almost 50 years had past in international european football, and Villarreal had never appeared under the tuesday to thursday lights. the club was founded in 1923. it took them 75 years to first appear in la liga, the spanish first division. but it only lasted one season, and Villareal were back in 2000, the same year when spanish football wrote history with an all spanish Champions League final between Real Madrid and Valencia CF.
europe became a reality for Villarreal even with some poor results in spain: in 2003, they qualified tfor the UEFA Cup because of some luck and fair play in the 2002/03 season, and success in the extinct Intertoto Cup, a qualifier for the UEFA Cup. first round, first match, september 24, 2003. a disappointing 0x0 at home to the fourth force of turkish football, Trabzonspor. but a 3x2 in turkey saw them through to the second round, where Torpedo Moscow was eliminated thanks to a solid 2x0 home win.
a second turkish team, galatasaray, was in their way for the third round. the relalatively new spanish primera liga team had reina in goal (third goalie for this year's world cup team), and the stars sonny anderson, brazilian, and juan riquelme, argentinian. both scored in istanbul for a 2x0 lead, but 2x2 was the final scoreline after 90 minutes. a great result, confirmed at home with a 3x0 win and another goal of each star cited above. Villareal had survived their first european winter and played round of 16 matches in march. josé mari and sonny anderson scored goals to beat Roma, and the italian favorites were at a brink of elimination. but AS Roma managed to score the first two goals in the return match. the team had walter samuel and chivu in their starting line-up, both of them started yesterday's final for internazionale by the way. Roma also had brazilians mancini and emerson in midfield, and totti + cassano up front. but once again sonny anderson decided the game!
quarterfinals for the yellow submarines, as they were being called due to their yellow jerseys. the next matchup was against Celtic, the club which had just eliminated FC Barcelona - why would they not eliminate a much lesser prominent spanish side? Glasgow's sole star was hendrik larsson, swedish hero. and he tied the game in scotland after a Villareal goal early in the game. it looked good for the yellows, should they reach the semifinal in their first european season? yes, they should! sonny anderson scored one of the goals, 2x0, and the semifinals were no dream.
their opponents were favorites, though. fellow spaniards Valencia FC had reached two UEFA Champions League finals in 2000 and 2001, and were a Top 5 club in Europe, at the time. the likes of canizares, pellegrino, ayala, baraja and angulo were in those finals, and they helped their team to a good 0x0 tie in Villareal. and it was enough. palbo aimar, hailed by argentinian press as a possible number 10 for the argentinian team, won the duel against juan ramon riquelme, and Valencia advanced to the final. still, it was a great start into europe for Villareal CF.
once again over the intertoto cup, the club reached UEFA Cup action again, the very next year. it was the first season with a group face, coach manuel pellegrini, who just had a season at Real Madrid, was lucky to get some doable competition in the draw, and a 1x1 draw in rome, against Lazio (with Pandev, who also became CL winner yesterday). Villarreal, now without their former hero sonny anderson (who moved to Barcelona), beat Middlesbrough 2x0 in the decisive match and ended up topping the group. against Dynamo Kiev, a 0x0 was a good result in the Ukraine, and brazilian marcos senna was part of that match's line-up. 2x0 at home, once again the round of 16 was achieved. the expected opponent had been Valencia, where revenge was wished, but the spaniards lost to Steaua Bucharesti, a tradicional club in europe, but with no real recent success, also due to the bosman law. their coach was the star, the legendary italian keeper walter zenga. and the defense worked once more, 0x0 was the final result in Bucaresti. at home, riquelme and jose mari scored, and once again, a 2x0 was a great result to qualify.
in the quarter-final, finally a team was able to score a goal against Villareal - and not only one, but two, and even worse, in spain. and maybe even worse, it wasn't a big team, but AZ Alkmaar, a dutch team which is the 101 team in european history. even with roman riquelmes goal, a 1x2 loss was the disappointing result. and it wasn't to be this time around: Villareal only managed a late 1x1 equalizer in the netherlands, not enough to reach their second UEFA Cup semifinal in two years. still, an impressive start to their history in europe continued.
and at home, things were going great. that same season saw Villareal finish third, behind the two top teams Barcelona (champions) and Real Madrid. the Champions League would now be their destiny!
