“There were just hours to go until Real Madrid’s match against Athletic Bilbao and Madrid were about to finish the first half of the season five points clear at the top of the table with 16 wins in 19 games. Favourites to win the title, they were about to score their 67th goal and Cristiano Ronaldo would soon be on 23, one ahead of Leo Messi. But it was not about that all that. Not now and not later. It would not even be about the 4-1 win – a brilliant game, open, exciting and end-to-end, between two sides that can be great to watch. The focus was elsewhere. Even José Mourinho’s focus was elsewhere. The team meeting at Madrid’s Mirasierra Suites Hotel wasn’t so much about formation as about information.” Guardian

“Scott Minto was enjoying a holiday in Montreal with his wife and family last summer when he got an unexpected email from Sky Sports, asking if he wanted to present their Spanish football coverage in the new season.” Spanish Football

“Five thoughts from the first leg of the Copa del Rey and Barcelona’s 2-1 win over Real Madrid in the latest clásico.” SI

“Next week is the real Jornada 19, the week that defines the true half-way of the league programme, so I’ll wait until then to do the traditional ‘half-term report’. Next week is also a bit special because the opening games that should have been played back in August, which were called off because of the players’ strike, will finally make their belated appearance.” ESPN

“For Real Madrid and Barcelona, draws are the new defeats and draws like this are the new disasters. For everyone else, draws are the new victories and draws like this are the new cup wins. No one expects to beat Madrid and Barcelona – between them they have lost only 10 of their past 181 games against the rest of the league over the past three seasons and Barcelona have lost four of their past 93 league games – so a draw will do. For Espanyol, a draw like this will do nicely: an intense, breathless derby, a packed house, an 86th-minute equaliser scored by the 20-year-old Catalan who turned them down, a 90th-minute shot smashing against the bar, a penalty appeal ignored, and a 1-1 scoreline that could cost their city rivals the title. Rather like the 2-2 scoreline against the same rivals that cost them the title last time four and half years ago.” Guardian

“While one doesn’t want to talk about counting chickens before the fat lady sings, she’s certainly tucking into a second helping of brownies and custard when it comes to Barcelona’s title chances. A combination of poor away form, the tendency to switch off during games, a bad recent record against Espanyol and a last minute penalty decision going against the Dream Boys left Barça five points behind Real Madrid after a 1-1 draw in Cornella.” FourFourTwo (Video)

“Saturday night sees the seventh – and final – Clasico of 2011, and perhaps the one with the most tactical possibilities. There are reasons for that on both sides. Real have played a more attacking game this season, and there’s less certainty that they’ll defend deep, park the bus, and invite pressure. Barca, on the other hand, play the same style of football as ever, but they’ve experimented with a new formation – 3-4-3, which they’ve used in over half of their league games this season. With few injuries and squads stronger than last year, it’s surprisingly difficult to predict the 22 players that will start this match.” Zonal Marking

“Raimon is the groundsman at Levante, a man who practically lives in the Ciutat de Valencia stadium and does everything from cut the grass to sweep the steps and paint the lines on the pitch. In a room under the stand he has, over the 24 years he has been at the club, constructed a mini-museum of all things Levante — including press cuttings and posters, shirts and photographs going back years. That is not all he does: under the stand he also collects old farm equipment — his other passion — and cooks. When Levante has a team meal, it sometimes hold it down there with the groundsman as chef.” SI

“The biggest spenders in Spain in the last 3 seasons naturally occupy the top four positions, Barcelona and Real Madrid are on another level, fan base, investment and a disproportionate tv deal ensure it’s difficult for others to keep up. Málaga’s fairly recent new ownership and strategy mean they are now well positioned to challenge in future seasons, although the jury is still out as to what they can achieve in the present. But the other team that currently sits in a Champions League position after 6 games is a lot more surprising – Levante.” La Liga UK

“Pride of place this week goes once again to Levante, who stay second behind Barcelona on goal difference after beating Malaga 3-0 in the duel of the new-teams-on-the-block. It’s true that Malaga lost their goalkeeper Willy (he might have to change the name on his shirt if he ever gets signed by an English team) after half an hour to a sending-off, but Levante proved themselves perfectly capable of taking full advantage, winning a game with lots of symbolic meaning attached to it.” ESPN

“He isn’t green or fat, he doesn’t have a movie franchise and there is no Princess Fiona in his life, but Valencia defender Adil Rami is happy to answer to his nickname, “Shrek.” The French-Moroccan will freely admit it’s because he eats voraciously and has been known, just occasionally, to belch. Loudly.” ESPN

“Both Barcelona and Real Madrid can claim to have been more than entertaining in their respective weekend victories. The first 15 seconds at the Santiago Bernabeu, for example, were particularly compelling. And both clubs also delivered in their own special ways on the traditionally fusty, dusty institutional level. Normally a day spent watching pompous, boastful men in their 50s, jangling their jowls whilst talking endlessly about finances and waving voting cards is as skull-dentingly tortuous as a 2010/11 Deportivo season highlights DVD.” FourFourTwo

