Valencia coach Ruben Baraja defended his players after their defeat at Las Palmas.

Los Che were beaten 2-0 by the islanders on Saturday.

Baraja said: “The evaluation depends on how you look at it. If you look at the result, I am not happy because the result does not reflect what we saw in the match -in terms of what we wanted to work on in the game.

"Football has this thing where, even if you work hard in the game, the opposition can score a goal in the final stages and it almost leaves you without a reaction. That's football. It's time to get back up and think about the next game. The work from the team has been good.

“We have to be self-critical and perhaps we could have been more intense in blocking the crosses. The centre-backs were marking their men and we didn't deserve to concede the goal. It deprived us of scoring at a difficult stadium to visit. Las Palmas got more of a reward than what was seen in the game. In the first meeting, we achieved the 3 points and we did not have very clear superiority either. We have to accept it and focus on the next game."

On Peter Federico's debut, he added: "When players join a team that are already playing, they have to pick up concepts and show what they can do, little-by-little. Today he got to enjoy minutes. He has to quickly accelerate the process of integrating into the team and contributing, because he is a player who can give us things that are different from what we have, and gradually he will show his level."