This was Leganes’ first ever season in La Liga and, as the second smallest team in the top flight, survival was their only goal. It may have taken until the penultimate week of the season, but they secured it. Through the whole year they remained loyal to Asier Garitano, the coach who had won them their historic promotion, and they were rewarded for it. There were some heavy defeats and moments of adversity along the way, not least when they went 11 matches without winning between November and February, but they earned enough victories to keep them afloat. A strong finish, with a 3-0 win over Las Palmas and a 4-0 win over Real Betis then finished the job. It should, though, be noted that survival was ‘cheap’ this year and that their points tally of 35 would rarely have been enough to avoid relegation. It was a blessing, then, that there were three teams even worse than Leganes.
In terms of Leganes’ style of play, they played a variety of formations, often adjusting their tactics to counter the opposition’s strengths. Sometimes this worked and sometimes it didn’t, but their flexibility ultimately helped them to stifle enough teams to survive. In terms of their standout performer, there can be no looking past Gabriel, the attacking midfielder who played in almost every midfield position at some point in the season, even playing as a centre-forward on occasion. He may have only scored five goals, but he was involved in almost everything Leganes did in attack.
