The 46-year-old coach arrived with an excellent reputation, given everything that he achieved at CA Osasuna, where Los Rojillos reached the Copa del Rey final and qualified for Europe in 2022/23.
Now, Arrasate has RCD Mallorca fans dreaming of a European adventure of their own, as they currently sit sixth in the table. The island club qualified for UEFA tournaments four times between 1998 and 2004, but they haven’t reached continental competition since then. They’ll get a taste of going abroad this season when they visit Saudi Arabia for the 2024/25 Spanish Super Cup, having qualified by reaching last season’s Copa del Rey final under Javier Aguirre, but making it back to UEFA competition would be an extraordinary achievement if they can keep up their impressive run.
However, Arrasate, forever the realist, isn’t thinking about European qualification. He adopted a similar approach in the season when CA Osasuna did make it all the way to seventh position to reach the Conference League, and the tactician is taking it game by game at the Estadi Mallorca Son Moix too.
Speaking after their most recent game, a 1-0 win at home against Rayo Vallecano, he said: “It’s just an anecdote that we’re fifth, but not that we already have 17 points. That’s something that does allow us to keep growing. I feel that the team is increasingly comfortable with this way of playing, and I know there’s still room to improve. We have to keep working with the same humility, while understanding that opponents will find it tough to play us.”
For Arrasate, his tenure at RCD Mallorca got off to a great start, as Los Bermellones held defending champions Real Madrid to a 1-1 draw in the first matchday of the season. Their first win didn’t arrive until Matchday 4, when they overcame CD Leganés 1-0 on the road, and that got them up and running. They’ve since achieved five wins in total, also defeating Real Sociedad and Rayo Vallecano at home, as well as Real Betis and Real Valladolid away. Only FC Barcelona and Real Madrid have secured more victories this LALIGA EA SPORTS season than the island club.
It’s testament to Arrasate’s system that RCD Mallorca are in this position, since their great start to the season hasn’t been achieved by any one player in particular standing out. Antonio Raíllo, who has been solid in defence, is the only footballer to have played every minute through the first 10 matchdays. No player has more than two goals, with Valery Fernández, Dani Rodríguez and Vedat Muriqi each on that number. And, at the back, the goalkeeping role has been shared by Dominik Greif and Leo Román, who have played seven and three games each.
The players deserve immense credit too for adapting to this new system. After mastering the art of a back five under Aguirre, RCD Mallorca have now switched to a system based on a back four. When Arrasate arrived, he insisted that he wanted to make the transition as easy as possible for the players and it seems to be working.
As he said in the summer: “I want to bring my nuances and my way of seeing football. I want my team to be recognisable, something I oversaw in previous years and which I’d now like to see at RCD Mallorca. This is a team that is already settled and that is already a good team. I’m going to try to lead the team to an even higher level, aware that this is a tough ask, but we are motivated.”
After 10 matchdays, this team is reaching new heights in the LALIGA EA SPORTS table, and perhaps this is only the beginning.