Valencia (EFE).- The Valencia fans will gather at 8:00 p.m. this Saturday in front of the Mestalla stadium to protest against the management of the Singaporean magnate Peter Lim, the club’s largest shareholder through the company Meriton Holdings, in the entity Valencianista, a club that is sixteenth in the League and one point from relegation.
The concentration, which will lead part of the fans not to enter the Mestalla until minute 19 -when the foundation of the club is claimed, in the year 1919-, not only seeks to change the sporting course of the club, but also to take a walk of 180 degrees to the institutional, economic and social drift in which Valencia has been established for almost a decade, with the only solution for Libertad VCF, the convening organization, that Lim sell his shares.
Keys to the fed up of the fans with Lim
To understand why the fans are fed up with Meriton, here are 15 keys in the form of data and analysis:
– More than a thousand days without playing in Europe. Valencia accumulates, as of this Friday, 1,067 days without playing any European competition match, a negative club record in the last forty years. At the moment, it is already the third worst streak of the 103 years of the club.
– The New Mestalla, almost fourteen years stopped. Since the suspension of the works of the Nuevo Mestalla was announced on February 25, 2009 due to lack of liquidity, the future stadium of the club has been completely stopped. Meriton Holdings acquired the club with the commitment, according to Amadeo Salvo, then president, to finish the stadium for the centenary -in 2019-. Almost fourteen years later, the works are still in the same state as in 2009.
– Ximo Puig: Meriton’s credit is low in Valencian society. On March 2, 2021 and after a meeting with the then president of Valencia Anil Murthy, the president of the Generalitat, Ximo Puig, assured that the credit of Meriton Holdings was “low minimum” in Valencian society.
– Difficulty with the City Council to retake the stadium. The friction between the City Council and Valencia increases weekly. The last one, after the meeting of the vice mayor Sandra Gómez (PSOE) with Libertad VCF, organizer of the demonstration this Saturday. Javier Solís, spokesman for the club, spoiled the meeting with a group outside the club to give them details of the project before he did with the interested party: “Put political and personal interests aside and focus your efforts on reaching an agreement.”
sports results
– Only 3 qualifications to Europe in 8 seasons. Of the last 25 campaigns, Valencia has entered Europe in 19. Of the 6 seasons that it has not been in continental competition, 5 are with Meriton Holdings as the largest shareholder.
– 7 years of losses in 8 exercises. Valencia accumulates more than 175 million losses since the entry of Lim. Only in the 18-19 campaign, and through the barter between Neto and Cillessen, did the club not lose money. In 2021-22, 45.8 million euros were lost.
– Valencia is the only team that has not won after the World Cup break. It has five defeats and a draw since then, relegation numbers.
Valencia CF coaches
– Six of the nine Meriton Valencia coaches did not finish their first season. SOnly three -Marcelino, Bordalás and Nuno- of the nine coaches who started a season at Valencia were able to finish it. In addition, most of the technicians – see Marcelino, Bordalás, Gattuso, Javi Gracia or Prandelli – denounced that there were no signings.
– He fired the best sports project of the last decade for no reason. After two consecutive campaigns qualifying the team for the Champions League and after lifting the Copa del Rey in the centenary year, he decided to fire the director without explaining any reason. general, Mateu Alemany, and the coach, Marcelino García Toral, who had reunited the club both sportingly and socially.
– Continuous devaluation of assets. Dani Parejo, who a season earlier had lifted the Copa del Rey as captain, was ‘gifted’ to Villarreal, where in his first season he helped win the Europa League. That same summer he was sold to other great figures: Rodrigo Moreno (for 30 million euros), Francis Coquelin or Geoffrey Kondogbia (15 million). This summer, he was sold to Gonçalo Guedes and Carlos Soler.
– Sales that are not supplied and if they are supplied, they are granted. The great sales of the club have been replaced on the field by loaned, when not by the quarry. Parejo’s departure was not replaced with anyone; nor those of Coquelin and Kondogbia in 2021, the year since which Valencia continues without a ‘6’. Now, Guedes has been replaced by Lino, on loan from Atlético, while the only one replaced by a signing has been Soler, by André Almeida.
Lim: No news from Singapore
– Statements by Lim underestimating the club: «I have a football club and I see what happens. It’s nothing else.” Lim assured that Valencia was little more than a hobby in an interview with the Financial Times in 2021, in which he maintained that Valencia was good for him to do “networking”, that is, to establish contacts.
– 27 victories in the last 100 games in the First Division. Valencia, which has an average number of victories in the First Division of 44%, has achieved only 27 wins in the last hundred games, numbers that only confirm the sporting drift of the club and, above all, the imbalance with respect to its history. .
– Historically the most direct rival, Atlético de Madrid, from taking 20 points to being 174 behind. On the day of Meriton’s arrival, Valencia was third in the historical league table and was 20 points ahead of Atlético de Madrid. Now, the good work of those from Cholo and the sporting irregularity -or the regularity in the middle of the table, depending on how you see it- has made the mattress team take 174 points from Valencia. A difference of 200 points in nine seasons.
– No news from Singapore. The maximum shareholder of Valencia did not go to Seville last May to see his team in the Cup final against Betis and since the pandemic began he has not been seen by Mestalla. Yes, he was, for example, in the World Cup in Qatar, but not in the Spanish Super Cup played in Saudi Arabia. The only appearances since then are the images of the club’s communications when a coach or president travels to Singapore. Carlos Rosique
