La Liga relegation battle: Jornada 32 weekend

Many important matches this weekend, of course, though Girona-Villarreal is the only one that actually has two of the bottom seven playing each other.

Saturday:

Huesca—Barcelona Barca will be rotating heavily here, and Luis Suarez and Gerard Piqué are suspended anyway. That will help Huesca, but probably not enough, though I could see this one being a draw.

Atletico Madrid—Celta Vigo The home side have been fairly dreadful of late and are missing a number of players, but Celta are without Iago Aspas in this one too, as he picked up his fifth yellow of the season against Real Sociedad. Probably a dour home win.

Sunday:

Real Valladolid—Getafe This one sure looks like it could be a draw if Valladolid can actually figure out how to score, but Getafe are a tough team to break down and probably will control play in their fashion. It’s the early Sunday matchup, so if you get up early in the morning in the US to watch this, you might be put to sleep again.

Athletic Bilbao—Rayo Vallecano The last team to win at San Mamés was Villarreal, amazingly enough, and I doubt Rayo will. Muniain returns from suspension and between him, Raul Garcia and Iñaki Williams, Los Leones should win this one.

Girona—Villarreal A more detailed preview to come tomorrow, but Girona will miss Alex Granell and Douglas Luiz in midfield, both suspended. They are very reliant on Cristhian Stuani (18 goals out of their 33). Too reliant? Or will he carry them to safety? We’ll find out.

Valencia—Levante Valencia should be on top of the world following their fairly fortuitous win on Thursday, while Levante are struggling. A key matchup here will be Ruben Rochina against Dani Parejo. Valencia fell flat against Rayo on the road, but I don’t think the Mestalla crowd will let them do that here.

Current standings:

Girona 34; Levante 33; Celta 32; Valladolid 30; Villarreal 30; Rayo 27; Huesca 24.