Allan Nyom is lame. Since the start of the season, the Cameroonian defender from Getafe, 37, has suffered from a series of physical problems. But on December 6 at La Cerámica, his coach, José Bordalás, decided to give him the title against Villarreal, taking advantage of what seemed to be a remission of the malaise. It was a mistake. Before the break, Tajon Buchanan confronted Nyom in the left corner of the visitors’ box, forcing him to sprint. When Buchanan intervened with his right, the defender was stuck and when he finished with his left, he had all the time in the world to aim well. Bordalás replaced Nyom “ipso facto”. The 1-0 victory rushed Villarreal and fans celebrated it as a milestone. People remember that two years ago the team fought not to go down to second place. They now occupy third place in the League. The visit to Barcelona (4:15 p.m., Dazn and Movistar+) allows us to measure the team’s potential in a critical period.
Buchanan’s goal against the suffering Nyom hides problems that have continued to arise at Villarreal. The team had just drawn 1-1 against Antoniano in the Cup and the rest would reveal major shortcomings: a 2-3 defeat against Copenhagen in the Champions League and a 2-1 elimination against Racing in the Cup. Behind the curtain of a historic transfer market in the La Plana club, the one that spent the most in Spain this year after Atlético and Madrid, with more than 100 million to strengthen the squad, the reality of a team in which the fundamental players are far from being their best version.
The pillar of the defense, the expert Juan Foyth, is injured and Renato Veiga, the central defender called upon to lead the defense, is still, at 22, too impulsive a boy to carry the full load. In the midfield engine room, the real fulcrum of the team, the 36-year-old veteran, Dani Parejo, found no other help than that provided by Santi Comesaña, an interior in excellent condition who has often been seen alone at the head of too many departments. Thomas Partey, signed with the idea of becoming the head of the project, spent the first months of the season trying to regain the physical form lost after months of inactivity and anxiety derived from personal conflicts. Pape Gueye, experienced pivot, left for the African Cup.
“Against Copenhagen we were overwhelmed by anxiety, and that makes you make more mistakes,” Comesaña admitted to the As newspaper. Comesaña made multiple attempts to connect the attackers, and these did not always help. Gerard Moreno, the most brilliant of attackers when it comes to opening closed defenses, is not coming out of his long cycle of muscle pain. Pépé seems depressed since he was excluded from the Ivorian selection for the African Cup. And Mikautadze, the most expensive player in Villarreal’s history (30 million paid to Lyon last summer), is a young man who cannot understand that his mission must consist of anything other than waiting for the ball to be brought to him to finish it. The man lives so far away that when he has opportunities, even noisy ones like in Santander or Paphos, he generally misses them.
“We are the team with the fewest goals scored in La Liga, but in two Cup matches we need more than 60 shots on goal to score two goals,” Marcelino reflected. “We are in a lot of pressure. This anxiety to win is typical of a young team, but it shows that there is a lot of ambition.”
Immaturity is as obvious as evolution. Aside from the big two, no team has added more points in La Liga than Villarreal in the calendar year 2025. Barca’s visit comes at the wrong time, as almost always. Since the 2007-08 season, at the threshold of the Messi era, Villarreal has not beaten Barça at home. Today, everything conspires against the La Plana team, so big and so beaten at the same time, and so young, forced to learn at a forced pace to overcome the ordeal of Lamine.
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