The coach of Valencia, Ruben Barajawill face next Sunday’s visit to Atlético de Madrid in his third attempt to become the first coach of the Mestalla club to lead the team to league victory in Metropolitan.
The Madrid team, after decades at the Vicente Calderón, moved to the Metropolitano for the 2017-18 season, where Valencia played seven times in the league and did not achieve victory in any of them against a team that always dominated of Diego Simeone in these confrontations.
In fact, they have six defeats and one draw, which they achieved in the 2019-20 campaign by one goal with Albert Celades, who until now is the only coach to have produced points in Atlético’s new home, thanks in goal with Dani Parejo putting the tie back on the scoreboard after the first goal from Diego Costa.
Sunday will be the third game Baraja has coached at the Metropolitano against Valencia in the Liga. In their debut, in the final stage of the 2022-23 campaign, they lost 3-0 and last season they lost 2-0.
Before Baraja, four other coaches had the option to lead Valencia to its first victory in the Metropolitano. Like the Valladolid player, the Asturian Marcelino García Toral had two chances to do it, but with him the Mestalla club lost 1-0 in 2017-18, in their first match in this situation, and 3- 2 in 2018-19.
Then came the draw with Celedes on the bench and, after that, two more defeats. Under Javi Gracia, Valencia went 3-1 in 2020-21 and with Jose Bordalás on the bench they made it a tight 3-2 in 2021-22.
Source: La Verdad
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