (I haven't seen figures for Uche's deal, either).  We wish him well as he returns home.

Season ticket campaign:  Yet again, Villarreal is the place to be if you love football. The new twist this year is a refinement of the club's VYP (Very Yellow People) program; depending on how many of the 29 home matches in all competitions you attended last season, you become a Gold, Silver or Bronze member of VYP and receive a discount on this year's ticket.

For a ground with a capacity of 25,000--and since we're excluding the covered area for visiting supporters from this campaign, more like 21,000--it's amazing how many different areas of the ground, with varying ticket prices, there are to choose from, much more than in American stadiums for instance.  For those of you who only know the ground from TV, generally the crowd shots are either at the ends or of fans in the "Preferencia" stand; the seats near the halfway line cost around $500 at most for a season ticket, so about $20 per match.  Hard to beat that.  Plus, you get free admission to Villarreal B and C matches, too.

One minor point to note is that there's no mention of the Colectivo Aldeano or other fan groups being placed in that corner where they've been the last couple of years.