Levante

Levante  

Levante manager Tom Parfitt came to the club after the season’s opening league fixture had seen the Spanish club lose 2 – 1 to Hellas Verona in Italy. The defeat came after a mixed pre season which saw the club win twice, draw once and lose four times. The board felt that this kind of form was not something that they could live with, and made a very early managerial change.

In the four games that Parfitt has overseen, results have continued to be disappointing so far. Things started off encouragingly with a 3 – 1 win at home to Turkish side Besiktas, but three defeats followed, going down 4-2 at home to another Italian side, Hellas’ rivals Chievo Verona, a massive 9 – 1 defeat away to Espanyol in an all Spanish affair, and then most recently a 1 – 0 home loss to German side FC Koln have left the club at the foot of the table.  

After that huge defeat to Espanyol, the travelling supporters were massively disappointed. That said, they didn’t give up on the players, and have gotten behind the team and embraced the philosophy that the manager is trying to bring to the club.  

Levante fans in surprisingly great voice against Epanyol

With the side conceding 15 goals in the four games Tom has been in charge, it’s not hard to see where the problems lie. The nadir was obviously the massive defeat to Espanyol, and although it was disappointing to follow that up with another defeat, the team did at least show a little bit of character against Koln.

A new goalkeeper, defender and a holding midfielder have all been brought in, and the club will now be looking to tighten up defensively, then move out of and away from the relegation zone.  

The previous management team had spent most of the transfer budget before Tom arrived, with the vast bulk of it going to Eintracht Frankfurt in exchange for £10m record signing Vaclav Kadlec. The young Czech has played both on the wing and in attack already for Levante, although Parfitt now looks set to leave him up top in the number 9 shirt, alongside loan signing Clinton N’Jie. 

£10m club record Vaclav Kadlec

As the funds were rather depleted when he came to the club, Parfitt has had to be creative in the transfer market. He has been able to bring in one loan player so far, along with seven permanent signings. John Ruddy, Robert Snodgrass, Sebastian Bassong and Baroni Christian bring bagfuls of experience with them, whilst young Portuguese starlet Leandro Da Silva Lopes, Marcus Maddison, and Paraguayan striker Angel Romero all offer a lot of promise for the future.

Angel Romero in action for Paraguay

Young winger Marcus Maddison talks to PUTV about his move away from Peterborough United to Spain

The club may well dip into the transfer market again, for both permanent and loan signings, but for now Parfitt is now keen to give the new boys an opportunity to bed in and try to put a run of results together with a settled side.

The club were linked with Nikica Jelavic of Hull, although this is now thought unlikely to happen. Certainly a striker is not the manager’s main priority at the moment. The club are also thought to be keen on a couple of South American midfielders, but the names remain under wraps for now as the club wouldn’t like to alert any potential rivals to the players. Although again, any potential deals are not thought to be imminent.  

Time will tell what the future holds, and how the season will pan out for Levante, but the long term ambition of the manager, board, and most of all the fans, is to see the club competing in the top division alongside the likes of Barcelona, Real Madrid and Bayern Munich every week. It’s a bold aim, but one which, in time, Parfitt feels is not unrealistic.

He stated that although he has only been at the club for a couple of weeks, he feels that the squad is already stronger than the one he inherited, and that although the results are still poor, he is confident they will pick up sooner rather than later.      

Results

A – Boca Juniors L 1 – 3 (Friendly)

A – Spartak Moscow W 2 – 1 (Friendly)

H – Rubin Kazan D 1 – 1 (Friendly)

A - Hoffenheim L 0 – 1 (Friendly)

A - Manchester Utd L 0 – 3 (Friendly)

H – Sao Paulo – L 1 – 2 (Friendly)

H – Spartak Moscow W 1 – 0 (Friendly)

A – Hellas Verona L 1 - 2

H – Besiktas W 3 – 1

H – Chievo Verona L 2 – 4

A – Espanyol L 1 – 9

H – Koln – L 0 – 1

Transfers in
Player	Club from	Fee
Sebastian Bassong	Norwich	Nikos Karabelas & Acosta Deyverson
Baroni Cristian	Corinthians	£320k, Aranda Tono & Jose Mari
Marcus Maddison	Peterborough	£530k
Angel Romero	Corinthians	£400k & Rafael Martins
John Ruddy	Norwich	£300k, Martinez Ruben & Marti Roger
Robert Snodgrass	Hull	£300k, Javi Jiminaz & Jesus Fernandez
Leandro Da Silva Lopes	Peterborough	£10k
Clinton N’Jie	Real Madrid	Season long loan
Transfers out
Player	Club to	Fee
Ander Artabe	UCAM Murcia	£447k