Unai Emery has not had an easy task since he joined Valencia in 2008, but along with Pep Guardiola, who ascended the Camp Nou throne from the club's B team at the same time, the 39-year-old coach is the joint second-longest serving manager in La Liga. The only man who has held a job in Primera for longer, Manuel Preciado, has done so largely through the force of his personality, the love of his players and the club's fans -- and by keeping Sporting in the top flight. In Gijon, that is about all that is required.
Emery took over a team with regular Champions League ambition and his task was to keep it in Europe. Taking over after the disastrous reign of Ronald Koeman -- disastrous because despite a King's Cup win, Valencia finished a budget-busting 10th place -- Emery knew only too well the financial constraints of his paymasters. Valencia seems to have been 500 million euros in debt for the past five years and its plans to move into a new, larger stadium remain on the drawing board.
The banks having long since abandoned the club, the only way to balance the annual books became to sell Valencia's star players -- a tactic very astutely put off until the team was back in the Champions League. As soon as that cash cow was assured, David Silva and David Villa departed in 2010, followed by Juan Mata in 2011, for a combined fee of around 100 million euros.
Last season, Valencia spent almost exactly what it earned in transfers. The year before it made a tidy 50 million euros. This is largely because of Emery's ability to take a rough diamond and polish it into pure cash potential. Roberto Soldado's market value is 12.5 million euros, and he was bought for 8.8 million euros. Aritz Aduriz cost 3.8 million euros and is currently worth double that. In 2009-10, Valencia spent a paltry 4.4 million euros in the transfer market, but brought in players such as Ever Banega and Jeremy Mathieu, who was a good part of the reason Barcelona left Mestalla a couple of weeks ago with just a point. The entire Valencia squad's full market value this season is little more than Villa and Silva are currently worth.
This was probably the reason Valencia hired Emery and the reason he has not been fired -- a hobby of choice for Liga presidents eager to deflect attention away from their own, often destructive, involvement in the running of clubs. Emery enjoys the support of a Preciado, and to a modest extent the results of a Guardiola, while also balancing the books. Keeping Valencia in the mix -- albeit last season 21 points shy of second-place Real -- is no small feat but Emery has always been a managerial overachiever, after a serious knee injury ended an undistinguished playing career. Emery's next step was presented to him. The prescient president of his then-cub, Lorca, offered him a gig as manager. Emery led the side from Tercera to Segunda. The following year he almost guided Lorca to the top division, falling just a few points short. When Emery moved on, Lorca was relegated.
After a switch to lowly Almeria, Emery led the coastal coasters to the top flight for the first time in its history, and the following season to eighth in Primera. Alvaro Negredo, a Real Madrid reject who scored for fun at Almeria, joined Emery at Valencia when Villa departed. Former Almeria players Diego Alves and Pablo Piatti followed this summer. Unable to spend like his rivals, Emery shops cheap and takes advantage of the loan market, as he did by resurrecting the extinct career of Sergio Canales.
Unlike Preciado, a blood and thunder, us-against-them leader of men, Emery cuts a professorial figure and uses sophisticated tracking software -- which monitors and stores each and every movement of his players and the opposition's, and can also tell a penalty taker in which direction a goalkeeper is likely to dive -- during matches. It is technology like this, and a coach able to use it, that gives Valencia its sole economical advantage over its richer rivals.
Against Chelsea in the Champions League on Wednesday, Emery deployed Mathieu ahead of Jordi Alba, in a reverse of what he unleashed on Barcelona in La Liga. He also switched from a more static 4-4-2 against Barca -- designed to contain its buzzing front line while allowing swift breaks from the left in the space vacated by Dani Alves with Guardiola preferring a back three -- to a fluid 4-2-3-1 to counter Chelsea's packed midfield. Emery knew the threat of Ashley Cole and Jose Bosingwa to overlap Juan Mata and Florent Malouda.
Valencia pushing up in defense led to Chelsea's goal, but as soon as his side went behind, Emery switched the speedy Piatti for Mathieu to keep up the attack, rather than opting for damage limitation. Valencia fashioned several chances after the change and Roberto Soldado had a golden opportunity to provide the first after pulling Petr Cech from his line. But the Spanish forward's cross was weak and easily cleared. Valencia continued to probe and came close to leveling the score through Piatti and Victor Ruiz. The substitutes Sofiane Feghouli and Jonas also made their presences felt, the former testing Cech from range and the latter releasing Piatti, who shot narrowly wide. Diego Alves kept the home side in the game at the beginning of the second half and his opposite number did the same as Valencia peppered the Chelsea goal in the final exchanges. A deserved equalizer came from the spot, Soldado slotting home after the unfortunate Salomon Kalou's first touch of the evening was made with his hand.
Saved in goal by a former charge, rescued at the other end by another; it is the legacy of Emery's rise through the Liga coaching ranks, a trajectory that few in the country could hope to match under similar circumstances.