“It was Fernando Roig who said it best, explaining the truth that lies behind the Spanish League or the LFP. ‘You go to a league meeting and you discuss things, you explain, you talk about your position for half an hour,’ the Villarreal president told the radio station Cadena Cope, ‘and then it turns out to be completely worthless. There you are making proposals, analyzing the situation and it means nothing because the decision has been taken by in some restaurant the day before the meeting. You can talk, but the decision has been made and there is nothing you can do.'” SI

“When it comes to explaining Barcelona’s draw against Real Sociedad – which doesn’t seem so bad when you consider Pep’s Dream Boys still have more points than this time last year – LLL falls into line with Mundo Deportivo. ‘It wasn’t the ‘FIFA Virus’ or the wrong line-up, nor bad luck. Barça dropped two points in San Sebastian because they fell for the old sin of complacency,’ writes Joan Poquí.” FourFourTwo

“Real Madrid seized an early advantage in the Spanish league by beating Getafe 4-2 on Saturday after Barcelona squandered an early lead to draw 2-2 at Real Sociedad. Madrid striker Karim Benzema and Getafe’s Nicolas “Miku” Fedor scored in an evenly matched first half at Santiago Bernabeu stadium.” SI

Barca held, Madrid win
“Barcelona were pegged back from two goals ahead as Real Sociedad snatched a superb and deserved 2-2 draw at the Estadio de Anoeta. Two goals in as many minutes from Xavi and Cesc Fabregas put Barca 2-0 up inside the opening quarter-hour and they appeared to be cruising, but Imanol Agirretxe’s header changed all that and Antoine Griezmann netted a bizarre equaliser – making good on his pre-match promise to prove his commitment to the club after the collapse of his longed-for summer move to Atletico Madrid.” ESPN

“Spain’s unsurprising 6-0 win over Liechtenstein on Tuesday night sealed a wrinkle-free qualification through to the Euro 2012 finals in Poland and the Ukraine. And that got LLL’s noggin a-bogglin’. While the make-up of the Spain squad for that competition and even the World Cup in 2014 could look similar, barring a few Xavi- and Puyol-shaped tweaks, the blog started contemplating how a 4-3-3 Spain in five years’ time may well look for Euro 2016 in France…” FouFourTwo

“La Liga Loca can count at least seven reasons for an enormous smug cloud hanging above Barcelona after Monday night’s 5-0 win over Villarreal – a cloud so dense and orifice-clogging it may lead to mass evacuations.” FourFourTwo

“Every time they say goodbye, La Liga dies a little. Now Juan Mata has signed for Chelsea from Valencia, just as Sergio Aguero signed for Manchester City from Atlético Madrid. For fans of City and Chelsea, the transfers are fantastically exciting, two great additions to two teams aspiring to win the Premier League. For the Spanish league, they are frightening. Despite the injection of around 75 million euros, the transfers are confirmation of a worrisome trend.” SI

“Like two immense superpowers, Real Madrid and Barcelona keep on piling up the arms in the race to outdo each other. Football may never have seen two squads like this head-to-head before and the battle looks set to be fascinating. It may also turn downright nasty again.” World Soccer

“You can tell the season is about to start when it might not be about to start after all. With barely a fortnight to go, the Spanish players’ union called a strike over more than €50m of unpaid wages and on Wednesday morning another meeting between the league and the players’ union, the AFE, broke down. According to the AFE president José Luis Rubiales, in the last two years alone 200 players have been affected by salaries that have gone unpaid. So, here we are: three days to go and there’s no football.” Guardian

“For 15,000 supporters to turn up for the unveiling of a 35-year-old forward arriving on a free transfer, the club in question is either based in a city which is clearly lacking in fun stuff to do, or is an institution that possesses a horde of extremely excited fans. As the side in this particular scenario is in the playboy paradise of Málaga, the masses that turned up to give Ruud Van Nistelrooy a warm hand on his entrance are an indication of a club whose supporters are genuinely living the dream and close to peeing their pants in giddy anticipation at the season to come.” Football365

Paying homage to Catalonian Luis Enrique
“Even before the satirical film An American in Rome was released in 1954 with the legendary comic actor Alberto Sordi japing around Trastevere wearing a baseball cap in the style of Joe Di Maggio threatening to destroy macaroni, Italians have held a curious fascination with the strength, opulence and freedom of the United States.” Fox Sports

Super build-up for Super Cup
“The friendlies are all but over, the endless waffle and piffle concerning Cesc and Neymar have been banished to the inside pages, Karim Benzema has been reborn for the 15th time and Leo Messi is back in Barcelona ready to open another can of whup-ass on Real Madrid. This is the state of play in the Spanish press just six days before what has been branded by one paper’s rather feeble attempt at hype as ‘the most important Supercopa in 14 years’.” FourFourTwo

