Way back in August 2019, fledgling English football manager Robí di Lathamé took the reigns of Sporting Lisbon. Now, 21 years later at the age of 56, I was preparing for my final match as a football manager.
After two successive titles, Valencia CF had suffered a shocking blip in form at the start of the 2029/30 La Liga campaign - even dropping to one place outside the relegation zone!
Our exciting Valencia CF side were riding high on the wave of a first La Liga title in 24 years in the 2027/28 campaign. But we knew a wounded Barcelona and Real Madrid would come back fighting.
After 10 games of their 2027/28 La Liga campaign, Valencia CF were sitting pretty at the top of the table and a club record unbeaten run of 13 matches in all competitions.
Our second season with Valencia CF had gone very well, securing the club's highest finish in the save thus far by coming in 2nd behind a dominant Real Madrid. But plenty of rebuilding was going to be required during our third summer in Valencia.
A second season in Valencia saw us lead Los Cules to an unexpected second place finish, only behind an increasingly ridiculously good Real Madrid. We'll take a quick look back at the season just gone and our key players throughout the campaign.
We headed into the second half of our second season with Valencia sandwiched by Spanish giants Barcelona and the increasingly untouchable Real Madrid.
Heading into the first international break of our second season with Valencia, we were sitting pretty at the top of the league with the evergreen Son Heung-Min in top form.
We came into season two in Spain in need of a fairly substantial rebuilding effort to strengthen a threadbare squad and replace several Valencia CF stalwarts and one big-name departure.
Our first season with Valencia after six years of glory in Sporting was an unprecedented success, wrapping up third place in La Liga and winning the Europa League.
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