It’s back! 12 August, one of the world’s premiere football championships kicks off. Popular at home and abroad, Spanish football’s scores of fans are right now awaiting the new season of La Liga, its 92nd year so far. While three of last season’s competitors won’t be returning, three new teams stand ready, all seeking to establish themselves at the pinnacle of Spanish football. Meet the newcomers and get ready for a new, exhilarating season!
By the way, La Liga’s actual and formal name is “The Campeonato Nacional de Liga de Primera División”. For sponsorship purposes it is named “La Liga Santander” after Banco Santander, Spain’s largest bank and originally of Santander, Cantabria.
Spain boasts several of the most popular teams in the world with Real Madrid and Barcelona regularly ranked in the top few of this international list. But, other teams are also quite popular outside of Spain’s borders with Atletico Madrid, Valencia and Real Sociedad among them.
However, many more teams put up a good fight every season, challenging the behemoths of the Spanish footballing universe for fame, glory and finances. These newcomers are Almería, Real Valladolid and Girona. More about these clubs below.
Where do the teams of the new season belong?
Do you know where all teams’ home grounds are located? Not all of them are named after their home towns or cities (all though many of them are).
And this is a link to the new season’s schedule. La Liga schedule. It starts with a game between Osasuna versus Sevilla at 9 pm tonight.
Who are the top flight newcomers?
Almería fought tooth and nail all the way to the final round to win the league, narrowly beating Real Valladolid. Both ended up on 81 points, but although Almería had scored three goals less than their competitor, they had allowed their opponents eight fewer goals than Valladolid throughout the season and won La Liga 2 for 2021/2022 on a better goal difference. The club was founded on 26 July in 1989 and they have been in the top flight twice before. This will be their seventh season in the Primera División. At their best, they came in as number eight in the league.
Real Valladolid was the highest scoring team of La Liga 2 last season but a somewhat softer defense than Almería’s lost them the title. The decision went all the way down to the wire though. Valladolid were founded on 20 June, 1928 and have been competing eight times in the top division for a total of 46 seasons including the upcoming one. Valladolid have never been the champion of Spanish football, but can boast a fourth place.
Girona had the fewest points (68) of the four candidates for promotion with Eibar (80 points) the clear favorite to win the qualifiers. But, following the 42 regular league games and only sixth place ranking in the final table, they banana peeled themselves into promotion through four additional qualification games. Girona scored considerably fewer goals during the regular season compared to Almería and Valladolid, and that might not do in the top flight. We will see. The club was founded on 23 July, 1930 and have only once before been in the Primera División. The upcoming season will be their third. At their best the team achieved a tenth place in the top league.
Which clubs left us last season?
Granada spent the last three seasons in La Liga before getting relegated back down to the second tier. Having enjoyed a seventh and a ninth place the previous two years, this time their performance was not good enough to keep them up in the top flight. An 18th place during the 2021/2022 competition saw them relegated.
Apart from a dip to the second tier in 2016/2017, Levante have been a La Liga competitor since the 2010/2011 season. While the last season saw them constantly struggle at the bottom of the table, they ended up as number 19 out of the 20 competitors. The best performance in La Liga came in their first season following promotion from the second flight when it came in at a very respectable sixth place.
Alavés had a bad season last year. They ended up at the bottom of the table and were relegated from La Liga for the first time since the 2016/2017 season. Since arriving in La Liga, Alavés have been a mid to lower half team with a peak performance in their first season when they placed as number nine on the final league table.
Featured image by 0fjd125gk87 from Pixabay.
We at Find Your Spain publish in-house written articles and provide links to content from other sources which we hope you will find useful, interesting, and informative. Got a tip for us? Drop us a line, comment on a post.
If you enjoyed this article please like us on Facebook or subscribe at FindYourSpain.com. It’s free. And, share our sites with friends and family.
