Levante and Getafe face off in the round of 32 of King’s Cup in the City of Valencia, in a game with a Primera flavor. The granotas will be looking to go through to continue their unstoppable unbeaten streak and prove they can take on a top-class rival. From him, The azulones will not want to allow chances for surprises, in a competition in which they have historically been used to going far.
Both formations, and in particular the one led by Calleja, face the match with an eye to internal competition. The Madrileños are in 14th place, five points behind Sevilla who mark the descent, so presumably Quique Sánchez Flores will rotate to rest holders in Liga SmartBank.
For its part, Levante is at the center of a dispute to end the season in the two highly anticipated first places of the SmartBank League, which allow you to go up directly. Those of Orriols ended the year in third place, just one behind Eibar, with whom they drew in the last duel, and one victory behind the leader, Las Palmas. Both competitors are already knocked out of the Cup, so they save that extra match load for their Second Division fixtures. Calleja referred to the load of matches to which the team is subjected in the first weeks of January due to the Cup match in the press conference that preceded the match against Getafe. “In a few days we have the confrontation with Sporting, we are waiting for it”, said the coach, who acknowledged that the priority, without a doubt, is promotion.
For this reason, he is expected to usher in changes to the XI that has been commonplace in league competition, giving rest to more important players who are charging minutes this year. Calleja also underlined that, if we want to talk about Levate as a First Division team, this must be demonstrated in the league by going up, “We have a team that aspires to everything.”
As for Getafe, he recognized the rigidity of Quique Sánchez Flores’ teams and the difficulty that the match will entail, both for the ease with which their attacking players can score a goal and for the difficulty it takes to hurt them behind. And it is that in the last four clashes between granotas and azulones, the last one this summer in the preseason, Levante has managed to score only one goal against the Madrileños, with two defeats and two draws.
But the real morbidity will not be on the bench, if not seeing Jorge de Drutos face to face with Getafe, a team he was one step away from joining in the summer, and who excluded Azulón due to alleged physical problems. Half a season later, de Frutos is one of Calleja’s key men in the Second Division.