Will Santamaria get the nod for Mallorca against Nastic.

Will Santamaria get the nod for Mallorca against Nastic. | Miquel A. Borras

Monro BrycePalma29/10/2016 00:00
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Real Mallorca go looking for their first away win since 4 June (when they beat Valladolid to stay in La Segunda) with a trip to bottom side Nastic Tarragona tomorrow afternoon. Coach Fernando Vazquez has a fully fit squad at his disposal, the only notable absentee being Argentinian midfielder Juan Culio who serves a one-game suspension after receiving his fifth yellow card in last week's 1-0 win against Alcorcon. His place looks likely to be filled by local boy Damia Sabater. The coach faces a goalkeeping dilemma. Should he play Roberto Santamaria who has missed the last month through injury or should he retain club veteran and captain Jesus Cabrero who hasn't put a foot wrong recently, including saving a penalty last week?

Nastic are four points adrift at the bottom of the league and haven't won a game all season. That in itself is a warning shot across the bows for Mallorca as they seem hell-bent over the past couple of seasons to lose against the bottom team. The Catalans are struggling to get a team together with two players suspended, one sent home for disciplinary reasons and eight doubtful through injuries. Last year Nastic finished in a play-off position and have really come unstuck so far this season. In their squad is an ex-Mallorca player Sergio Tejera who played here between 2008 and 2012. Now 26, Tejera arrived in Palma from Chelsea's youth team as a promising 18-year old but failed to make the grade before moving to Espanyol.

Mallorca really have no excuses and it would be a major setback if we don't leave the Nou Estadi with all three points. With a home game against free-falling Zaragoza next Saturday, it's our big chance to move into the play-off zone. I emphasise again that Mallorca have a terrible record home and away against basement clubs but surely they'll overcome a team who at the moment have relegation written all over them.

I read with interest the rallying call from one of our owners, Steve Nash, when he was here last weekend. The only thing that made me slightly worried was when he said: “I think we need another two, three or even four years to go before we are ready for promotion.” Speaking as a frustrated Mallorca fan, we've already had four terms in the second tier of Spanish football, and I would sincerely hope it won't take us another four seasons to break free of La Segunda's shackles.

With that in mind, the club are about to extend some of our best players' contracts starting with the two first choice full backs, Joan Oriol and Eduard Campabadel. The former has had an outstanding campaign so far and both have, in some games, been our best attackers.

More news disclosed last week was that if the American owners headed by Robert Sarver (who allegedly paid 20,660,475 euros) hadn't purchased Real Mallorca last January then “Los Bermellones” as a footballing entity would have been wound down and we could have disappeared. We were that close to oblivion.