‘We have high hopes of improving the players’ overall fitness in time since they are young’
Javier Agenjo, one of Almería's fitness coaches, talks about his first impressions of the ‘mini pre-season’ ahead of the 2019/20 season resumption
Once the individual and small-group training sessions were finished, the fitness coach of the UD Almería, Javier Agenjo, spoke to the club's official radio station, UDA Radio. Javier Agenjo is getting the players ready, together with Víctor Fortes, towards the return of the SmartBank League behind closed doors. The big question is whether the side will have enough time to get to the next game in great form considering that they are playing games every 72 hours. In this regard, he was emphatic and quite categorical: ‘We have high hopes of improving the players’ overall fitness in time since they are young.’
Agenjo made a brief assessment with regard to the start of the full squad training sessions, ‘the players are fine and coped well with the gradually increased workload.’ He described the performance carried out during the 'mini pre-season' that leads the teams to the last encounters of the 2019/20 season as ‘very positive’. ‘The truth is that I am delighted with the team in general’, he added.
On the other hand, the fitness coach is missing just one thing: ‘It is true that one obvious disadvantage is the lack of those friendly games over the weekend to increase the pace of play.’ This circumstance causes Javier Agenjo to detail the training planning in which he will ‘try to play several games during the week’, in addition to José María Gutiérrez having the opportunity to put ‘tactical drills and exercises that have not been able to work on before’ into practice.
The Almeria’s dressing room are now fully aware that during the remaining eleven matchdays, the routine could be summed up in four actions: ‘playing, recovering, activating and playing again.’ Thus, the Rojiblancos’ fitness coach has got an effective strategy in mind so that he can successfully continue training with those footballers who do not travel to take part in away games and those players who play fewer minutes in a match. In this way, the squad will be fully fit so as to jump onto the pitch ready for action.’