“If you were to pay a visit to a home game at the Saniat R’mel stadium in the Moroccan City of Tetouan, you would be forgiven for thinking you were in the domain of a lower league Spanish side. For although this is the home of Maghreb Athletic Tetouan of the Botola League, there is a distinctly Spanish theme present amongst the clubs fanatical supporters. From the banners honouring ‘Los Matadores’ (the matadors) and the passionately waved Spanish flags, to the replica shirts of Athletic Bilbao and Athletico Madrid that echo the Red and White colours of the home team, the tributes are commonplace on the terraces.” In Bed With Maradona

“What do Sir Alex Ferguson, Ottmar Hitzfeld, Carlo Ancelotti, José Mourinho and Josep Guardiola have in common? They are the only members of an elite group of managers who have won the UEFA Champions League twice. As members of the group, they are always guaranteed work at the top level of world football. This season a familiar face returns to Spain, a man who has come as close as anyone to entering this group. Héctor Cúper will probably feel he is the unluckiest manager in football.” In Bed With Maradona

“José Mourinho has already splurged €55m on five players this summer but the Real Madrid coach and newly appointed ‘sporting manager’ wants one more. In an echo of last year’s narrative, the Special One is desperate to sign another striker so he doesn’t go have to go out hunting with Karim ‘the cat’ Benzema, as he complained last time round when Gonzalo Higuaín knacked his back. Here are the four frontrunners whose names have been bandied around in Spain as the main men who could join the Santiago Bernabeu strike force.” Football365

“Last Thursday marked the pre-season’s first bout of conspiracy theorising and childish screams of ‘it’s not fair!’ in the ongoing media war between Real Madrid and Barcelona. It was the day after the fixtures for the 2011-12 campaign were announced and the loonier parts of the Barça press thought they could smell a rather pungent rat as they cast their eyes over Barcelona’s opening few games, which kick off with a trip to a beefed-up Málaga.” FourFourTwo

“Once the tipping point is reached departures become inevitable and the slide becomes harder to arrest than ever; what starts as an emergency solution risks becoming a permanent situation, the enshrinement of inequality and the inability to compete. Handled well, the effects can be palliated but, barring a sudden shift, the trend is unavoidable. Spanish soccer has reached that tipping point. Valencia certainly have.” SI

“Real Madrid ended October above Barcelona after perfect month – essential in a league where dropping a single point is as advisable as jamming your todger in a toaster. Pep’s Dream Boys carelessly threw away two precious points at the Camp Nou in a 1-1 draw against Mallorca, prompting mass panty-bunching panic in the Catalan capital.” FourFourTwo

“I’ve taken the decision to name my team of the year without any mention of Barcelona or Real Madrid players. You know about them already, so it’s time for the rest of La Primera Division to get an honourable mention.” Footy Matters

“The month began as most do in la Liga – with a big, stinky controversy fishier than a Valencia pavement café which was only cast aside by the Spanish press when José Mourinho said something particularly outrageous and offensive. This particular bit of dodgy business focussed on Hércules – one of the more colourful clubs in la Primera last season – with reports suggesting particular members of the Alicante side may have ‘encouraged’ opposition teams to perhaps not try as hard as they might during the club’s promotion campaign from la Segunda the previous season.” FourFourTwo

“Eighteen days in the spring defined and decided the season. Finally, the inevitable happened and the curtain came down on the rest of Spain, leaving Real Madrid and Barcelona to fight it out for absolutely everything. The clásico series felt like the obvious conclusion, two-and-a-half weeks that acted as a microcosm of the season. The best two sides became the only two sides, league, Champions League and Copa del Rey their own private battleground, and as much of the spotlight was shone off the pitch as on it – where there were accusations and acrimony, formal complaints and a complete lack of class. Where it got genuinely pretty horrible. Just as it was always going to.” Guardian

“Our man in Spain, Tim Stannard, continues to look back on another incredible year in la Primera with the second installment of his review of the seaon…” FourFourTwo

“With little, bowl-headed Bojan wearing the captain’s armband for Barcelona as reward for a splendid A- in PE, LLL feared the worst for Pep’s Dream Boys at Málaga. A defeat for Barça would have left a table reflecting the fact that Real Madrid had lost the league by a single point, something Marca would no doubt have dined-out on for the entire summer. Instead, the mini-Dream Boys came away from the south coast with a 3-1 victory to give Barça a four point advantage over Madrid after 38 games.” FourFourTwo

“A shimmy and shammy as purty as a Tennessee beauty queen saw Iniesta glide through a sluggish Espanyol defence to set Barcelona on their way in what was, considering the bust-ups of recent years, a somewhat boring Catalan derby. Barcelona just need a single point against Levante on Wednesday to win the title, providing Real Madrid dodge their local civic duty and beat Getafe the day before.” FourFourTwo