This was a historic campaign for Getafe as they came in fifth, which is their best ever finish. They were even competing for Champions League football, but ultimately had to settle for Europa League qualification.
Getafe’s success has to be attributed to coach Jose Bordalas. When he took over at the club in the 2016/17 season they were second-bottom of the second division and he led them to promotion, to a mid-table LaLiga finish and now to fifth place.
His simple 4-4-2 approach is quite a defensive one and his team conceded just 35 goals, the joint-second best record in the division. This was the foundation of their success and it really helped to have the reliable Djene at centre-back.
Yet Getafe also scored enough goals at the other end thanks to their three excellent strikers Jaime Mata, Jorge Molina and Angel Rodriguez. They took turns to fit into the front two and combined for 36 LaLiga goals, which was 75 percent of Getafe’s total of 48.
There was, perhaps, an overreliance on their three strikers to score the goals and whenever these players were unavailable or not at their best the team struggled as they didn’t have many goals from midfield or from defence.
It’s hard, though, to criticise Getafe for what they’ve done this season with their limited budget. This was an excellent campaign and the goal for next season must be to try to repeat this, perhaps while improving the squad depth.
