LaLiga: Ferran Torres returns to face former club Valencia as Barcelona eye top-4 spot

Barcelona visits Valencia in a Spanish league match wedged between its Europa League tie with Napoli. Xavi Hernández’s team was held 1-1 by the Italian side in their first leg of the playoffs this week, when Barcelona wasted several scoring chances at Camp Nou. 

Barcelona needs a win at Mestalla Stadium to restore its hold on fourth place in the league after both Atlético Madrid and Villarreal moved ahead on Saturday. Barcelona defenders Gerard Pique and Dani Alves are both suspended for the game. 

On Sunday, both Ferran Torres and Ilaix Moriba will face their respective former teams. As they have a reunion with their former clubs, take a look at five individuals who have represented both, Barcelona and Valencia.

David Villa

Few players manage to become legends at two different clubs, but that’s exactly what David Villa did at both Valencia and Barcelona. The Asturian striker landed at Mestalla in 2005 at the age of 23 and proceeded to score 129 goals for the club over the subsequent five seasons, becoming the fifth-top scorer in the club’s history.

He had long been linked with a transfer away from the Mestalla and eventually made a move to Barcelona in 2010, the summer in which he played a starring role as Spain won the World Cup in South Africa. If success came quick and fast to him at Valencia, it came even quicker at the Camp Nou where he won LaLiga Santander title and the Champions League in his first season.

Jordi Alba

Jordi Alba may have graduated from Valencia’s academy but he actually started his footballing education off at Barcelona’s La Masia academy. After being released by the side from the Catalan capital, he moved to Cornellà and then on to Valencia, where he broke into the first team as one of the most promising wide players in world football.

Following three very impressive seasons in the Valencia first team, during which he mastered the transition from left winger to left-back, he was purchased by Barcelona and has been flying up their left flank to great effect ever since.   

Paco Alcácer

Paco Alcácer starred at Valencia before moving to Barcelona in 2016 and spending two seasons in Catalonia. Born in the Valencia suburbs, Alcácer joined his childhood club’s academy as a young boy and rose through the ranks before making his first-team debut at the tender age of 17. He went on to score 43 times in 124 appearances, earning the club captaincy, before joining Barcelona. 

At the Camp Nou he managed a very useful minutes-per-goal ratio of one strike every 153 minutes and helped his side win back-to-back Copa del Rey titles and one LaLiga Santander championship.

Gaizka Mendieta

The retired Spain international Gaizka Mendieta made his name at Valencia, representing the east coast club from 1992 to 2001, most famously winning the 1999 Copa del Rey and scoring one of the tournament’s best-ever goals in the final against Atlético de Madrid. 

From there, the Basque-born player became the most expensive Spanish player of all time when he moved to Italian side Lazio before moving back to LaLiga with Barcelona on loan.

André Gomes

André Gomes made his journey to the Premier League via Valencia and Barcelona. The Portuguese midfielder moved from Benfica to Valencia in the summer of 2014 and enjoyed two impressive seasons with Los Che. 

After winning Euro 2016 with Portugal, he signed for Barcelona later that July and spent two years at the Camp Nou, winning four trophies before heading to the Premier League.

Ronald Koeman (as coach)

The former Barcelona coach is a club institution, having starred in Johan Cruyff’s Dream Team in the early 1990s and scored the winning goal in the 1992 European Cup final. Following his retirement at the turn of the century he was long touted as a future Barcelona coach, but it was with Valencia that he made his first foray into LaLiga management. 

Koeman took over at Mestalla in 2007 with the club in institutional turmoil, but still led the side to the 2008 Copa del Rey title in his only season at the club. Twelve years later the Dutchman finally took the reins at Barcelona, again leading the club to a Copa del Rey title in his first season in the job. 

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