Football Season Guide

Real Betis had a great 2020/21 season, in what was Manuel Pellegrini’s first campaign in charge. They still played possession football for the most part, as they had been doing in recent years, but Pellegrini also brought a degree of pragmatism that saw Real Betis win more matches. It also helped Real Betis that Borja Iglesias found some reliable goalscoring form, turning in more of the many chances that the team’s creative midfielders were creating. The sixth-place finish means that Real Betis will play in the Europa League this season and that may test the squad’s depth, as they didn’t have midweek continental football to contend with last season. They have one of the older squads in the division and probably need to add some more pieces to their squad, even if not to the starting XI. There will be a couple of changes to the starting XI. One is negative as star right-back Emerson has been bought back by Barcelona and there was nothing Real Betis could do about that. One is positive, as they’ve signed Rui Silva to boost the goalkeeping position, which was one of their main weaknesses last campaign. All in all, things are looking good for Real Betis. They had a good year last year and will aim to do so again. They’ll just have to hope they can cope with the extra fixtures that Europa League football entails.