Deportivo Alavés went to the Sánchez-Pizjuán on Friday at 21.00 hours carrying the weight of a two-month winless league run, with Quique Sánchez Flores asking for a quick response from a team that has taken just two points from the last 21 available.
Alavés had not won in LaLiga since beating Osasuna 5-2 on 6 September. Since then, they lost to Racing, Valencia, Atlético, Celta and Barcelona, while drawing with Athletic and Málaga. That stretch left them near the relegation zone and made the trip to Sevilla a simple but urgent test: stop the slide before it gets worse.
Quique Sánchez Flores did not hide the size of the problem. He said that if the team were sitting in a more stable position, such as 11th with 12 points in 11 jornadas, and coming off regular results, there would be no issue. Instead, he pointed to a bad run that has drained confidence and “tries to sink” the group. His message was that the priority is not the table alone, but restoring the players’ morale.
“We have had two very difficult weeks on a moral and social level,” he said, adding that the squad is down and frustrated, but that it is always better to lift a group with a smile than with sadness. He also stressed that only one victory would pull the team out of its “sad and dull” dynamic and help bring back the belief that was there earlier in the season.
That is why the visit to Sevilla carried more than ordinary league value. Sevilla have become one of the revelations of LaLiga under Luis García, so Alavés faced a difficult setting as well as a bad run. Even so, Sánchez Flores kept returning to the same point: the team needs to simplify, recover the basics that made it competitive at the start, and find one result that can change the mood.
The next step was clear. Alavés needed a performance that could reset the tone, ease the pressure and give the squad the boost it had been searching for over the previous two weeks.
