Espanyol fans have, this season, two new idols who have managed to make RDT forget in record time. If the departure of the Madrid player has been digested for some time, it is, to a large extent, thanks to the contribution of Joselu and a Braithwaite who did not want to be less than his partner in the front. The Dane was key, scoring a brace in the victory against Mallorca (2-1), which places Espanyol five points clear of relegation. A forward who has gone from discarded at Barça to being a hero without a cape who makes Espanyol dance with every goal he scores has already accumulated seven goals in the League. With Joselu, they form one of the most lethal attacking pairs in the League: 18 goals between the two, just two short of the 20 scored by the Blaugrana’s Lewandowski and Dembélé.
The white-and-blues want to abandon the tag of innocent team. In the Jarque minute, Aleix Vidal was the smartest in the class and snuck the wallet to Nastasic, whom his goalkeeper put in a compromise with an erratic pass. Puigpelat’s winger did not waste the opportunity and ended up serving the goal in the tray to Braithwaite, who only had to push the ball. Espanyol were close to 2-0 after half an hour of the match, when Puado picked up a bad tackle from a visiting defender inside the area and ended up kicking wide.
Diego Martínez’s gesture of desperation said it all: clear chances cannot be forgiven in Primera. The Galician coach was not without reason, because Mallorca, a few minutes later, found the equalizer with a great shot from Muriqi that beat Pacheco at the top. Despite having scored his first goal as white-and-blue, Pacheco has again shown a lot of confidence in the various arrivals of Mallorca. He has made it clear that he has arrived to close the debate that originated after the departure of Diego López and to be the new owner of the Spanish goalkeeper. The winger was key in the second half with a providential pull that prevented Ángel Rodríguez from equalizing. He and César Montes, two of the winter signings, have brought reliability and defensive security to a Spanish team that is no longer the team with feet of clay that it was in the first round.
Diego Martínez surprised by leaving Cabrera on the bench and opting for Sergi Gómez in his place to have a cleaner exit from the ball from the back. Espanyol have raffled fewer balls than in previous games, but they have not achieved all the dominance they would like. The white-and-blues need to end up associating with the talent they have in the middle, two players of many carats who are not in the best physical conditions: Darder because he has been accumulating discomfort in the sole for weeks, Denis Suárez because he still needs shooting to put -se to tone after a few months of inactivity.
Mallorca has shown that a team without big stars, if it attacks and defends as a well-ordered block, is capable of fighting for the European positions. Javier Aguirre’s board, which worked so well in Cornellà-El Prat, has created problems for a Spaniard who has never been completely comfortable. Despite conceding the equalizer shortly before the break, the white-and-blues took advantage of the passage through the dressing rooms to react: Diego Martínez brought on Melamed in place of Aleix Vidal and the change proved his team’s strength . The entry of the player from the squad has brought electricity to Espanyol’s attack. Melamed, in fact, only took six minutes to warn with a deflected shot after a self-pass with the head and, shortly after, he provided an assist for Braithwaite’s goal. Far from breathing easy, Espanyol ended up suffering in a game in which Mallorca had some arrivals to scratch something more. With everything open, the white-and-blues have drawn from Aguirre’s manual: few inventions and a lot of pragmatism to close a result that gives them a lot of life.