Benfica Lisbon, OSC Lille, Manchester United - this seemed to be a doable group, Villareal were favorites to get a spot in the round of 16. with new signing diego forlan, striker from uruguay who is a curren Europa League champion and hero, and juan pablo sorin, a 0x0 wasn't a bad start into the tournament against english giants Manchester. although they did play with a one man advantage for the last half an hour after a wayne rooney red card. The 0x0 tie in Lille was an acceptable result, but wins were now needed. and when benfica lisbon (already with the brazilian defender luisão, the portuguese players nuno gomes and petit, runners-up in the euro 2004, and the greek karagounis, euro winner in that same year) also got a tie in villareal, 1x1, things started to look complicated; at least roman riquelme had scored Villareal's first ever goal in the Champions League. at lisbon though, marcos senna scored the winner at the end of the game, and Villareal were bound for the next round. another 0x0, this time in Old Trafford, saw them looking to seal the deal at home - the team had only scored two goals in five matches, but only suffered one. at that didn't change - a 1x0 win against Lille put Villareal top of the table, and Manchester United were out of the tournament.
once again, the draw was favorable to the spaniards. Glasgow Rangers was regarded as the easiest team to beat, and scotland wasn't new to Villareal after the duels against Celtic, a year earlier. riquelme and forlan scored leads, but the Rangers equilised both times. still, the 2x2 draw (which doubled the goals suffered in the tournament) was a great result for the home game, but the Rangers surprised the spaniards with an early goal in spain. the yellow submarine, though, tied the game (their sixth tie in eight matches), remained unbeaten in the european season and arrived at the quarter-finals! what a first three european seasons for the team!
in the round of the best eight, internazionale milan was the opponent, and the spaniards travelled to the guiseppe meazza in the end of march. toldo, cordoba, stankovic, cambiasso and ex-Villareal player samuel still play for the current european champions, and they started against the yellows. adriano and obafemi martins scored twice to come back from forlan's first minute strike - still not a bad result, a 1x2 away. but inter were the favorites to go through.
but Villareal came back! arruabarrena, the man for important goals, scored the sole goal, and the unbeaten run had come to an end in the first leg - but not the clubs run for european glory! even figo's comeback didn't help - Villareal were in the semifinal in their first Champions League attempt! There, Arsenal proved to be to strong. The lineup included names like jens lehmann, robert rires, freddy ljungberg, robin van persie, dennis bergkamp, cesc fabregas, gilberto, touré... and of course thierry henry, the king of london! Villareal wasn't able to score in any of the matches, Toure had the sole goal of 180 minutes. the dream of a second spanish final after 2000 was over (Barcelona went on to beat Arsenal in the final, with a winning strike by Belletti, ex-Villareal).
the team had gone from nothing to a top 15 team in europe in only three years!
2006/07 the club was absent from european action due to a bad run in la liga (to much focus on the Champions League), and 2007/08 was not a good season (neither was 2009/10, by the way). But in 2008, once again Champions League action was in order, and once again, Manchester United was an opponent in the group phase; and, once again, a 0x0 was the result in a game between these two sides (the third such result in three matches). Villareal now had quite a different team, with capdevilla, european champion; edmilson, world-cup experienced brazilian; and robert pires, who came from Arsenal. joseba llorente was also appearing on the scene, he is in spain's world cup squad for this year. the second match was against another old foe, and Celtic lost 0x1 in spain (a marcos senna goal decided it). rossi, italian hope for this world cup, and llorente were the attacking duo. at the end, ManU won the group, but Villareal qualified once again for the round of 16. and once again, the draw was good: panathinaikos should be eliminated, that was the feeling after december's drawing ceremony, but after a 1x1 at home, things looked shaky. gilberto silva, brazilian starter in midfield for this year's world cup, was playing for the greeks - and so was karagounis, who played for the spaniards when their european run started. Villareal did manage a dramatic win in greece, and that 2x1 saw them advance to the quarter-finals - once again to meet Arsenal. and, once again, Arsenal was just too big a matchup. 0x3 in the emirates stadium caused elimination, but it was that season that finally put Villareal into the Top 100 clubs of all time.
this season confirmed it - the spaniards lost twice to the austrians from Red Bull Salzburg, but beat Lazio 4x1 to clinch a spot in the second round. but in the intermediate round, german champions VfL Wolfsburg eliminated the submarines with a 1x4 defeat in the volkswagen city.
the yellow submarine did not manage to qualify tor europe in their first la liga season without pellegrini as a coach, but came close after a good run in the end of the season.
